If you’ve taken the stairs next to the elevator anytime since Pesach (Passover) break, you’ll have been accompanied with each step up the winding staircase by a creative daily Counting of the Omer (49-day Jewish practice connecting Passover to Shavuot). Each day a colorful new poster, made by middle school students and teachers, appeared with a fun play on each number we’ve counted along this 49-day journey from Pesach to Shavuot. Their presence reminds us with each step upwards that we are anticipating the arrival of Shavuot, our celebration of the Revelation of the Torah at Sinai long ago, and all of the wisdom–the torah–that we’ve acquired since then.

Shavuot is nearly here, beginning tomorrow evening at sundown. We’ve been celebrating at school by drawing on many different traditions for the holiday. In Nursery and JK, we sing and dance with the Torah and bring flowers and bikkurim (first fruits offerings) to decorate our spaces, as SK celebrates and showcases their learning over the last three years with their milestone Bikkurim event this evening. Lower School and Middle School experienced a mini Tikkun Leil Shavuot (all-night Torah study on the first night of Shavuot), as we worked to literally reveal hidden words of Torah and interpret them together. And, per the custom of eating dairy and celebrating the sweetness of Torah, we all got to enjoy a sweet ice cream treat!

Shavuot’s emphasis on the gift of Torah and its timeless wisdom, coupled with the approaching end of the school year, invites all of us to look back on the learning and the wisdom revealed over the course of this year: the skills acquired, the passions discovered, and the emotional lessons learned. All of this learning—whether anticipated or unexpected, delightful or difficult—is part of the Torah that shapes us and guides us along our next unfolding chapters. That which we learn and internalize is a gift that we get to keep for our whole lives, a gift that no one can take away from us. In Proverbs 6:22, we read regarding Torah, "When you walk, it will lead you, when you lie down, it will watch over you. When you awake, it will speak with you.” As you and your children reflect on all of this year’s incredible learning, consider which pieces of acquired wisdom continue to speak to you. What makes those voices come to life, and what do they sound like? What does that wisdom teach you to do in the world? 

As we celebrate all of the torah that guides us along our journeys this Shavuot, may our mouths be quick to share our own wisdom, and may our ears be ever-open to the wisdom that comes from each person we meet, because each one of us, from the youngest to the oldest, has important torah to teach.