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The Levantini Podcast
Ulpan La-Inyan - Speaking Hebrew with Confidence
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Welcome to the Forinsey Podcast. Forensic.us is a language training website for Hebrew, Arabic, and Russian designed specifically for intermediate to advanced learners. Our daily lessons prepare you to read real foreign language news articles and listen to actual foreign language media on a wide variety of subjects to put you on the path to language mastery. If you're studying Hebrew, Arabic, or Russian, you can visit our site at foreign c.us. That's F-O-R-E-I-G-N-C-Y.us, and enter the promo code LANguageMastery for a 10% discount on our annual and six-month subscriptions. In this episode, I speak with Ami Steinberger, who's the founder and CEO of Ulpan Leignan, which is a Hebrew language ulpon in Israel. Ami's Upon focuses on helping new immigrants master the essentials of everyday conversation, which is a real gap that exists with other Hebrew language wulpons in the country. We talked about a number of different things, including how he structures his lessons, why small class sizes are important, and also the challenges that new Hebrew students face. I had a great time talking to him, and I hope you enjoy the show. Hi, I'm here today with Ami Steinberger, who's the founder and CEO of Ulpan La Inyan. Thanks for joining us. Pleasure. Pleasure to be here. So if you wouldn't mind, tell me a little about the Ulpan that you started in Israel and also what is an Ulpan.
SPEAKER_00Sure. Okay, so maybe I'll start with the second question. What is an Ulpan? Sure. An Ulpan, pronounced in Hebrew Ulpan, actually comes from Aramaic. It means literally studio. But it's become kind of an icon in Israeli culture where people who have immigrated to Israel, Jews have immigrated to Israel since 1949, have been given free Hebrew study by the government. And that's called Ulpan, where they come and they do the studio, they come to study Hebrew on the house. And basically Upan refers to any Hebrew language school usually in Israel.
SPEAKER_01And what we're hearing right now in the background is somebody in the classroom next to you actually doing a lesson today, right? Someone like that, yeah. And when did you start it? I opened this almost 10 years ago.
SPEAKER_00This summer is 10 years. Oh wow. And you guys are located in Jerusalem, but also all over the country, correct? Yeah, we have offices in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv and classes that take place all over the country, wherever there's English speakers were there.
SPEAKER_01So tell me why you started it and what what your background is.
SPEAKER_00I started it because I saw that there was a need for a conversational program. I grew up in LA. My father's Israeli and my mom's American. My baby they raised me speaking both English and Hebrew. So I didn't have to learn it as a foreign language when I came to live here. But I saw that a lot of English speakers around me in Jerusalem were graduates of the traditional system, and they came out with a lot of knowledge of grammar charts and some passive understanding, but a lot of them fell short of the ability to speak with confidence. So I was familiar with the Pimsler language learning system. It's kind of a hobby of mine. I like to learn languages using that system. And that's what you guys adopted in your rule bond is the Pimsler method. Yeah. Well, so we took the principles of the Pimsler method, and I wrote lessons based on those principles. So it mimics a lot of what goes on in a Pimsler lesson.
SPEAKER_01So explain to me what exact I mean, I I know, but for our listeners, what exactly the Pimsler method is. Sure.
SPEAKER_00Pimsler method. It's a type of lesson where the students are placed in a virtual conversation. Like they're thrown into a virtual conversation between a couple of native speakers. They play the roles of the different speakers, but they're taught how to play those roles bit by bit, kind of like learning how to swim by slowly putting your feet in the water, inch by inch, it's all good until one is really able to swim. So that's really where Pimsler, how Pimsler works. It's like from the ground up. It's very it starts with core vocabulary. It focuses on core vocabulary, the most important words one needs to know to function in a given language and society in a given society, and teaches them in a way like in it's like a lot of language learning systems will have a lot of repetition. This is smart repetition, where the students are asked to recall something right when they're about to forget it. Like the system is optimized for that. The lessons are optimized for that. And it's all within context, it's all within a storyline. So that's that's more or less how Timbler works. And what year did you make Aliyah? I actually made Aliyah with my family in 94. Oh wow. But we left, but we left after a year. Okay. Went back to LA? Yeah, I went back to LA.
SPEAKER_01That was technically Aliyah, but uh And then when did you return for 11 years ago. Okay. And even though you grew up speaking Hebrew when you made Aliyah yourself, were there things that you struggled with the language?
