Is An Online Hebrew Course For You?

By Author: G Maher
Total Articles: 9
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There are two ways that you will learn Hebrew from a pain resource this will be through an online Hebrew course or through Hebrew home learning software. Both options are excellent but deciding on which option is best for you depends on the time you have available, how organized you are and how you learn best. In this article we will talk about the advantages of an learning Hebrew via and online Hebrew course.

What do you want from your course?

If you choose to learn Hebrew through an online Hebrew course you will need to be organized and committed, most online courses are 3 months to an academic year in length and you will need to attend classes at scheduled times. Online Hebrew courses are more expensive than buying a home study program but you have a-lot more resources available, such as 1-1 lessons and feedback from a native Hebrew speaker, however you should not be put off the price if you were to pay for private lessons with a Hebrew teacher it would be considerably more expensive and ...
... in my experience no where near as good.

How much do you want to speed?

With an online Hebrew course you will pay a monthly, quarterly or yearly fee depending on the language provider that you choose, prices can vary from $55 a month to $800 dollars a year but again I say, don't let this put you off, I used to pay $20 an hour for private lessons, I had 3 lessons a week and if you do the math you will see that $800 for a year is not so expensive and I stress the learning experience is much better than private lessons with a real flesh a blood teacher.

How do you want to learn?

With an online Hebrew course you will learn to speak Hebrew in a Virtual classroom, in your virtual classroom you will have your Hebrew instructor online plus the other students that are attending the class, there are generally between 6 – 8 students in a class at anyone time, the instructor dictates the pace and the subject matter of the lesson and you can converse and talk in real time with the instructor as well as the other students during the lesson. If you are adverse to learning with other people then most online courses have the option of 1-1 lessons but I think if you are learning Hebrew online it is better to learn with other students as you become more immersed in the learning process and this way is generally more fun (learning a new language should be fun). As well as the classroom aspect of your course you will also have other resources available such as Audio, Video and quizzes to help you better understand and retain the lesson subject matter.

How do you learn?

An online Hebrew course was not the best option for me when I started learning Hebrew because I live a pretty busy life and I just knew that I would be unable to stick to scheduled lessons, I also like to learn at my own pace in my own way but learning Hebrew such as I did means that you have to come up with your own learning plan, while all software based Hebrew courses are intuitive and step by step you still need to have a lesson plan with objectives and goals so that you know where you are going and what success looks like. (I am a professional Learning & Development specialist so creating lesson / course plans is not hard for me). With an online Hebrew course the path is laid out from beginner to advanced you have structured pre-organized lesson plans and as long as you attend the scheduled lessons your instructor will take care of the rest, they will have the lesson plans, goals and objectives for each session and course so you can just concentrate on learning.

What level do you want to reach?

This is a big question, while both the software and the online approaches will take you from beginner to advanced they don't take you there the same way, nor in the same time, if I was to throw my hat in ring I would have to admit that an online course is better if you want to attain an advanced proficiency of the Hebrew language, I don't feel this is possible with a Hebrew software course unless you avail of other Hebrew learning resources that you can use to compliment your course such as Language exchange sites or actually moving to Israel, you just can't beat real conversation which is a vital ingredient if you want to speak Hebrew to an advanced level. With an online Hebrew course you have all the tools that you would have with a software based course but you have the extra ingredient of learning with a real teacher and you also get to speak with the other students in the class, so you get a real feel for the language not to mention real time feedback and instruction.