Instructor’s Guide

What we adjust is: 1) the depth to which we explain the hows and whys of the language during the lecture portion of the class, and 2) the number of hours we require students to translate each week. For example:

Standard Three- to Four-Credit Class:

With the exception of the first two weeks, which involve more lecture time, we cover a grammar chapter in the first 30 to 45 minutes of class time each week with the rest of the class hours devoted to reading text. Outside the classroom, we require five hours per week spent on the translation homework in addition to studying vocab and grammar. (When state standards required five-credit hours for first-year language classes, we had additional time for “Fun Friday” activities (see Additional Classroom Activities): reading from Tall Tales Told in Biblical Hebrew, guided sight-readings from Scripture, etc.)

Standard Two-Credit Class:

Every program has unique features, and this grammar intentionally allows space for that. In a two-hour setting, require three hours of translation each week while continuing to move on to a new chapter every week. Cover the grammar at the pace of one chapter per week but simplify some of the explanations. For students who need to understand how things work, that information can still be found in the grammar. For translation assignments, drop the book of Jonah (and its vocabulary) and slow the reading of Ruth to half-pace. When we did this, we had vocab quizzes every other week (half the vocabulary) and read Ruth through twice—once at a slow pace and a second time (using their previous translations) at a rate of one chapter per week.

Blended Classroom:

Another option is a blended classroom format, but we have not experimented with that yet. Because the LBH grammar is written with the self-learner in mind, we suspect that this textbook may work well in a blended format setting. However, we personally prefer to review the grammar concepts in class.

Grammar: 30 to 60 minutes per Week (including time to take a quiz)

If you keep the main elements of the chapter in focus, you can adjust the depth at which you discuss the details. (See lecture notes by chapter and additional classroom activities.) Remember, the grammar is written in a communicative style and the students can read it on their own. Let them take responsibility for some of their own learning and flesh out the specific features when you interact with the text in class.

Reading and Translation: All Remaining Course Time

Since the objective of learning Hebrew is to read the biblical text, we have found that the greatest incentive is to begin translating as early and as much as possible. Above all else, be sure you have the students read and translate the text. This element is counterintuitive to teachers who have learned through a different model. Always have your students read the text aloud in class (except when you are extremely pressed for time, but even then as much as possible). Reading aloud is the only way students will come to understand the text in Hebrew. It also creates a “safe” platform to make mistakes (imperative for language learning), and it gives a chance for the instructor to see what the student is assimilating.

Note: We represent two very different teaching styles and personalities. Karl’s tendency is to present short, academic lectures and Becky’s tendency is to strive for full comprehension of grammar before moving to the text. For the sake of our students, we both had to strive for a more balanced approach. Becky had to explain less and read more (in fact, some weeks students were so tired that she just showed the chart they needed to memorize and moved on). Karl had to learn to slow down and flesh out some of his explanations. We went from a program where students could either read or parse, depending on who taught their first-year course, to a program where students had well-rounded skill sets. They read enough to keep reading and understood enough grammar to find answers to what stumped them. In other words, they were equipped to be lifelong learners of Hebrew—regardless of their field of study or future career.

Instructors and students sometimes worry about the amount of vocabulary assigned. Keep in mind that the concentration of learning occurs when students read the text. Without vocabulary acquisition, reading slows to a grinding halt after only a few weeks. Remind your students that the overall objective is short-term memory, not immediate mastery. If you are concerned about the amount of vocabulary, consider adjusting the weight you place on it while grading or adjust the way you test it. For example, we provide Hebrew words and only require the students to provide English definitions. Though we test vocabulary cumulatively, we place more weight on words from the most recent vocabulary list (see Tips for Quizzing). Since the goal is short-term retention, you might also consider matching quizzes. (When we tried that approach, we found that students got lazy and did not end up with adequate short-term memory. Thus, we keep our requirements higher but adjust how vocabulary affects their grade.) Do not panic if your students are overwhelmed. Just coach them on study practices, remind them of the rewards, and reassure them that your grading intentionally focuses on finding the balance between incentive (study!) and reward for the pursuit of knowledge.

Note: All infrequent vocabulary is glossed for the student in the translation. The disadvantage to this system is that there are some frequently used words that do not appear in the Joseph narrative. We add those words in the second semester lists so that by the end of first year, the student has memorized all verbs that occur 50 times or more and all nouns that occur 100 times or more.

We require the grammar exercises to be completed in the following format: 1) study the concept; 2) complete the assignment in pencil; 3) correct the assignment in pen; and finally, 4) highlight what they do not understand. We do not always get to review the assignments in class (reading the text trumps everything), but a teacher or a teaching assistant can answer the highlighted questions when reviewing the assignment. You may decide to review a few of the exercises in class if the whole group is struggling.

