If you need tutoring in Hebrew or Greek and have special learning needs or simply want to work with someone who knows how to think creatively when it comes to teaching, Sarah Blake may be the right person to assist you. Sarah enjoyed studying French and Spanish early in her college career; but Hebrew and Greek presented particular challenges for her. As she explains in her post at State of Formation, she once thought that she would be unable to study Hebrew because she needed text in braille and she did not know that Hebrew could be put into braille. Her journey to successful language study taught her the value of perseverance and hard work. She hopes to help others to succeed in biblical language study as well, sometimes against more challenging circumstances than she faced.
Sarah has completed two years of study in both Hebrew and Greek at Anderson University School of Theology (Anderson, IN) and graduated with professional distinction in Hebrew. She served as a teaching assistant in an intensive Greek course in 2009 and has since provided tutoring in both Hebrew and Greek as needed. She specializes in assisting people with special learning needs. Her strengths include attention to students' individual learning needs, familiarity with language learning processes, and ability to teach students to understand differences in word order and learn to think through the processes necessary to translate a passage into clear wording. While most of her students have been sighted, Sarah's students have included some who were blind. She presented a paper at the 2011 annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature entitled "Using Technology to Meet the Needs of Biblical Language Scholars Who Are Blind." She maintains a repository of information regarding resources and techniques for empowering scholars who are blind to succeed in biblical language programs at http://biblang.night-light.org.
Sarah uses communication methods that best meet each person's needs. This may include one-on-one meetings for local students, telephone or Skype calls, email, exchange of audio files, or MSN chat sessions. Her rate for tutorial services is $15/hour. Please email her to discuss your tutoring needs.
