Israeli Accent

Syllabus Summary

• 1. What is an accent?

  Introduction to our Learning Process
  The Language Identity Flow Chart
  3 Different Types of Sounds

• 2. Practice

  Get to know the group and their challenges with Hebrew speaking. Provide general feedback for this specific group to determine where to focus-how to adjust for the remainder of the course. Lots of speaking, lots of sharing, finding common ground, etc.

• 3. Intro To Hebrew Vowel Sounds

  How Many Vowel Sounds Are There?
  Diphthongs (Straight vs. Moving Vowels)
  Easy vs. Not-so-easy Vowel Sounds

• 4. Practice

  This is the chance to really hear the unique subtleties between our native accents and target sounds. We'll use conversation and games with minimal pairs to highlight these key differences.

• 5. Unstressed Vowel Sounds

  Pure Vowels (Oral Posture + Lip Position)
  How To Pronounce ה ,ו ,ש ,ל ,ב
  Linking Practice with Function Words

• 6. Intro To Consonant Sounds

  P T K Sounds In Hebrew (+ Dalet)
  Pronouncing Lamed
  Allophones of T and D

• 7. Practice

  While the vowel practice requires more precision with mouth shape and form, consonants are a little easier to discuss. They involve touching tongues to teeth and gum ridges and are more or less measurable and demonstrable. We'll use this session to practice tricky words with our consonant sounds workshop and particularly bring up common phrases to continue to apply each session to the real life conversation.

• 8. How To Pronounce Resh + Chet / Chaf

  Allophones of Resh
  Clusters with Resh
  Most Challenging Hebrew Words

• 9. Practice

  Let's flip accent learning on its head! This week we work to imitate Israeli accents in English. The goal is to not have to think about the words but simply isolate the sounds. Using English as the word base, we then can focus on how an Israeli brain would go about saying this word. For example, is Dadדֶד or דַד? What about Dead? We'll answer these questions and much more during our practice week with Resh and Chet.

• 10. Intro To Prosody

  How to Parse a Hebrew Sentence
  Review Function vs. Content Words
  Tonality: Asking Questions + Making Statements

• 11. Practice

  We'll start reading more short phrases and moving up to reading longer paragraphs with a focus on parsing and attention to stress. Students will start asking themselves, "Where's the emphasis in this phrase?" They'll see the relationship between our tonality and rhythmic stress.

• 12. Strategy + Practical Applications

  Anticipating Common Questions
  How to Best Use Practice Time
  Review Our Process
  Answer Any Final Questions

• 13. Practice

  An to come together and discuss what we've taken away from the experience. We'll share the things that we're excited to implement as well as the characteristics we're still working through, but with form and technique. We'll share some resources for listening practice and shadowing as well as the next steps for taking Hebrew pronunciation to a more solid, consistent place.