Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar dedicated a new Bible education center at the Aseh Chail School in Efrat. The center turns Bible learning into a sensory experience, allowing children who visit to touch and see materials that take them back to Biblical times.
The center is divided into activity areas that connect to the Bible through subjects like archaeology, geography, drama and music. Visiting schoolchildren get to know the Bible stories and characters through these activities. In order to get the visitors into the proper Biblical mindset, and to make the experience more memorable and exciting, they don Biblical garb immediately upon entering the center.
The center is named 'Atnachta' – a Hebrew word that means “a respite” and that letters that form the acronym “Tanach,” or Bible.
Connecting to the morality
The center was designed by stage designer Hugo Guez, whose works include the recent reconstruction of ancient structures at Masada. It is designed to give visitors a feeling that they have entered another world and time. When students learn about the journey of Israelites through the Sinai Desert, for instance, they are asked to prepare accessories that will help them walk on the hot sand using only materials that are available in the desert. They act, create art, play and bring the past alive.
Ruthy Mark, initiator and manager of Atnachta, told Arutz Sheva's Hebrew news that while there is no substitute for regular book-based studies, “the learning center brings the Bible to students in an experiential and exciting way that will cause them to connect to the message, the morality, the personal lesson and the period.”