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Jewish home schooling increasing in popularity
Squeezed into a child’s seat, Nora Lavender, mother of two young sons, sits across from her oldest, 7-year-old Shalom Yehuda, at a small wooden table in a corner of an office in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, leading him through spelling lessons. In the background are the sounds of children at play, which mother and son ignore.
Shalom Yehuda, his kipa featuring a soccer ball design, aces this afternoon’s spelling lesson. His reward is a Harry Potter sticker, which he adds to the growing collection in his workbook.
The two are in the waiting room at Sensory Freeway Therapy Services, a therapy center that treats children with a wide variety of special needs and where Lavender’s youngest son, 3-year-old Dovid Efraim, comes several days a week for treatment for mild cerebral palsy.
The setting is also a school for Shalom Yehuda.
The Lavenders are home schoolers, which for them means education that takes place at home, in therapy centers, museums, parks or other places where they can carry some books. While Dovid Efraim gets therapy, Shalom Yehuda learns; Sensory Freeway has become as familiar to the family as their living room.
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