The translation assignments target what is known as the zone of proximal development (a concept developed by Lev Vygotsky). In other words, the translations provide the student with enough guidance to read just beyond what they currently know. Adjusting expectations so that homework is not a measure of performance, but a learning experience, is one of the secrets to student success. Since the objective is to gain exposure to texts, and through that to concepts in context, we encourage instructors to adopt certain guidelines for their students. (See pages 79–80 in the LBH Workbook.)

Adopt an acceptable time limit

Although some students will complete an entire translation, in our program, students are given full credit for spending five hours per week on their translation work regardless of how many verses they translate. Aside from relieving the students of excess work, this limit recognizes that everyone learns to read at a different pace. It also allows a teacher to gauge a student’s progress. Remember that there are times in the semester when they will all slow down, such as after the introduction of the different verb stems.

Require students to correct their own work

The time limit you choose (five hours a week in our program) includes time spent correcting their work against the answer key provided in the workbook. As noted in the workbook instructions (see pages 79–80), this process involves three steps: 1) complete the work in one color; 2) fill in blanks and/or correct their work in another color; and 3) use a highlighter to mark what they corrected but still do not understand. If possible, they are to word their question in the margin, but many students do not have vocabulary to express their confusion yet.

Note: The key to success in this process is helping students accept the foreign concept that you are not judging them based on what they “got right” on the first try, but rather on their engagement with the material. (An overflow of this principle is that if their performance is not based on initial accuracy or on quantity, you slowly remove any temptation to cut corners or to cheat. The student is then free to learn, even if it slows down the process.)

Move on to a new translation each week

In the first semester, we do not get to cover the entire chapter in class. However, since the translations are created by taking biblical texts and adjusting it to the students’ growing exposure to grammar, moving to the next chapter provides even more advantage than if they just completed the last chapter. Think of it as learning a language through immersion; while you only catch part of the conversation in the beginning, you grasp more and more with each exposure. Also the freedom to move on lessens the students’ feeling of being behind.

Grading the homework assignments

The homework is awarded full credit if the three steps are fulfilled and if the lesson is either completed or the student spends adequate time working on it. Usually a simple glance confirms completion. As you record their translation assignments, take note of any highlighted areas that may not have been addressed in class and either jot down a short response in the margin of their work or roll the question into a subsequent discussion where appropriate.

Note: In the past, we struggled to get translations graded and returned to students in time for them to review them for a quiz. We streamlined the process by recording translations and exercises from the preceding week while the students are taking their quiz. Because we read aloud in class, students are still held accountable to having the work completed on time, and because of the self-correcting element, work does not take long to record.

In our program, we focus on Genesis 1:1–5 and Deuteronomy 6:4–9 during the first semester. We work through these passages the first few weeks of class, allowing the students to practice pronouncing consonants and vowels while we explain meaning. Students should practice these passages on their own by reading them through one time each day (five days per week). They record their participation weekly by reporting how many days they read the text aloud (students cannot make up for missed days by counting multiple readings in one day). Each student meets with us once during the semester to read through the passages orally (this is not translating, but reading). We grade the reading as a pass/fail, allowing students to redo the assignment until they pass (while encouraging them not to waste our time with failed attempts). During second semester, we suggest focusing on either Genesis 22:1–14 or Exodus 20:1–17.

Interesting note: For ten years straight, every student’s oral reading participation percentage has been within five points (half a letter grade) of the student’s overall course grade at both the midterm and final points of the semester.

Although this may seem advanced for first-year students, these exercises:

• Help the student to see the bigger picture of the biblical text
• Force the student to shift from focusing on words to seeing clauses
• Move the student from seeking syntactical arrangement (which can still be nonsensical) to seeking logical meaning (e.g., “Jacob served Laban to Rachel” versus “Jacob served Laban for Rachel”—example from a student reading in Weingreen’s Hebrew grammar)
• Focus on the relationship between clauses to show the author’s message (grammatical) and identify the main ideas (thematic)

As students begin creating their own diagrams, the main problem they encounter is the tendency to view parallel main clauses as subordinate simply because one event leads to another. As a result, clauses that should be aligned at the right margin end up indented due to the students’ perception of cause and effect. An illustration that may prove helpful for distinguishing between main clauses and subordinate clauses is to think of clauses like separate slides in a film. They have a natural cause-effect relationship simply by occurring in a fixed sequence. However, if the clauses are different scenes in the film’s progression, students should regard them all as main ideas and place them at the right margin of the diagram or dialogue box. True subordinate clauses should present details that fill out the image within a single event. For example, “He left, and he avoided the situation” represents the same event as two scenes—one in which he is leaving and another in which he is avoiding the situation. Although related, the author leaves the relationship between the events unexpressed. By contrast, the sentence “He left so that he could avoid the situation” includes a subordinate clause that modifies the main action and paints them as a single scene. Even though both expressions convey the same event, in each case the author guides readers in their perception of the event.

