Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

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KramerKram
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Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by KramerKram »

Since some people have been talking about starting a thread for those going through the Italian Athenaze, I thought I would go ahead.

I am about to begin Chapter 6. It's slow going for me, because I'm transcribing all (Greek to Greek) of the μελετήματα (exercises) into my Flashcard program (Anki).

As I am going along, I am adding my own notes. My goal is monolingual/pictorial instruction. I use the same symbols and methods of the book and Lingua Latina to try and make the experience more inductive than it already is.

_________________________________

These are the resources I have been using to try and figure out the meaning without using a Greek-English Lexicon:

For Greek-Greek meanings:
Lexicon of Four Languages (Λεξικὸν Τετράγλωσσον) - Definitely the most useful for me so far.
A Greek Boy at Home Vocabulary (very useful towards beginning, less useful after around chapter 3).
Online Suda - Ancient Greek Encyclopedia - Hard to search. Very helpful if you can find what you are looking for. Needs Unicode search option.

For finding synonyms:
Edwards, An English-Greek Lexicon
Woodhouse, English-Greek Dictionary
Louw-Nida (Koine, and I use BibleWorks)

Other:
Kalos for checking my declensions/conjugations (Careful, this one has some accent errors. But there is nothing else like it out there: it can conjugate or decline practically anything.)**
Diogenes - For when I'm comparing synonyms, or I just can't figure out what a word means. Requires Unicode Greek input, I believe.
Polis - For Grammatical Terms in Greek Can also be ordered from Amazon.ca.
ֹAthenaze American - Occasionally, when I want to figure out what something means in the immediate context of Athenze, I check the American version.
Smyth - For Grammar (when I'm doing the μελετήματα)

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My biggest complaint against Italian Athenaze (hereafter ItAth) is that it doesn't teach grammar in Greek. I believe it was someone on here who said that Grammar is important for understanding a language, but the best way is to study the Grammar in the said language. Lingua Latina did it, I believe ItAth could have as well. Since it didn't, I'm having to use all the sources above to do it myself, so to speak.

About myself: I have a background in Classical Greek with more emphasis on Koine. After seeing the rapid progress in actual reading ability I attained using Lingua Latina, I decided to go back to try and immerse myself in Greek. So, my notes in my book and my flashcard program may contain synonyms that are not used in Athenaze, but I recognize them. So please don't ask for my notes or my flashcard deck unless you understand that caveat.





** http://www.kalos-software.com has been marked as a malicious website for some reason, so I have provided a direct link to the download above.

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Prometheus
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Re: Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by Prometheus »

I only have the second volume of the Italian edition (which I ordered by mistake!) and the first volume of the English edition (along with the excerpts from Volume I provided for free download by the Italian publishers), but I'm only about half-way through the first volume. I'd be glad to join you in discussing Athenaze.

(Incidentally, I like the way they explain the grammar in the Italian edition, for example, how the middle voice works.)

How would you like to start? What kind of exercises or activities do you find helpful?

Lee

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Prometheus
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Re: Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by Prometheus »

Are you still interested in forming an Athenaze study group?

Would you like to start with Lesson 6?

Lee

Damoetas
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Re: Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by Damoetas »

KramerKram wrote:My biggest complaint against Italian Athenaze (hereafter ItAth) is that it doesn't teach grammar in Greek. I believe it was someone on here who said that Grammar is important for understanding a language, but the best way is to study the Grammar in the said language. Lingua Latina did it, I believe ItAth could have as well. Since it didn't, I'm having to use all the sources above to do it myself, so to speak.
Grammatical explanations in the target language are certainly nice, but I don't believe that not having them constitutes any major handicap. The main thing you need to learn a language is lots of comprehensible input of that language; as long as you're reading lots of Greek (and preferably, hearing it too), it doesn't matter if the grammar is explained to you in English or in Greek.

On the other hand, I do think it's important for a textbook to give you as many examples as possible of a new grammatical construction. A lot of them just tell you, "Ok, this is what this means," and then expect you to go off and apply it through a process of logical deduction. Instead, they ought to give you tons of example of it being used in real contexts, preferably contrasted with other constructions, so you can train yourself to understand it instinctively.
Dic mihi, Damoeta, 'cuium pecus' anne Latinum?

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thesaurus
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Re: Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by thesaurus »

I'm happy to contribute to this group. I've read through both volumes of ItAth, but that was a while ago. I recently read my way through the first volume again and the first few chapters of the second. I could always use some review.
Horae quidem cedunt et dies et menses et anni, nec praeteritum tempus umquam revertitur nec quid sequatur sciri potest. Quod cuique temporis ad vivendum datur, eo debet esse contentus. --Cicero, De Senectute

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Prometheus
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Re: Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by Prometheus »

Glad to have you with us, Thesaurus!

I have Vol. 2 of the Italian Athenaze and Chapters 6 and 11 from the Italian edition of Vol. 1 (along with an English version of Vol. 1).

Should we start to work on the exercises of Chapt. 6 and compare our answers in the forum? Or somewhere else? Or quote noteworthy sentences from the Greek text? Or ask questions about the grammar and vocabulary? What would you find most useful?

Clemens
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Re: Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by Clemens »

Χαίρετε!

I'm now working my way through the Italian version of Athenaze and I'm wondering if there is some kind of solutions manual to the exercises of Athenaze and Meletemata?

Interaxus
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Re: Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by Interaxus »

Clemens:

There's a Teacher's Handbook for Book 1 (affordable) and a Teacher's Handbook for Book 2 (will cost you your shirt!). They go with the English editions but should work equally well with the Italian editions - I know the Book 1 handbook (from 1990) does.

Cheers,
Int

christophe
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Re: Athenaze (Italian) Study Group

Post by christophe »

I would like to inform that an Italian edition of Polis has been published recently : Polis parlare il greco antico come una lingua viva, San Paolo editions. http://www.libreriauniversitaria.it/pol ... 8821568473
In addition, the German edition of Polis is going to be published next fall by Helmut Buske.

Christophe

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