West Hempstead program injects kids with taste of Judaica

Since 1991 the Pearl Greene Sunday Morning Smile Program has provided fun, learning and — most of all — smiles to special needs children in the West Hempstead area.

Rabbi Moshe Gottesman and a team of teachers and teenage volunteers have worked to provide a warm, non-threatening and nurturing Jewish environment for children who might not otherwise have one. The program services children with down syndrome, autism and other developmental disabilities who are in public school and would have no other opportunity to be in a yeshiva setting if not for this program.

Students learn davening, the aleph bet, the parsha and the halachos and minhagim of the various Jewish holidays. The boys even put on tefillin with the help of the teenage volunteers who give up their Sundays to help out.

“There’s such a sense of connection. They learn the parsha a week in advance so at the Shabbos table they’ll know what it’s all about like their siblings and counsins who go to yeshiva,” Annalee Ickowics, who has been a teacher at the Smile Program for 25 years and currently serves as the program’s director said. “The kids say they go to yeshiva because they do!”

While enrollment in the program isn’t free, Rabbi Gottesman has made it clear that he wants to help as many children as possible and that parents can pay what they’re able to. The Smile Program also holds fundraisers such as the Cupcake Kumzitz and their cookbook. Donations are always welcome.

“The kids meld together so beautifully, it’s like a bouquet of flowers is growing in HANC,” Ickowics said.

The Sunday Morning Smile Program runs from 9 to 11 every Sunday during the public school year and is open to children from the ages of four to 17.

For more information, visit sundaysmiles.webs.com or call Annalee Ickowics at 516-486-0918.