Curricular Materials
This 8-10 lesson curriculum offers an approach to decoding biblical Hebrew that is systematic, scaffolded, and targeted for English-speaking and -reading students with some proficiency in modern Hebrew. This curriculum is designed for children between 3rd and 8th grade attending community day schools. It contains information on basic- to intermediate-modern Hebrew.
The approach used in this curriculum offers a step toward developing “successful” biblical Hebrew reader identities among middle elementary Jewish day school students. As long as biblical Hebrew is being taught, it should be taught well so that students can feel (and therefore be) successful. However, the pedagogical approach presented here does not speak to the social aspects of learning a literacy practice, and we encourage educators to consider how they might make learning biblical Hebrew feel necessary to a student's sense of self and identity.
This curriculum builds out of teacher research led by Professor Ziva Hassenfeld, SCRoLL Lab Director, from 2017-2019. More information is available in the following publications:
- Pursuing Fluency: A Curricular Intervention in Tanakh Education
- A Pedagogical Approach to Teaching Biblical Hebrew in American Day Schools
- The Second Conversation: Interpretive Authority in the Bible Classroom (forthcoming)