• Differentiated bar/bat mitzvah training: both special needs and enrichment
  
• Family Education classes – Jewish education comes alive!
  
• Creative experiential writing, including Dvar Torah composition and presentation
  
• Long distance learning through telephone and Skype

Aliya Cheskis-Cotel is a creative educator who has taught students ranging from age 7 to 70. In addition to making Family Education classes available for parents and children together, she specializes in alternative Jewish tutoring and Bar/Bat Mitzvah training for all students. Whether your child needs high-level enrichment or has learning-challenges, Aliya can tailor a course of study that will be both engaging and fun. She is committed to the belief that every child, regardless of his or her learning style or formal Jewish background, should be able to have a fulfilling and meaningful Bar/Bat Mitzvah experience. Aliya even teaches students throughout the U.S. by Skype. She also teaches guitar and modern spoken Hebrew.

Please see the latest article on her work in The Jewish Week. Click here.

Aliya has a masters degree in education from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and has taught at the Abraham Joshua Heschel School in New York City. She is a recipient of the Joseph Gruss Award for Teaching Excellence. Most recently, Aliya was the Director of Congregational Learning at East End Temple in New York City. But beyond her four decades of classroom curriculum development and teaching experience, she loves working one-on-one with students to help make Judaism come alive. Aliya brings her passion for the arts and music into each lesson, whether it means exploring the week's parsha through creative writing and art, or helping a kid make the connection between Harry Potter and the teachings of the sages.

About Aliya

When Aliya began teaching my oldest son, he immediately became engaged in and excited with the work he was doing with her. Within the context of his learning, among many other things, he was learning or writing new songs on the guitar, writing diary entries in the name of biblical characters, drawing and creating multi-media art of midrashim and holiday experiences. When they studied for his bar mitzvah together, the entire year was tailor-made for his learning in an out-of-the-box way that suited him perfectly. Our second son worked with Aliya through his challenges to produce an outstanding devar Torah and creation and delivery of a personal poem that members of the congregation still talk about. And our third son studied an amazing amount of source material with Aliya and completed Haftorah, Torah, Devar Torah and a brilliant interpretation of the Torah portion seen through the eyes of his pet cat. Aliya took three completely different children with different needs, learning styles and circumstances and guided them with a sensitivity and innate sense of who they were as individuals and learners.

-Rabbi Leana Moritt

We met Aliya just in the nick of time! It was only a few months before the Bat Mitzvah and we felt woefully unprepared! Thanks to Aliya not only did a true understanding of the Parsha (Bible portion) develop but an authentic connection to the Jewish religion and the Jewish people was fused. These lessons enriched our daughter’s education and she and Aliya remain friends to this day.

--Neva Small