his mother’s milk, in the child’s mother tongue, in Yiddish. In this way, the
children’s kitchens became schools, and during the breaks the children would
be fed breakfast and lunches.
But Jewish society was not yet ready for that sort of school. There was
a shortage of pedagogically trained Yiddish teachers and a shortage of Yiddish
textbooks. The teachers had an extremely difficult and responsible task. After
the war, teachers’ conferences and consultations began to take place with the
goal of creating suitable textbooks, devising programmes, and creating higher-
education establishments for teachers and educators. And Roza was everywhere.
She was seen everywhere and her influential opinions were heard
everywhere. She took part in the first conference of Yiddish secular schools
in the Polish Republic. She was an administrator of the Froebel²⁹⁹ courses in
Vilna. She was involved in the Yiddish Teacher-training Seminar in Vilna
and gave classes and lectures on pedagogical topics. She contributed to various
pedagogical journals. Her care for the Jewish child was evidenced in every
word she spoke and wrote.
But in 1923, at the height of her involvement in her work, Roza Symchowicz
left Poland because she lacked citizenship papers. She spent 3 years in Vienna
and Berlin and in 1926 returned to Poland, and took pains to acquire Polish
citizenship. She then resumed her beloved work with Yiddish secular education
which had been interrupted. [4] She was invited to collaborate with the
Central Yiddish School Organisation (TSYSHO) which had its headquarters
in Warsaw and which administered all the secular Yiddish schools in Poland.
Roza Symchowicz’s task was to visit all the schools in the provinces. She also
worked in the pedagogical section of the Institute for Jewish Research (YIVO),
helped organise school exhibitions, and continued to contribute to pedagogical
journals. It was precisely all this that turned her thoughts again to the unfortunate,
underprivileged child. Whilst in Warsaw she concerned herself with
and raised funds for poor, mentally handicapped children in Vilna who were
being raised in a special institution. When, in 1937, an international teachers
conference was held in Paris, the School Organisation sent Roza Symchowicz
there as their delegate. In superb French she spoke of the Yiddish schools and
299 Friedrich Wilhelm Fröbel (Froebel, 1782–1852), German pedagogue, theoretician, and leading creator of pre-school education schemes, based on principles of humanism.