Supplies: Lots of whiteboard space and a few dry-erase markers. Since classrooms do not always have enough whiteboard space, we use removable whiteboard cling sheets. Because we reuse it, one package has lasted nine years.

Community: Have students work in groups but require that each person takes a turn writing. That way no one is humiliated if they do not know something, and the students can help each other to think through what they do know. If you pair students who struggle with those who succeed, both benefit greatly if you have the one who knows the answers practice asking guiding questions.

Objective: The goal is to move the student from memorization to understanding and to help them discover how what they have memorized translates into the broader Hebrew language. For example, having them use their memorized qal paradigms and niphal representative forms to create a full niphal paradigm on the whiteboard shows the simplicity of a process that can be difficult to explain with words. In that 15-minute exercise, those students learn the underlying principle for creating every strong verb from the qal.

Moving from known to unknown: During this process, create opportunities for each student to succeed. If students are really struggling, move to the most basic concepts. Even if they are trying to write the qal paradigm but have not bothered to memorize it yet, they can recite the first form or, at the very least, try to write it as you say it. Again, start with what they know and then help them move to what they do not know. If they can write the consonants of the 3ms perfectly but guess the wrong “a” vowels, show them that they only need to learn those two small marks to know the first form. Or if they can hear the “a” vowel, but do not know which one, see if their vowel rules will help. Provide as many prompts as they need to recite the applicable rule to you, then let them see the link. By the time students get to the verbs (where we usually use the whiteboards), they have a breadth of knowledge. They just have to be shown how to use it. A little encouragement goes a long way in overcoming their fear that this foreign language is beyond their grasp.

Rarely is the whole class able to catch the meaning of the full verse. Thus, the student reads it a second time, phrase by phrase, but only as far as the class is able to follow the meaning in Hebrew. Once they lose the meaning, the verse is read again. Often that means rereading a phrase over and over (in Hebrew). In our classes, when anyone loses the train of thought (signaled by raising a hand), the reader will back up and start again. Usually each read-through results in increased understanding, although sometimes students have to ask questions about words that stump them. When answering those questions, avoid parsing or defining and find other ways to trigger thoughts that will help the student recognize or remember the word. Students love to help with this, using everything from charades to puns. This process is repeated until everyone in class comprehends an entire verse. Obviously, on these days we cover far less text, but this practice counteracts the belief that learning an ancient language must be restricted to “decoding.” In fact, we encourage students to practice this technique on a single verse from their translation homework each week.

We also handle the room more casually, still encouraging the students to read the Hebrew and tell us what they know but filling in data for them more quickly or prompting them to speak up as a class. The main texts we use on these days come from Tall Tales Told in Biblical Hebrew or some of our favorite biblical or extrabiblical passages (see Supplemental Readings). Texts from Tall Tales are graded in terms of difficulty, but despite some unfamiliar vocabulary and some rather awkward wording, students are always encouraged by what they can read and understand. Honestly, sometimes they just feel relieved that their theology or biblical knowledge is not involved in every translation. When we choose biblical texts, the difficulty level is often far beyond their ability (Karl is known for introducing readings from the book of Job). But with the teacher as a guide, the students have plenty to contribute and are introduced to some new grammatical, syntactical, or lexical features in a nonthreatening environment. Though introducing students to texts far beyond their reading ability may seem counter-intuitive, it is a widely recognized and highly effective practice. Just as parents are encouraged to read chapter books to preschool children and thick novels to middle-schoolers, your students will enjoy your guiding them through texts that they love but cannot yet read for themselves.

Hebrew tutors are also invited to a weekly meeting where we discuss issues of pedagogy, grammar, reading, scholarship, theology, interpretation, and life. Here are some things we have learned along the way:

Students can be hesitant to reach out for help. Having tutors show up in your classroom to introduce themselves helps make the tutors seem more accessible.

Tutoring is not just for struggling students. Encourage advanced students to meet with tutors so that they can be challenged outside of the classroom.

Being a tutor is not just for the elite. We have found that the perfect tutor is one who loves the language and sincerely cares about others (even if they did not get high grades). We invite most students who complete first-year Hebrew to consider joining the tutoring program. Often those who struggled more are ready to tutor during the second half of the year (after reviewing the grammar in third semester).

Our tutors are allowed to make mistakes. We assure the tutors and remind those who seek them out that these students are still learning. If the tutor is not sure about an explanation, just have the student check in class.