מבטא
Hebrew Accent workshop for advanced students
Hebrew Accent Workshop:
Work and change your accent by learning how to produce the sounds unique to Hebrew, the languages intonation and more.
The course is intended for people who know how to speak Hebrew at level Bet+ and above.
The course is a once per week workshop, 5 meetings in total, in a small group.
No book is needed for this course.
Once per week, 19:00 to 21:00 on Tuesdays, 1250 NIS
The average class size is about 6 students for the in-person courses (the max size of a group is 10 students).
What affects one’s pronunciation of the Israeli accent?
The main influences are the student’s mother tongue and the languages to which one is exposed to throughout their life.
Our students come from all corners of the world, and speak a wide range of different languages and sounds that they grow up hearing (or not hearing!). Due to this, everyone has a particular set of sounds they have a hard time pronouncing…and that’s where we come in. In order for the practice to be as effective as possible, we will focus on the sounds that are most difficult for common international languages (English, Russian, French, etc).
What if I speak a language that is not very common? Can I still join the course?
Each person’s case is unique, so talk to us and we’ll see if there is a group that suits you also!
Is it possible to get rid of my accent after one course?
The way we speak is a habit that we learn from childhood, and includes a great many aspects. Just like a new language, learning how to produce new sounds has to be done gradually. The process takes some time until it stops feeling “foreign” and becomes part of our identity.
For beginner participants, the course will go over the language groundwork and sound structure of the Israeli accent, which will already lead to a great improvement in speaking abilities. For continuing participants, the course will offer a fun social framework for “maintenance” and deepening of the Israeli accent until the student reaches an automatic flow of speaking with a confident Israeli accent.
With that being said, we cannot promise a native speaking level of Israeli accent but we can assure you that you will leave the course with more confidence and flow in your Hebrew speaking.
How do you practice an accent?
The students will learn to “open” their ears to different sounds and learn to recognize the differences between them, both in the Israeli accent, but also in their mother tongue. We will deep dive into the structure of the human mouth and the anatomy of sound production, as well as learning to produce the important sounds within the Israeli accent. Similar to learning any new skill, we will start off with short exercises and will slowly apply the newly learned material into every day speaking, beginning with vocabulary and sentences through to short conversations.
Will there be homework?
The students will have short motoric exercises of 5-10 minutes for self-practice, which sometimes will include recordings of words, sentences and short passages.
About the teacher
Pelleg, our pedagogical manager, is both an experienced Hebrew teacher and a certified speech therapist (logoped), who has treated children and adults with various speech impediments. She realized that the basic principles of pronunciation therapy can be successfully applied while working with Hebrew students on the production of some of the more difficult sounds the Modern Hebrew accent includes.