SPEAKER_00Not so much struggle. It was more like I was learning new words all the time. I still I still do learn new words occasionally. And especially I have to imagine with slang, correct? Yeah, slang, I was picking up different slangs. Yeah, for sure. I mean my gr my dad speaks slang of the 70s, so I had to catch up a little.
SPEAKER_01So when you're talking to new students or even with friends that you have who are who are new immigrants to Israel, what are the common frustrations that they express? Not only just from wulpong courses that exist, but also if they've studied the language in in the US, then they've come here thinking that they'll be able to hit the ground running. What are some of the frustrations they express to you? That's a really good question. Do they have trouble communicating with people in the streets? Do they feel that the vocabulary they were taught is not adequate? It doesn't match up to the way people actually speak?
SPEAKER_00No, that's usually not the case. Usually it's like they've got the vocabulary, they they they've got some vocabulary that'll that'll be like a head start, but they won't necessarily be able to call it up and use it. It's more it's not on the tip of their tongue. It's like it's kind of clumsy.
SPEAKER_01Right. And tell me about the current Ulpan system in Israel and you know the frustrations that students have going into those and and what you try to do differently.
SPEAKER_00The current Ulpan system, like the Misala Krita, the Ministry of Immigrant Absorption, has since expanded the Ulpan system to like to include us. But the traditional Upan system is people sit in a class of like 30 people and from all different linguistic backgrounds, and the teachers speaking all in Hebrew, and the students don't really know what's going on. And slowly they'll learn through osmosis, but it's like traditional grammar, teaching grammar, teaching grammar drills, and things like that, using text, which is a more academic approach to language, but it doesn't teach the skill of speaking day-to-day with confidence. Like I'm taking a course right now along like with that similar method, and I'm really feeling the difference between that and pimsler. Pimsler is a lot more effective. What course are you taking right now? Arabic, local uh school.
SPEAKER_01Great teacher method has his word improved. And is that uh spoken Arabic or the fusa? Spoken. That's great. Yeah. So to go back to the Pimsler method and the way you guys are adopting it at your Ulpan, how do you decide what the core topics are? What are the essentials that somebody needs to learn?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'm going back to how I designed the curriculum. It depends on the level, like with level one. I think about the most practical conversations we'll have day-to-day in Jerusalem Tel Aviv, in one of the cities. That's where I build from there. For the upper levels, I look at like I look at the newspaper and see what are the most common words here that uh whether words that come up over and over again. I want to teach those structures, not necessarily the words, but more the structures so that people can function on that level as well.
SPEAKER_01Right. And when it comes to the day-to-day, like what are some things you can think of, the essentials of what people need to know, whether it's things in the kit like household items to being at a restaurant.
SPEAKER_00Being at a restaurant is definitely uh important, especially in Tel Aviv. People like to sit in cafes a lot, although it's recently do as well. Going to the supermarket, functioning there, going to the bank, uh, opening an account.
SPEAKER_01Those are all all things like all yeah, those are all gaps that I think they seem obvious, but in traditional Hebrew courses, they get overlooked. Exactly. You'll be able to read a really complex YNET article on the Netanyahu corruption investigation. But you know, if you need to buy wet wipes at the grocery store, you're flabbergasted. Exactly. So to put you on the spot a little bit, say I'm a beginner-level Hebrew student, I'm taking your course, and you're trying to prepare me to have a basic conversation at a restaurant. What are the essentials that you need to teach me?
SPEAKER_00So what are the essential words you need to know? Or like how would I go about it? What are you what are you asking? Yeah, the essential words. So the essential words and phrases. Okay, the essential words and phrases for for being in a restaurant. You want to know how to how to say, you want to be polite, you want to say, uh, you know, could you show me the menu? Right. Like if shall we wot the frit, bivakasha. In the pimsler part of the lesson, we'll teach you how to have a conversation with the the waiter, the waitress. They might ask you, matrze lasmin, which is a polite way of saying what you want to order, like what would you like? L'asmin. What's the implite way? And the implite is mat'ot se, matal, mat'ot lezmin. Right? Matirze takes the future tense, makes it a little fancier. With the pinzl pincil method, then you're breaking down each part of that sentence, correct? We're breaking it down, but more than breaking it down, we're training this the student to use it. Like we'll say, here's how here's how the waiter might ask you, what would you like to order? Listen and repeat. Ma tirtzel asmin, and you'll repeat it after me. And then I'll focus on the new word in that phrase. Let's say you already know that as mean, you already know ma. So I'll be like, tirtze, and you'll be saying tirtse, and I'll say tirtze, tirtse. You'll be working at a pronunciation. And then I'll move on a little bit and then I'll go on and say, Do you remember how to say what would you like to order? And you have to call it up right when you're about to forget it.
