[B-Greek] re: What are some other languages

W. Fulton WarrenFulton at telering.at
Tue Apr 13 10:08:45 EDT 2004


On Sun, 11 Apr 2004 23:37:40 +0200, Randall Buth wrote:

> Now what about Greek and Hebrew? Language internalization requires
> extensive live use. Extensive reading is part of that extensive use but at
> some point (sooner is better than later) a person must use the language
> to communicate with others if the language is ever going to internalize.

Exam-fixated students might just shrug their shoulders here and and claim
that they never really need to "internalize" the language, just reproduce
the forms. But what does "language internalization" mean? That you can
produce the forms out of a natural sense of how the forms work together in
communication, rather than having to refer mentally to external charts and
abstract rules before you piece the forms together as if you were writing in
code. Likewise, reading without the internalized language facility is
decoding, a laborious process at best. Even if your exams are strictly
limited to the written domain, internalized fluency from "live use" will
boost your score significantly.

This may seem counterintuitive. After all, we learn how to speak by speaking
and how to understand by listening, why shouldn't we learn how to read just
by reading? Probably because reading depends on listening in the natural
order of things. Listening comes first, before we learn to read. Reading is
really "listening to the text." In trying to predict how successful
beginning readers will be, primary school teachers have identified 3 key
indicators: phonological awareness, oral language proficiency, and verbal IQ
(cf. Quiroga, Lemos-Bitton, et al. Univ. of Washington, 2001). A study by
Lopez-Emslie (SW Reg. Conference of the International Reading Association,
1985) found that "efficient readers" had equally high "oral Engish language
proficiency" and that "the Oral Language Dominance Measure is a good
indicator of future English reading success."

As teachers and students of Greek, we need to look at reading as a sub-skill
of the communicative process (formulating and receiving messages). If we
don't, we may find that our ability to read biblical texts may have more to
do with our long-standing familiarity with the texts themselves rather than
the underlying language system.

> A sobering thought for a young student is that it is possible to read for
> thirty years and never internalize a language. (I've had students doubt
> this statement, but ask your Greek teacher to tell you in Greek how
> they spent their time last week. A German teacher can rapidly respond
> even if they don't know what to report.)

As Dr. Buth points out, this will have profound implications for our
methodology:

> I recommend common-sense from what we know works in testable
> languages in order to measure if we are making the right kind of
> progress in biblical languages. A student who spends 4 years in college
> and 3-4 years in seminary, or perhaps another 3-6 years in grad
> school should aim at nothing less than a fluent control of Greek and
> Hebrew, except that I feel that the educational structures that exist do
> not move in such a direction.

If I understand this correctly, we should look to proven techniques in
modern language teaching to support Greek pedagogy. Is this the thrust of
the the SBL "Oral Language Initiative"?

Warren Fulton
Vienna




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