Offered:

This course is offered each Term (pending sufficient student enrollment).

Date & Time:

Our 2023 Term 2 Conversational Hebrew 300 course meets on Wednesdays for 1 hour each week between 11:30am and 12:30pm beginning on Wed 3 May 2023 (New Zealand time). The course meets for 8 consecutive weekly sessions. If you live outside of New Zealand and wish to Zoom in, check the local Time Zone equivalents below.

Time Zone equivalents:

for live-streaming Zoom Sessions from New Zealand. If your Time Zone doesn't suit our live-streamed class, you can also access our courses by watching the live-recorded sessions that are posted to the course webpage each week, usually the next day.

  • Honolulu, Hawai’i: begins Tue 2 May 2023, 1:30-2:30pm

  • US Pacific: begins Tue 2 May 2023, 4:30-5:30pm

  • US Eastern: begins Tue 2 May 2023, 7:30-8:30pm

  • London, UK: begins begins Wed 3 May 2023, 12:30-1:30am

  • Paris, France: begins Wed 3 May 2023, 1:30-2:30am

  • New Delhi, India: begins Wed 3 May 2023, 5:00-6:00am

  • Bangkok, Thailand: begins Wed 3 May2023, 6:30-7:30am

  • Singapore: begins Wed 3 May 2023, 7:30-8:30am

  • Tokyo, Japan: begins Wed 3 May 2023, 8:30-9:30am

  • Sydney Australia: begins Wed 3 May 2023, 9:30-10:30am

Description:

  • This Conversational Hebrew course emphasizes conversational skills and spoken ability. This course is for those who have already completed Introductory and Intermediate Hebrew and who wish to enhance their conversational skills with weekly conversations with a native speaker. This course will help increase your grammatical skills, expand your vocabulary, and improve your speaking ability. Both contemporary and traditional Hebrew songs will be learned.

  • Conversational Hebrew 300 is offered every Term (pending sufficient enrollment). Each Term consists of 8 consecutive weekly classes lasting 1 hour only.

Meet our Instructor

Hebrew instructor Benjamin Tobias

Our Hebrew classes are taught by our Israeli-Kiwi Instructor Benjamin Tobias. Benny was born in Israel and was raised as a fluent Hebrew speaker at Kibbutz Kinneret, located near the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret) in the Jordan Valley. He also served as a Captain in the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). Benny moved to New Zealand in 1982, becoming a New Zealand citizen in 1984. He graduated from the University of Waikato with an LLB degree in 1994 and an LLM in 2007. For many years he worked for the New Zealand Transport Agency, both in planning and in a legal capacity. Benny is now partly retired, keeping himself busy with Ellys Physio and teaching Hebrew in his spare time. He is married and has 3 children and 3 grandchildren, who reside in New Zealand, Israel and Italy.

Location:

This class is a hybrid class with both in-person sessions in our classrooms or through distance-learning via Zoom.

All in-person classes are held at the EarthDiverse offices and classrooms located at 401 Anglesea Street, Hamilton Central, Hamilton (located just north of the Hamilton Central Bus Station) (entrance is located on the side of the building, see map below). Those looking for parking for our evening classes can park just in front of the building in any of the available car parks. Daytime parking can be found in our dedicated car parks, or free 2-hour on-street daytime parking can be found just in front of Anglesea Street.
Location

Distance Learning:

This course has distance-learning options for those unable to attend the live class sessions in Hamilton. Students have three options for attending our courses once they have registered:

  • Attend in-person classes in our Hamilton classrooms at the regularly scheduled day and time.

  • Attend our live on-line classroom sessions via Zoom at the regular scheduled day and time.

  • Watch the live-recorded class sessions at your leisure, at a time, day and place more suited to your schedule.

Distance-Learning option:

  • In addition to our in-person classes in Hamilton, our courses offer distance learning options for those unable to attend classes in-person. Live-streamed Hamilton classes are available via free Zoom software for those living outside the Waikato. Live-streaming allows you to participate fully in your own learning, ask questions of the instructor and participate fully in the same way as if you were in the physical classroom.

  • Those unable to attend the scheduled date and time of the actual class sessions, or those who need to miss a class or two due to previous engagements or unexpected illness, can watch any or all of the live-recorded video sessions on their computers, laptops, tablets or mobile devices and study at their own pace and in their own time.

  • Detailed instructions on how to access our distance learning components will be sent after completing your registration. There are no additional fees for this service. However, distance learners will need access to a desktop or laptop computer with a good quality web-camera (tablet devices and mobile phones can also access our live-streamed classes), a built-in microphone (most modern laptops have built-in microphones) or a headset with a microphone. You will also need to download and install the free Zoom software on your computer or device. Those accessing the video recordings will be able to do so with a simple web browser on any device.

Pricing options:

All prices in NZ dollars and includes GST. Unwaged includes students, seniors and retirees.

Course curriculum:

Week by week new material will be posted throughout the duration of the course. Video recordings of each weekly session will be posted here after 1-2 days after each class.

    1. EarthDiverse Zoom instructions

Additional course info:

  • Video and PDF content of class presentations or whiteboards notes are uploaded weekly after each live session
  • Begins on Wed 15 Feb 2023
  • NZ time: Wednesdays 11:30am -12:30pm

Notes:

Those who cannot make the class meeting day and time either in-person or via live Zoom sessions may consider accessing this course through the weekly recorded video sessions. Class videos are posted within 1-2 days of each live class session and are available for your own personal learning session on a day and time of your choosing.

Prerequisites:

Prerequisites for this Course:

  • Completion of Introductory and Intermediate Hebrew courses OR sufficient understanding of essential Hebrew.

  • If you already have learned the Hebrew script, and have sufficient background in Hebrew grammar, vocabulary and some spoken Hebrew you may be eligible to join this course. Contact us for more information.

Materials:

  • Course materials are included in the course fees. These are currently distributed to students via the course webpage as PDF files which can be printed out at home.

  • You will only require a pen or pencil, a notebook for taking your own class notes, and a loose-leaf binder. Any notes that our instructor writes on the class whiteboard are posted on the course webpage as a digital PDF file so that you can print these out at home and add them to your own notebook.