YOUR MISSION
April 15, Friday night, and April 16, Saturday night, we will celebrate the two PESACH SEDARIM (“Seder” in singular). These will probably be the two of the most important nights of the year. During those nights we will fulfill a very special Mitsva: והגדת לבנך, telling our children the story of Pesach: Our history. Our beginnings. Our identity. To do that we have to recite and “teach” the Hagada to our children and our guests. During these two nights, we become educators. And masters of ceremonies. As such, we need to organize and program the Seder in advance!
A few tips.
DIVIDE AND CONQUER
My first recommendation is to divide the Hagada, so that everyone, children, family members, and guests, participate of the Seder. This is essential to capture and maintain the attention of our audience.
For that, we must do our homework ASAP.
1. First we have to divide the Hagada into sections or texts, like, “Abadim hayinu”, “The 4 sons,” “The 10 Plagues”, etc.
2. Once you divide the Hagada, you have to decide who can be the best candidate for each part of the Hagada. “Ma Nishtana” for example, is obviously a must for the kids. “The 4 sons” can be read, translated and / or explained by an adult. “The 10 plagues” can be played by children and adults, etc.
3. Once we are clear about our strategy for the Seder we have to text or WhatsApp asap to our guests and assign them the part of the Hagada we want them to read or explain.
For adults, for example, you may want to ask them to prepare a paragraph of the Hagada in Hebrew and English, and briefly discuss some of the ideas of the text. We should recommend them to search material for these texts, asking Rabbis, Tora scholars, and / or searching online). Apart from preparing the texts, adults can also present some interesting subjects such as “Why do drink 4 glasses of wine?, Why do we eat reclined? What does the Haroset represent” ?. etc. YOU CAN USE OUR WEBSITE FOR MANY OF THESE TOPICS: See here
Young children should be asked to sing (and perhaps explain) parts of the Hagada that are usually sung, as “Ma nishtana” or “Had Gadya”, etc. A good idea is to ask younger children, from 3 to 7 years old, to draw (before Pesah) some parts of the Hagada, bring their drawings to the Seder, and explain to their audience the significance of their artwork. This will make them feel very important.
THE SEDER MUST NOT BE BORING
The most important goal of the night is to engage the children. Ideally, they should remain awake “willingly” until the end of the Seder.
We try to achieve this by keeping the AFIQOMAN, and the prizes, for the end of the night.
Children should act and play certain parts of the Hagada, for example, the ten plagues. To make “visible” the 10 plagues we can bring plastic frogs, animal masks, ping pong balls for “hail”, black sunglasses for “darkness”, etc.
Organize educational games for children, apart from Afiqoman, like a Pesach treasure hunt. But the game has to be brief and limited to the place where the Seder is taking place. I also recommend, especially when there are many children in the Seder, to have 10-20 simple questions and answers ready, with small prizes, to reward the correct answers. Each time the Seder is about to spin out of control or is getting bored, or when everyone’s attention is needed, you can ask one of those questions, showing the prize first. In that way, you will regain control over the Seder whenever necessary. Examples of questions: “Who can say the 10 plagues? What was the name of Moshe’s Rabbenu’s grandfather? Who can mention three foods that are Hamets?”
THE SECRET:
The secret for a successful Seder is “anticipation and preparation”. We cannot improvise and divide the texts at the Seder night, or expect our guests to participate in an intelligent way, spontaneously, without giving them time to prepare.
Start TODAY, divide the Seder, knowing in advance who will be your guests, divide the roles, organize the plays, the texts, the songs, ask the children to do the drawings, buy the ping-pong balls, etc. and write to your guests and family, describing their specific mission.
