Persian · Specialist course
Farsi for heritage speakers, starting from what you already have
If you understand Persian and cannot read it, a beginner course wastes your ear and insults your vocabulary. This one starts from the gaps instead.
Who this is for
Is this the right course for you?
Adults who grew up hearing Persian at home, understand a great deal, and cannot read, write or operate in the formal register.
What you cover
What the lessons cover
- A diagnostic first, to find what you actually have and what is missing
- The Perso-Arabic script, taught at adult pace rather than beginner pace
- Writing, from short messages to formal correspondence
- The formal register that home Persian rarely includes
- Filling grammar gaps you never noticed because you learned by ear
- Reading modern prose and, if you want it, classical poetry
Heritage learners are a distinct kind of student and they are badly served by general courses. The profile is consistent: strong listening, a natural accent, hesitant production, and little or no literacy. That is close to the opposite of what a beginner course is designed for.
Starting with a diagnostic
The first lesson is largely assessment — conversation, some reading, some writing — so the tutor can see the actual shape of what you have. Heritage speakers routinely underestimate their listening and overestimate their grammar, and both matter for planning.
The formal register
Home Persian is affectionate, informal and often regional. Persian has a substantial formal register, including specific polite verb forms, that simply does not come up at a family dinner table. For many heritage speakers this is the largest single gap.
Persian for Heritage Speakers questions, answered properly
I understand Persian but cannot speak it well. Is that normal?
Extremely, and it has a name — receptive bilingualism. Children in diaspora families hear the language constantly and answer in English, which builds comprehension without production. The good news is that the hard part is already done. Production usually comes back quickly once you have a regular obligation to speak with someone who is not family.
Why not just join a beginner course?
Because it will bore you and it will teach you what you already know. Heritage speakers typically have effortless listening, a natural accent, and large gaps in literacy and formal register. A beginner course spends months on pronunciation and basic vocabulary you absorbed as a child, and never gets to the parts you actually need.
How long will it take to learn to read?
Faster than for a true beginner, because you already know the words the letters are spelling. Most heritage speakers read simple text within three to four weeks and read comfortably in three to six months. The script is a smaller obstacle than it looks once the vocabulary is already in your head.
Related courses
Other Persian courses
Dari
Aid and resettlement workers, interpreters, researchers, and people with Afghan family or community connections who need Dari rather than Iranian Persian.
Persian Poetry
Learners with roughly intermediate Persian who want the literature, and heritage speakers who can read the words of a ghazal without following the argument.
farsi tutor online — every level and every course we teach in Persian.
Start with a free Persian trial lesson
You meet the tutor, they work out where you actually are, and you both decide whether to carry on. If we are not the right fit, we will say so.