“Israel Is Meant for Me”: Kindergarteners’ Conceptions of Israel

From the Mouths of Children: Widening the Scope and Shifting the Focus of Understanding the Relationships Between American Jews and Israel

“…to playful (e.g., "If you were visited by someone from another planet, someone who spoke English and understood everything you were saying but really didn't know anything about life on Earth, how would you explain to them what it means to be Israeli? "), they always allow children to identify for adults the concepts salient to their conceptions of Israel (e.g., the tensions between Israel as a safe haven for Jews and a place often engaged in violent conflict) and exclude those that are not (e.g., the tensions between Israel as a Jewish state and Israel as a democratic state) (Zakai 2015).…”

“…Though there have been studies about the practices of teaching about Israel in Jewish day and supplementary schools (e.g., Grant 2007;Pomson et al 2009;Pomson et al 2014) and about the ways that Jewish preteens and teens perceive of Israel (e.g., Pomson 2012;Pomson et al 2014;Hassenfeld 2016Hassenfeld , 2018, American Jewish children's experiences of Israel and Israel education have been generally overlooked (cf. Zakai 2015). Children, defined throughout this article not under a legal framework as minors under age 18, but with a socio-cultural frame as those who have not yet reached adolescence, are rarely included as research participants.…”