[B-Greek] Teaching Greek in churches [Was: Teaching mi verbs first]
Steve Westfall
steve.westfall at comcast.net
Thu Aug 2 00:34:28 EDT 2007
John and David,
I've been teaching Greek to a group of adults at my church, and our approach
is probably a little unusual for such a setting. Although their goal is to
be able to read the New Testament in Greek, I've started them with Classical
rather than Koine Greek. We are using the Athenaze grammar from Oxford
University Press, along with its accompanying Workbook.
Some people may think we're nuts, but I have found this to be a good way to
approach it. Athenaze actually includes both Classical and NT readings with
almost every chapter, and I've been supplementing that with additional NT
readings generally drawn from the Sunday lectionary (glossed as necessary).
Pedagogically, it is a hybrid of inductive and deductive methods. It
emphasizes the primacy of reading, and one learns new language features by
encountering them first in the readings. This is followed by a more
systematic presentation of grammar.
After we finish volume 2 of Athenaze, I will probably have them all get hold
of the on-line version of Funk's Beginning-Intermediate Grammar of
Hellenistic Greek (if it's complete by then) to help with differences
between Classical and Koine. But the reality is that by that time they will
already have become accustomed to most of the differences inductively
through their NT readings.
My hope is that when we're done, the students will have a better feel for
language features and different literary styles than if they had only
studied Koine.
Steve Westfall
-----Original Message-----
From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of David McCoy
Sent: Wednesday, August 01, 2007 1:32 PM
To: Carl W. Conrad; John M.Linebarger
Cc: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Teaching mi verbs first
Hello:
I will also be teaching a first year Greek class at our church this Fall,
using Mounce's Basics of BIblical Greek, so I appreciate being privy to this
discussion.
I have a number of grammars and have had various contacts over the years,
and have never heard of anyone teaching "mi" verbis first. Carl's advice
sounds great to me.
John, perhaps we can stay in touch, either via B-Greek if there are topics
of interest to all, or offline just for mutual advice and encouragement.
Sincerely,
David McCoy
On Wed, 1 Aug 2007, Carl W. Conrad wrote:
> Date: Wed, 1 Aug 2007 14:04:05 -0400
> From: Carl W. Conrad <cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu>
> To: John M.Linebarger <jmlineb at comcast.net>
> Cc: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Teaching mi verbs first
>
>
> On Aug 1, 2007, at 1:18 PM, John M. Linebarger wrote:
>
>> Hello! Deus [Deo?] Volente, I will be teaching a first year Greek
>> class at our church this Fall, using Mounce's Basics of BIblical
>> Greek. I have been advised by my teacher and mentor, Dr. Glen
>> Riddle, that it would be wise to teach mi verbs first instead of
>> omega verbs, because mi verbs occur all over the New Testament, and
>> because mi verbs are often an afterthought in the teaching of first
>> year Greek.
>>
>> The problem is paedogogy, finding appropriate exercises to teach mi
>> verbs that don't presuppose omega verbs and other moods having been
>> taught first. Mounce teaches mi verbs last, and his exercises are
>> rife with things taught in the previous chapters.
>>
>> Two questions. First, what does the group think about this approach?
>> Second, what exercises and sources would you recommend should I
>> decide to go ahead and try to teach mi verbs first?
>
> (1) The rationale strikes me as fishy from the start: MI-verbs do not
> appear ubiquitously to any greater extent than do W-verbs. Of course,
> this is a NT Greek class, but a somewhat comparable approach in
> Classical Greek was the one used at University of Text at one time
> (Morgan?) that did Ionic dialect and read Herodotus for the first
> semester before shifting over to Attic, on grounds that there's no
> irregularity of long alpha and eta vowels in Ionic. It matters not a
> whit with what item you begin; you will find that you can't do
> exercises or readings without building them upon elements not yet
> introduced and needing explanations.
>
> (2) Exercises and sources -- if you decide to go through with this
> experiment:
> (a) Whatever you do, don't create artificial sentences that aren't at
> least very closely based upon authentic Greek texts; (b)
> (b) Choose source texts that only use -MI verbs, if you can find
> them. If you can't, then consider going back and starting with W-
> verbs; if you decide to do that, I would urge that you get quickly
> into contract verbs, inasmuch as they really ARE ubiquitous.
>
> Carl W. Conrad
> Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
>
>
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