When I first started learning Hebrew in 1994 most
When I first started learning Hebrew in 1994, most books jumped into teaching sentences and grammar, and only covered the Hebrew alphabet on one or two pages. You really cannot learn how to read Hebrew with just one or two pages of training. You really need a whole course dedicated to that subject. Finally, I found an exercise book that was dedicated to just teaching a person to read the Hebrew letters. This book would teach one letter, and a few vowels in the first chapter. The second chapter would follow-up with the same letter, and add another letter and another vowel or two. In Hebrew, the vowels are written below or above the Hebrew letters, and they are called Nikud. Using this methodology, I finally got to where I could read Hebrew words “on site”. Then I could make out words in the course book, the Sidur, or the Hebrew Bible and finally be able to pronounce them, even if I didn’t know what they meant. As a beginner though, I didn’t always know if my pronunciation was correct or not.