SPEAKER_01So in addition to that method, what do you encourage your students to be doing in the class? So are they taking notes? Are they creating flashcards? Do you have audio files that accompany each lesson that they listen to when they go home? Right.
SPEAKER_00During the core lesson, which is what Pimsler is based on PIMSLR method, during the core lesson, we highly encourage them to close any text that they have. We want to divorce the auditory from the visual. We want them to be able to converse without any reference to the visual. After the core lesson, which takes about half an hour, we'll have them open a workbook and and and take a guess as to how to spell the words they just learned how to use, and then we'll show them a presentation about how to actually spell those words. Right. So that's that's how we teach the reading and writing as well. At least at the beginning of that.
SPEAKER_01One thing I found not frustrating with the Pimsler method, but one thing I wish that it would it would have is that it would be ongoing and continuous, right? So if I download you know the most advanced level of Pimsler Hebrew, it's really not that advanced, but it's still method to here, but that then it's over.
SPEAKER_00So it never goes on, right? The problem is like the high demand courses like German, Spanish, French, like they go up to level five. Right. Which is even there, it's still lacking. Right. Yeah, it's not enough. I mean Hebrew and Arabic go up to level three.
SPEAKER_01That's one thing that's intriguing about your program is you may not have an app yet that does that, but it seems like your classes are some form of that where it's an ongoing developing course using that method.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. We have higher levels as well. We have level six, level seven. And also in the courses, like it's not just the core lesson. Pinsler is a half an hour a day, but this is a half an hour of core lesson, pinsler style, plus reading and writing, plus spontaneous conversation where we give the students a topic and we have them go for it. We also teach a word bank of an extra, another 10 words that like Pimsler focuses on functionality. So there's a lot of verbs and adjectives and how to use them in sentences, but it doesn't have too many nouns. So we fill in those gaps in our program so that students are able to really like really function.
SPEAKER_01Right. And did you have a background in uh education and teaching, or was this just a passion of yours and you saw a new?
SPEAKER_00It's more of a hobby that turned into a passion, that turned into a turned into a profession. Like I I have a background in English lit and psychology, but not a formal education background. Informal education, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Like I've done uh And how much resistance did you face when you started this? I mean, starting something starting something new is always difficult, but I imagine you're coming in with a method that's not being taught in Israel necessarily. What was that like?
SPEAKER_00People liked, I mean, people like the breath of fresh air that this offered. Uh the one res the one piece of resistance that really stands out for me is when I opened the program, the first thing I wanted was that Misada Klita, Ms. Adhinoch, like the powers that be in the Israeli government, would recognize my program and and send uh new Olim to it. So I sat with a represent a representative from each of those offices, the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Immigrants Absorption, and I showed them the lesson. And the first lesson is, how do I get to the grocery store? Or where's the grocery store? If I'm a codit. And they looked at me and said, we don't use the word makolith anymore. And I'm like, okay, that's who I have to do, that's who I'm dealing with. They just kind of rejected it. So it took a while until we're uh we're back on the map as far as Massadak Tutta goes, but we're teaching Makod and people still use Makolit, and uh they're kind of in an ivory tower of uh you know Netanyahu's uh problematic policies.
SPEAKER_01When new immigrants come to your course, what's the structure look like? How long does it last? How big are the class sizes?
SPEAKER_00What do you recommend in terms of number of classes per week? With beginners, we recommend three to four times a week, if possible more, but that's not usually feasible for people. On the off days, we highly recommend homework. People keep their minds uh stimulated by Hebrew on a regular basis, on a daily basis. The New Elim courses are six to eight months, and people who aren't New Elim come to our program as well. They they get each course is 30 hours of instruction, 20 meetings of an hour and a half. By the way, I didn't mention before that you asked about recordings and online materials. We have a student section of the website with with like flashcards, electronic, electronic flashcards, and recordings of dialogues and uh readings and quizzes and things like that. And how often are you uh are you creating new content for that?
