A leading educator urged local teachers to think “outside the box” in combating negative media images of Israel and the Jewish community’s own obsolete “paradigms” about Zionism.

Alex Sinclair, chair of the education department and assistant professor of Jewish education at the Jewish Theological Seminary, spoke to 180 religious school instructors at the 23rd annual Teacher Learning Conference.

The conference, sponsored by the Partnership for Jewish Learning and Life, a new agency of United Jewish Communities of MetroWest NJ, was held Aug. 29 at the Alex Aidekman Family Jewish Community Campus in Whippany.

Prior to his keynote address, Sinclair told NJ Jewish News that the Jewish educational system needed to start thinking “outside the box,” moving away from “the old paradigms where we view Zionism and the connection with Israel as a response to criticism, a response to crisis, a response to poverty.”

Instead, he said, teachers should be “looking at ways to create proactive positive engagement with Israel through things like culture, through conversation, through dialogue, through interaction, and through Jewish vision.”

Reiterating his theme to the audience, Sinclair told the educators that their top goal should be to encourage students and their families to visit the Jewish state.

“The only way to really understand Israel is to go there,” he said.

And yet, he said, young people may be hesitant to go to Israel because they are constantly getting signals that Israel is a nation in dire straits, which, in turn, makes Zionism a difficult selling point.

“We are training them to think this way,” he said. As an example, he cited a young man who raised money for Israeli school children as his bar mitzva project, based on his perception through Web sites and donation appeals that left him with the erroneous impression that “most [Israelis] are too poor to buy school supplies.”

Sinclair acknowledged that Israel has real needs, including unemployed immigrants and senior citizens living in poverty. Constant exposure to appeals on Israelis’ behalf, however, blurs the message there are many wonderful aspects to Israeli life.

He urged the teachers to concentrate on reaching their students through Israeli culture.

“The kids you work with day in and day out are interested in music,” Sinclair said. “They have a choice: Jewish or non-Jewish. Why not nudge them toward Jewish if the teacher can find an appropriate Israeli artist?”

He noted that several popular Israeli musicians — whose message is not necessarily religious — incorporate Jewish themes in their work.

“In the past several years, there have been some really fascinating changes in what’s going on,” said Sinclair. “A lot of newer artist are doing music in a way that’s engaging Judaism, with religious texts, with Jewish heritage….”

Creating this connection could make the students of today the philanthropists of tomorrow. “If we can give people a positive and profoundly beautiful, exciting, powerful Zionist identity, the money will take care of itself,” he said.

Following Sinclair’s presentation, the teachers attended workshops covering such topics as teaching about Israel through music and the arts and for specific grade levels, holidays, Israel, and Hebrew language skills.