Published: 31 August 2020
Last updated: 4 March 2024
KATE DODSON KNEW LITTLE about Judaism and even less about the Yiddish language when she arrived at the Sholem Aleichem College pre-school for a casual shift as an integration aide.
She had almost finished a nursing degree but that early experience of working with children was enough to change her career trajectory entirely.
“I just fell in love with kids and being around kids,” she says.
For Kate, who is not Jewish, being surrounded by Yiddish culture was entirely foreign. She grew up in suburban Wantirna after moving to Australia from the English town of Bedford when she was eight years old.
“It was so far from the bagel belt,” she says. “I had no idea about Yiddish language or Yiddish culture at all.”
In 2007 Kate went back to university to study early childhood education as she settled into work at Sholem Aleichem, which is considered the only secular Jewish school in the world where Yiddish is taught every day.
While working in the pre-school Kate gradually became more comfortable with Yiddish and started to feel the lure of the language and culture.
“I just really connected with it. I love the traditions and I love the stories and culture behind it. I think that’s a huge part of why I’m at the school.”
I should declare that Kate taught both my young children at the Sholem Aleichem pre-school and I loved the energy and warmth she brought to her kinder room.
But last year I noticed Kate dropping the occasional Yiddish phrase. “Vash di hentelech”, I heard her say as I dropped off my son, reminding the children to wash their hands.
She was absorbing the language through the songs, games and lessons taught to the children by the Yiddish teacher.
Earlier this year, during Melbourne’s first round of coronavirus restrictions, Kate enrolled in an online Yiddish course with two colleagues from Sholem Aleichem and other students from Poland, Russia, The Netherlands and Israel.
The course was offered through the Centre for Yiddish Culture, which is based in Warsaw. The Kadimah Jewish Cultural Centre in Melbourne offered three scholarships to the course and they were snapped up by staff at Sholem Aleichem, including Kate.
The three-week intensive course involved three hours of classes each night after work. There was also homework including crosswords, poems and basic language exercises.
Over the three weeks Kate managed to learn the alphabet and by the end of the course she could slowly read simple texts. Pronouncing some words was tricky but not insurmountable with some persistence.
“To try and wrap your tongue around some sounds is almost like retraining your tongue.”
Kate plans to keep studying and hopes to do another Yiddish course.
She loves the idea of helping to secure the future of the Yiddish language by sharing what she’s learned with the children.
“Even if it’s a small part of helping to continue the Yiddish culture I’m happy with that.”
Kate aims to reach a level of proficiency that will allow her to read to the children in Yiddish.
“I’ve had instances where children have brought me a book in Yiddish and asked me to read it,” she says. “I want to be able to do that.”
One of Kate’s Yiddish teachers in the course was also not Jewish, proving it is not necessary to be Jewish to love and maybe even master the Yiddish language.
Kate now recognises Yiddish phrases on television shows. She listens to the music of Melbourne Yiddish band The Bashevis Singers and finds herself getting teary in some of the songs.
“You can hear the emotion in the language and you can feel the meaning behind it.”
Kate can understand why Yiddish has had an influence on popular culture, particularly in America. And she believes a non-Jewish background should be no barrier to embracing the language.
“Yiddish is a Jewish language but it belongs to everybody.”
Ben Preiss is on the board of the Sholem Aleichem College
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Photo: Kate Dodson teaching students in the classroom (Ben Preiss)
