[B-Greek] Another source for digital vocabulary tools

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Fri Aug 17 07:13:57 EDT 2007


In the course of this morning's blog review, I've come upon the  
following (at http://tinyurl.com/2xeo77) that may be useful for those  
wanting to make their own flashcards or vocabulary tools for  
acquisition of Greek vocabulary:
========
Learn a foreign language on the cheap

The No Thick Manuals wiki details how to learn a language efficiently  
using two free, open source applications. The first is jVLT (java  
Vocabulary Learning Tool), a completely cross platform flash card  
application. The second is StarDict, a Windows/Linux-only dictionary  
that provides an impressive array of features and dictionaries.  
Granted, most of us would require some textbooks and/or audio  
supplements, but anyone learning a language needs a good dictionary  
and some flash cards, and these free desktop applications sound a lot  
simpler than making flash cards by hand and manually looking up words  
in your dictionary. If you're a language nut, share your favorite  
tools in the comments.
=========
More information, for those interested, is at "No Thick  
Manuals" (http://tinyurl.com/26y5cs) which has helpful screen shots  
and URLs for retrieving the programs in question.

The caveat I'd add is the same as that I reiterate regarding cheap  
glossaries and dictionaries: one ought not to suppose that  
acquisition of one, two, or three or four glosses for a Greek word  
can bring anyone mastery of that word; there's no substitute, when it  
comes to more important words, for STUDYING the entry in an  
unabridged lexicon and reviewing carefully the exemplary citations  
for variant usages there (and of course, there's no dictionary that  
is wholly free from errors or dubious judgments.

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)





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