How to Keep Growing in Hebrew if You’ve Reached the End of Our Videos

Aleph with Beth

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As we continue to work hard to bring you more lessons, we realize that many people have already caught up with the videos we've created and are wondering what to do while they wait for more lessons.

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If you're one of those people, this video is for you. We'd like to give you some suggestions on how you can keep growing in Biblical Hebrew as you wait for us to finish building the course, which will take at least a few more years.

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First, we recommend listening to the podcast audio versions of past videos to practice your oral comprehension and review vocabulary.

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This is something that's easy to do while you're exercising, cleaning the house, washing dishes, or commuting to work.

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Second, take some time to review the short story videos and read the short story PDFs which you can download on the resources page of our website.

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This is an enjoyable way to improve your fluency and further internalize vocabulary.

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Third, read the transcripts of past episodes. There's value in developing the skill of reading

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Hebrew texts aloud. When you do this, you help your brain sharpen its grasp on the different spellings and sounds of words while building more fluency and familiarity with pronunciation and vocabulary.

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These transcripts are full of color and interesting images to keep you engaged. Once again, you can read or download them for free on the resources page of our website.

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Fourth, read narrative passages of the Hebrew Bible with the BART Bible app.

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We've talked about this app before in another video and it's an amazing tool for those of you who want to dive into the biblical text and learn more by reading.

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Here's how we recommend you use the app. Select the gloss language you would like, and set the view to display only these things.

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Then, choose a passage of narrative to read, such as the first half of Exodus or the book of Ruth.

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We don't recommend diving into the poetry books yet because they're much more complex and may be discouraging.

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Then begin to read and also listen to the pronunciation of the recording. Simply tap any words you don't understand and a gloss will pop up to help.

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When you've understood the verse, read it aloud and listen to it a few more times and then move on to the next verse.

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If you get stuck and need a translation, you can download the translation you want and then tap with two fingers to glance at it whenever you need it as you're reading.

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If you don't have an Android phone, you can try HebrewGreekBible .online. Fifth, take some time to learn how to type in Hebrew.

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Although this won't give you comprehensible input, it's a valuable skill that could be used to communicate with a group chat learning

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Hebrew together, for writing commentaries or sermons on passages of scripture, or for writing your own short stories in Hebrew.

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The central theme of all of these suggestions is that you need more comprehensible input to keep growing.

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If you're unfamiliar with the idea of comprehensible input, we highly recommend that you read the page about our methodology on our website.

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There you'll find some interesting videos, podcast episodes, and an excellent paper written by Scott McQuinn which we recommend that everyone read to understand more about how to learn a language.

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You may think you already know everything about language learning, but you may be very surprised by some new things when you read

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McQuinn's paper. We also recommend that you avoid developing habits that will hinder your reading fluency.

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A common confusion is that if you learn a lot of grammatical concepts about the language, then you'll acquire the language better.

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Unfortunately, that might hinder your progress towards fluency. It's fine to learn grammar, but it's important to understand that it's not the same thing as acquiring the language.

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It's a completely separate category. Always keep in mind that learning about a language is not the same as learning the language.

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So we recommend being careful not to think of the language as a code that you have to analyze and solve, which is a tendency many people have when they start reading books on Hebrew grammar or watch videos that explain

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Hebrew verses as if they were puzzles to analyze. If you develop a habit of always analyzing and parsing every verb or noun while reading, that will hinder your ability to truly develop fluency and enjoy reading large sections of text.

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So we hope this little video helps you. We love all of our students so much and we're so excited to see many people learning and finding the joy of reading and studying the