Nitza Krohn

Assistant Professor of Hebrew Language Instruction

Department: Hebrew, Jewish Education , National Association of Professors of Hebrew

Phone: (212) 678-8903

Email: nikrohn@jtsa.edu

Building Room: Kripke 401

Office Hours: By Appointment

Biography

BA and Teacher’s Diploma, Tel Aviv University; MA, Queens College; EdD, Columbia University

Nitza Krohn, an assistant professor of Hebrew Language Instruction, has been at The Jewish Theological Seminary since 1987. She has an EdD in applied linguistics from Teachers College, Columbia University.

Dr. Krohn has written extensively on Hebrew language pedagogy and methodology. Her book Reading Academic Hebrew: An Advanced Learner’s Handbook, published by Brill in 2011, articulates the grammatical and semantic knowledge that native Hebrew readers bring to the task of reading complex academic prose.   

Dr. Krohn has been a frequent presenter on topics related to the teaching of Hebrew at the annual meetings of the National Association of Professors of Hebrew (NAPH). She has also presented at the annual conference of the American Association of Applied Linguistics. She chairs the Pedagogy Committee of NAPH and is the editor of its publication, Hebrew Higher Education.

Publications 

  • Review of The Verb+ by Rivkah Bilboim. [In Hebrew.] Hebrew Higher Education 16 (2014): 231–35.
  • Review of Easing into Modern Hebrew Grammar: A User-Friendly Reference and Exercise Book, by Gila Freedman Cohen and Carmia Shoval. Hebrew Higher Education 15 (2013): 215–22.
  • Reading Academic Hebrew: An Advanced Learner’s Handbook. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2011.
  • “Teaching Rabbinical Students Hebrew: Findings from a Needs Analysis in the Conservative Movement.” Helkat Lashon 42 (2010–2011): 9–23.
  • “Does Hebrew (Still) Matter? Some Answers from a Hebrew Language Needs Analysis Study.” Conservative Judaism 61, no. 4 (Summer 2010): 4–16.
  • Review of Routledge Introductory Course in Modern Hebrew, by Giore Etzion. [In Hebrew.] Hebrew Higher Education 13 (2010): 175–78.
  • “The Hebrew Language Needs of Future Conservative Rabbis: A Needs Analysis.” Journal of Jewish Education 75, no. 3 (2009): 258–89.
  • “Reading (In)comprehension: Diagnosing Reading Difficulties of Advanced Learners of Hebrew Through the Analysis of Translation Errors.” [In Hebrew.] Hed Ha’Ulpan [Journal of Hebrew Language Acquisition, Ministry of Education, Israel] 90 (Fall 2006): 85–98.
  • Review of Language in Jewish Society, by John Myhill. Working Papers in TESOL and Applied Linguistics 6, no. 1 (Spring 2006).
  • Review of Hebrew for Level Gimmel, by Hiya Dahan. Hebrew Higher Education 10 (2003).
  • Review of the Hebrew software program Triple Play Plus, Hebrew Higher Education 5 (1998).
  • “Teaching Dictionary Use: Why, When, and How.” Hebrew Higher Education 5 (1998). 
  • “Corrective Feedback in Written Work.” Bulletin of Higher Hebrew Education 4, no. 2 (1991): 49–55.

Lectures

  • “A Methodological Framework for Planning Grammar Instruction.” MOFET International webinar, January 15, 2015. 
  • “The Status of Hebrew in the Conservative Movement in the United States: Findings from a Hebrew Language Needs Analysis of Conservative Rabbinical Students.” Israeli Association for Language and Society 8th Annual Conference, Jerusalem, June 30, 2009. 
  • “Teaching the Reading of Academic Hebrew to Nonnative Readers: Goals, Challenges, and Solutions.” NAPH International Conference on Hebrew Language, Literature, and Culture, Stanford University, California, June 19–22, 2005.
  • “A Pedagogical Framework for Teaching Grammar: Teaching Impersonal Sentences.” Annual Meeting of the International Center for University Teaching of Jewish Civilization, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, June 29–July 3, 2003.
  • “Contextualizing a Foreign Language Needs Assessment.” American Applied Linguistics Association Annual Conference, Arlington, VA, March 22–25, 2003 (copresenter). 
  • “The Planning and Teaching of a Course in Academic Reading in Hebrew.” Annual Meeting of the International Center for University Teaching of Jewish Civilization, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, January 5–9, 2003. 
  • “From the Zadik to the Zabar: The Rationale and Contents of a Thematic Hebrew Language Teaching Unit.” NAPH annual conference, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, July 2002.
  • “Investigating the Foreign Language Needs of Students in an Academic Setting.” New York Association of Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages (NYS TESOL) 31st Annual Conference, Rye Brook, NY, October 19, 2001 (team presentation). 
  • “Stages in the Development of an Achievement Test for Intermediate-Level Hebrew at The Jewish Theological Seminary.” Annual Meeting of the International Center for University Teaching of Jewish Civilization, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, July 2–6, 2000. 
  • “You Don’t Say It That Way in Hebrew: The Contribution of Error Analysis to Language Teaching.” NAPH Annual Conference, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, June 1999.  

Research

Second-language acquisition, needs assessment and curriculum development, teacher training, and the methodology and pedagogy of Hebrew-language teaching.