Hebrew professor says key is to focus on person, not language
Vardit Ringvald's methods have helped make Brandeis Modern Hebrew a bestseller
Photo/Mike Lovett
Professor Vardit Ringvald
Vardit Ringvald visualizes the acquisition of language as a spiral, not a line.
She found that 80 percent of language learners quit at the intermediate level out of frustration when their skills fail to improve at the previous rate. So Ringvald set out to understand why. She sought to learn what separates the 20 percent of students who move into the advanced category for what are considered difficult second languages – Chinese, Japanese and Hebrew – and how teachers could increase that percentage. “Learning a language opens a door to understanding themselves a little better. The language becomes part of who they are. Language is not about grammar, it’s about the person.”
“We understand we have a mission, and the mission is not completed yet,” she says, pledging that she and her colleagues, all of whom have worked at Brandeis together for years, will continue to innovate. “Brandeis is not a place where you go to work,” she says. “It’s a way of life.”
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