Chicago Duo Join Lamplighters

By COLlive reporter

Lamplighters Yeshivah, a chassidic school in Crown Heights that specializes in child-directed education, is joining forces with a couple that will help them create a Montessori environment.

Rivkah Schack and her husband R’ Moshe Schack, the Lubavitch couple who co-founded the Torah Montessori School in Chicago, IL, will take the helm of the school’s leadership in the 5773 school year.

They will serve as Co-Educational Directors for this small, but growing school, COLlive was told.

Montessori education, which has been adopted by many Chabad House preschools, emphasizes independence, freedom within limits, and respect for a child’s natural psychological development.

In 2005, the Schacks sold a successful accounting business to found a school for their own children, who were not thriving in normative Jewish Schools.

They passed a Master’s of Education program and attended preschool and elementary Montessori training in Chicago at the Midwest Montessori Teacher Training Center.

They have been using Montessori materials with children in small group lessons combined with independent work tailored to the child’s level. They have also developed an innovative Judaic curriculum that includes benchmark assessments to measure their students’ success in learning.

“When people said it couldn’t be done– especially in such an established community such as Chicago — the Schacks didn’t give up,” says Yocheved Sidof of Lamplighters.

“They were, and still are, driven by connecting each child to Torah and Chassidishkeit “al pi darko” — the way Jewish, Chassidic education was always meant to be.”

Sidof said she was thrilled to bring the Schacks’ success and knowledge to Lamplighters by co-directing the school, beginning with the first New York Jewish training program in Montessori principles and techniques in the summer of 2012.

To learn more about the Schacks, their innovative curriculum and about the school, Lamplighters is holding an Open House on Monday, April 23 (If you cannot make this date, they will be having upcoming Open Houses on May 13 and June 3).

7:30 pm- for parents of 3-5 yr olds by Sept, 2012
8:30 pm- for parents of 1st graders by Sept 2012

Their address is 644 Eastern Parkway between Brooklyn and New York, ground floor. Preschool, ages 3-5, boys and girls and for first grade – boys only.

To RSVP (space is limited), contact [email protected]