SPEAKER_01Every year or so I spend a few months working on the content. Right. And are you ever in a situation where you realize you may not have something there? Like a student brings it up or it comes up in a class and then it just pops into your head, like, okay, I need to create like a daily I know you have those daily Hebrew language blog posts and really short lessons, which are great.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01Do ideas like that pop into your head where you're just like, okay, I gotta get this up? Occasionally, yeah.
SPEAKER_00And now nothing comes to mind. Right. And how big are are the classes usually? The Olim classes are up to six, and the non the non-new Olim classes, the regular classes, are up to up to 10, sometimes up to 12. And you cap it at that size on purpose, correct? Yes, absolutely. We don't want it, we want to lose quality. We want a lot of uh student attention, teacher attention.
SPEAKER_01And then I saw that so you guys also do private one-on-one lessons. What's the value though of being in a group?
SPEAKER_00The value of being in a group is that, well, first of all, it could be more stimulating, it could be more fun. People get to meet each other and they also get to bounce their ideas off of each other. They get to have conversations not just with the instructor one-on-one, but in pairs, practicing what they would do uh outside. They can hear each other's mistakes. Um, there's disadvantages and advantages to both. One-on-one, they won't hear the mistakes of the other students. But when it's a group class, they get to benefit from those mistakes, actually.
SPEAKER_01And what do you think about the ability of students to overcome their speaking fear when they're in a group?
SPEAKER_00That's another advantage of being in a group of learners, like people who aren't native Hebrew speakers, they get over that fear quickly because they're all in the same boat. They're all uh they're all learning, they're all making mistakes, and it's fine. Right. We encourage them to make mistakes in the streets as well.
SPEAKER_01And how do you guys encourage, or I wouldn't say encourage, but focus on some of the more subtle aspects of the language, right? So the accent, saying something with the right tone and intonation.
SPEAKER_00So there's there's pronunciation or there's accent. Pronunciation needs to be understood. We focus on that. Pimsler takes care of that, the core lesson takes care of that because they're they're trained in mimicking the teacher's pronunciation and intonation. Accent is something that's already that that people will choose how far to go with, whether they want to drop their their native accent in Hebrew, or if they wanna uh they want to keep it. Most people tend to come with their native accent and then work on the pronunciation. Right.
SPEAKER_01Because I noticed I remember when I was I lived in Israel for two years when I was in grad school. And when I was learning language, one thing that was really frustrating to me, but that I can't blame Israelis for is that when you start speaking and then you stumble over your words and they can see that you're struggling, they instantly switch to to English. Absolutely. One, because I think life is fast-paced there and they don't have time for that, which was totally understandable. But also I think a lot of Israelis want to practice their English. So how do you how would you advise somebody who's learning the language to not fall into that trap to be able to speak confidently?
SPEAKER_00I would say, first of all, just be persistent, just push and continue speaking in Hebrew, and then they'll have like a 50-50 success rate, but some Israelis just want to have patience for it and they'll switch to English or they'll just leave the conversation. But others will be zromitats, a lot of them will just go with it. And especially if they're new alim, then they can say to Israelis like, Aniolechadash or Anni Ulachadasha, and then the native speaker will be more likely to help them because there's an idealistic element to that, ideological.
SPEAKER_01Like I want to help people who are new alien. And there has to be some, I mean, there is something to the Pimsler method and dealing with that as well, right? Because it's all repetition and it just will come out of you naturally.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. The Pimsler method builds confidence in and of itself because every few seconds the students are quizzed, and if they get the answer right and they're they're confirmed by the right answer, then they get positive reinforcement. It happens every few seconds. So there's a lot of positive reinforcement that happens in the lesson. That builds confidence.
SPEAKER_01So tell me about the exams that you guys do at your old. Are they completely focused on spoken Hebrew or heavily focused on spoken Hebrew?
SPEAKER_00Heavily focused, yeah. Our quizzes after each lesson online are focused on students are given a dialogue and they have to fill in the blanks as to what would be the right word in that dialogue or a phrase, which does combine reading and writing because it's it's a text, but it's also based on conversational vernacular.
SPEAKER_01And when you're recruiting four instructors for your program, I guess what are the biggest challenges you face bringing in Hebrew teachers in order to have them adopt your method and not stick your way of doing things?
