Bar/Bat Mitzvah Basics 2/E A Practical Family Guide to Coming of Age Together [Hardcover]

How to manage the process with grace, joy and good sense.

A practical guide that gives parents and teens the how-to information they need to navigate the bar/bat mitzvah process and grow as a family through this experience. For the first time in one book, everyone directly involved offers practical insights into how the process can be made easier and more enjoyable for all. Rabbis, cantors and Jewish educators from the Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist movements, parents, and even teens speak from their own experience.
What's it all about?
Preparation for Parent and Child
Tutoring, stress, expectations, enjoyment, planning for children with special needs
Negotiating the ceremony and celebration
Designing a creative service, heightening the spiritual exercise, special issues related to divorced and interfaith families, planning a party that neither breaks the bank nor detracts from the inherent spirituality of the event.

Acknowledgments xiii
Foreword xv
Rabbi Jeffrey K. Salkin
Preface xix
Rabbi Julie Gordon
Introduction xxi
Cantor Helen Leneman

Section I: What's Bar/Bat Mitzvah All About? 1
1 Bar/Bat Mitzvah Basic Elements: Start to Finish 3
Cantor Helen Leneman
2 What Parents Should Know Before the Bar/Bat Mitzvah Ceremony 15
Susie Tatarka
3 Passing the Bar (or Bat) Mitzvah: Setting Clear and Realistic Expectations for Everyone 21
Cantor Marshall Portnoy
4 A Guide for the Perplexed Parent: How to Ask the Right Questions about Preparation 33
Cantor Helen Leneman
5 The Parents' Rite of Passage 43
Rabbi Susan B. Stone
6 Ritual Magic and Family Drama: Finding New Meaning in an Old Story 47
Dr. Judith Davis
7 To a Religiously Skeptical Jewish Parent 57
Rabbi Jeffrey K. Salkin

Section II: The FalÍ