At age 13 for boys and 12 for girls, Jewish kids are held responsible for their deeds. Prior to this, their parents are responsible for what they do.
This is the age at which the bar mitzvah ceremony is held for boys. There was no equivalent tradition for girls and the Orthodox community still does not have one. However, the Reform congregations and most Conservative congregations have created a bat mitzvah ceremony for girls (pronounced bath mitzvah in Ancient Hebrew).
The Orthodox do not allow women to read from the Torah in public, or to count in a minyan--a quorum of twelve Jews that is sufficient to hold a religious service.
Children train for the bar/bat mitzvah, some for many years. They learn Jewish law and the Hebrew language (enough to read passages from the Torah in special editions with the vowels written in), and take on a project that demonstrates their adulthood, such as volunteering at a shelter for humans or animals. The whole point of the ceremony is to demonstrate that they truly are adults, who want to, deserve to, and are able to be responsible for what they do.
Jewish parents who are not very devout in their religion nonetheless usually prepare their children for bar and bat mitzvah, at least with an abbreviated course of study of six months. They want them to be good citizens.
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