Thank you again for running my article. It generated excellent discussion! Two comments to make:
1) The first point of the article is that throughout Judaic studies we lack standards which leads to imprecision in our teaching and too many students who do not succeed. The example that I provided was about literacy in Tanach, but the same applies to gemara or navi skills. Since we lack standards, all teachers, and especially our best ones, are handicapped in their ability to teach. I found it interesting that the discussion turned to tactics instead of focusing on goals/standards.
2) Regarding Biblical literacy, it is important to distinguish between Hebrew language acquisition and Biblical literacy. Language acquisition focuses on reading, understanding, speaking, and writing, which should be the emphasis in teaching modern Hebrew. Ivrit B'Ivrit as a form of immersion seems to be the best way for a student to master those four domains. Biblical literacy on the other hand has a lot in common with the way we teach Aramaic for Gemara or Greek for those that read Homer in the original. We only focus on the two domains of reading and understanding. While there is much overlap, there are many significant differences. Israelis struggle with understanding Tanach. Another example that I recently came across is the word "kos" for cup. In modern Hebrew, this is one of the first words we teach children, yet it only appears five times in the Torah and all in Bereishit, chapter 40.
Kol tuv,
Rafi
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2016 09:53PM by mlb.
