Hebrew

Strong Hebrew programs have a clear rationale, a reason for doing what you're doing.

Your students have learned to decode Hebrew - great! 

And they're also learning about Hanukkah. 

Bridge their excitement and new Hebrew skills in a meaningful way with Shalom, Reader: 57 Hebrew Activities to Show What You Know. This resource introduces students to a family and its pets, and follows them through simple stories and scenarios that are familiar to children, such as holiday celebrations, school, family, time, and the weather.

There's an entire chapter built around Hanukkah that includes:  

• Hanukkah vocabulary
• A short guided conversation with a friend in Hebrew about what they eat and drink during Hanukkah

The beginning of a new school year is a great time to review learners' Hebrew skills, and to plan how you will support their learning all year long. 

Research shows that effective Hebrew learning comes from regular exposure to authentic language in various ways, including listening and speaking. Further, the best language connections come from using Hebrew in creative ways.

Here are some simple engaging ways to practice in small bites.

Movement-Based Conversational Hebrew

Hebrew is a real, living, dynamic language. Bring 10 minutes of active fun to your sessions with movement-based actitivities from 

Learning Hebrew is a skill that takes practice to keep sharp, just like any other skill. A little bit of regular practice goes a long way to boosting confidence and proficiency. 

Freshen up learners' Hebrew skills with these easy-to-access resources to help them review and practice in small bites.

Back-to-School Hebrew Reading Refresher

Do your learners' Hebrew reading skills get rusty between May and September?

The Back-to-School Hebrew Reading Refresher can get students back in shape in 3-4 weeks with practice games and exercises, writing skills, drills of Hebrew reading and remediation for reading problems. It's

Learning Hebrew is a skill that takes practice to keep sharp, just like any other skill. A little bit of regular practice goes a long way to boosting confidence and proficiency. 

In fact, brain research shows that just five minutes a day—or even ten minutes twice or more per week—in addition to your regular learning time can make a big difference in second language acquisition skills. 

Freshen up learners' Hebrew skills with these resources to help them review and practice in small bites.

Ten-Minute Hebrew Reader

Whatever your regular Hebrew program, you can begin any session with a quick "reading workout" using the Ten-Minute Heb

We recently received a letter from “Concerned Citizen,” an anonymous 8^th grader from Boston, who noticed that in the Hebrew series Z’Man L’Tefilah (Time for Prayer) “every single illustration in the book depicts white people,” and urged us to do better than to present “a singular image of Jews.”

The student is right. This series, developed in the 1980s by the publishing company A.R.E., is illustrated with small line drawings that present what could be called an Ashkenazic world view, a view that North American Jews are exclusively descended from the Eastern European Jews who immigrated during the late 1800s and early 1900s as they fled pogroms and other atrocities.

Behrman House took over distribution of this series in the early 2000s, and while we regularly review already published titles, as a small independent publisher we do not often have the budget to go back and

As we all know, there is no single magic bullet to ensure our students connect to the language of their tradition.

It would be easy if the only choice of Hebrew approach were one-size-fits-all. But there’s no single way. 

Our job as educators is to provide learners with real opportunities to use Hebrew in a way that aligns with the community's goals. 

For some communities, the goal of Hebrew is to develop prayer skills and meaning - being comfortable participants in and leaders of Hebrew-based rituals and worship with an understanding of the meaning and value of prayer.

If this is your program's goal, as you're thinking about your Hebrew program for the upcoming year, we're highlighting some of our tried and true Hebrew prayer materials for grades 4-6. These high quality materials have been created by experienced master Hebrew educators, b

Your students have learned to decode Hebrew - great! 

Now what?

Skill-and-drill practice feels tiring. Instead, build on your emerging readers' excitement and new skills by giving them opportunities to experience progress in a meaningful way. 

Imagine the sense of accomplishment a learner feels when they can not only read a sentence in Hebrew, but understand it too. Or when they learn new vocabulary and can then add it to other words they know to form a sentence. Or when they win a game of tic-tac-toe by reading Hebrew words. 

Shalom, Reader: 57 Hebrew Activities to Show What You Know offers the perfect fill-in for kids to consolidate their skills and take it to the next level. Think of it as a bridge between a Hebrew primer and more complex texts from a reading or prayer learning program. 

Shalom, Reader introduces students

Strong Hebrew programs have a clear rationale, a reason for doing what you're doing. Knowing your end goal provides you the necessary filter and foundation upon which to structure learning experiences, create effective lessons, choose appropriate materials, and develop benchmarks. 

We’ve provided a start with this guide that maps four sample learning goals to a range of materials that will help you get there. Download the Consider Your Goals guide.

This guide - plus more planning help - is available at behrmanhouse.com. Just click PLAN on our homepage.

One key goal for many programs is to help students recognize the Hebrew letters and their sounds, and to put those together to form syllables and words as they prepare to join the c