SPEAKER_00So we prefer working with people who aren't established Hebrew teachers because they they tend to come with their own methodology and they're they they're happy with their methodology. They don't want to flex, they don't want to shift so much. So we prefer people who who have a more eclectic background, maybe they've done a lot of informal education, or they're educators in a different field, or they're just students who are really bright, like university students who know English and Hebrew very well, and we'll hire them for to do private lessons, then eventually they'll they'll end up teaching group classes as well.
SPEAKER_01I know you have online lessons also. Do you stick to this same method? The method applies for over all your lessons.
SPEAKER_00Yes. Yeah, across the board. So if it's a presentation where we flip the computer in class and we'll show them the presentation for how to spell what they've just learned, and online we'll just share a screen.
SPEAKER_01So take me through a little bit of of an advanced online course of say it's a one-on-one online course. I'm an advanced speaker, and I'm mostly just need maintenance. And it's and it's my first lesson. What would what would the structure look like?
SPEAKER_00Well, the structure okay, so we start with uh with a core lesson where you wouldn't see any visual, any text or anything like that. You wouldn't have your workbook open, you wouldn't have your notebook open, nothing on the screen except for the instructor. And the instructor has their script where they're asking questions. They'll be like, should I do a sample lesson right now?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, let's do it.
SPEAKER_00You want like advanced? You're a beginner, right? No, I'm not advanced. You're right. That's what that's what I thought. Okay. Give me a minute, I'm gonna open it up. Sure. Let's see how advanced. First of all, we have to do a placement test. Yeah, let's see how uh embarrassed I'm about to get. Okay. She no shim, dalia virched, nos odbiyah the statufa, le sofit bell, itbalashil dalia, shehozer mechul. Hamatos, yamri Bazman correct you. Bazman Yamri. Hamatos, Yamri, Bizman. Basman. Basman. Tell me, did Uri's plane take off on time today?
SPEAKER_01Hamatosh el Uri Himribizman. Tagidi. Hamatosh Uri Himribazman Iom? Tagidi Hamatosh el Umi Shell Mashim Shalo? Uri. Uri. Himribizman. Huhimri Basman?
SPEAKER_00Yes, it took off this morning at six.
SPEAKER_01Ken Hamatosh himriba bokir b shishba bokir. Ken Huhimriya Bokir B Shish. So then you guys just continue to repeat that, or do you get do you break it down slower?
SPEAKER_00At that level, we're just going to continue with uh with what's there. The script may may refer back to the hamri, the verb to take off uh later on, but that's we'll just keep on going with the fellow full of conversation.
SPEAKER_01I have to tell you that having a script like that is really valuable. I mean, one of one of the big frustrations I have whenever I do online Hebrew lessons is usually starts, and me and the instructor are kind of just staring at each other. And there's no structure to it. You know, I have to I've always found, I've been doing language lessons for years online, that the student has to be the one to push the conversation. There's no script, there's no real structure to it, but having a structure like that where you're just going through the motions is is actually refreshing.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's very it's very well structured, it's very well uh the timing is important, the the method is all uh built in. So what are your short-term and long-term goals for your program? Short-term goals are to continue bolstering what we have. Uh we've been working on levels one, two, and three are already now full of uh like a broader vocabulary. Like it's always been for usage, it's always been going from level to level uh pretty seamlessly, but uh students tend to go to higher levels without getting the breadth of vocabulary of nouns and adjectives that they could get along the way. So we're working on on bolstering that levels one, two, and three are done in the next two months or so. I want to finish the rest of the program uh so that it's all like really set in place where students are saying that this is something that they graduate and they're able to really function in every way in Israeli society. And uh that's the yeah, in the long in the long term, I want to make this accessible not only to English speakers, but to French speakers who already have a program for them, and Spanish speakers and Arabic speakers and uh Amharic speakers, Ethiopian, Ethiopian students who Olim, who never necessarily learn how to read and write, this program could really work for them because it's so based on the auditory uh sense.
SPEAKER_01Right. Well, great. This has been um really interesting and really enlightening. And it sounds like you guys have a special and unique program. If people want to find your website, they need to go to ulpon.com, that's u-lp.com. And then what's your personal Twitter handle? Ami underscore Steinberger at and yeah, that's it. And if people are interested in enrolling in your course, either there in Israel or doing the online online lessons, all that information is available on your website. Yeah, it's all there. Great. Well, thanks again for taking the time. I really appreciate it, and I wish you the best of luck. Thanks to Alit too, too.