Hello!
About six months ago, I finally decided that I was going to learn Ancient Greek. So far it’s been equally challenging and rewarding. Unfortunately, I think much of the difficulty is due to a lack of fitting teaching materials. Indeed, I was somewhat surprised to discover that the best resources seem to be an Italian textbook unavailable in most regions (Athenaze), a translation of a German textbook long out of print (Zuntz), and an introduction to the fundamentals of the language written before the American Civil War (Kendrick’s Ollendorff).
These materials seem to be favored because they’re more in tune with principles established by newer research into second-language acquisition, as opposed to the more traditional grammar-translation methods still used by most textbooks. Thus, I’d be interested to hear if any of you have any thoughts regarding another textbook that uses a very different approach: “Ancient Greek: A structural programme” by C.D. Ellis and A. Schachter. Released in the 1970s, it’s a massive work of more than 1400-pages divided into two volumes. It seems to have a lot going for it, but I haven’t seen any discussion of it.
First of all, the course has a much stronger oral focus than what’s usual. It consists of 30 units with a common six-part structure. I’ll paraphrase the authors:
“Part A consists of simplified passages from Plato’s “Euthyphro” and “the Symposium” of Xenophon, which are to be learned by heart. These passages introduce and exemplify the elements which are being taught in the unit.
Part B consists of a series of self-correcting oral drills in which the new elements are taught. Each series of drills has a mimicry section, in which the new forms are learned by imitating the material given to you. Then there’s a section of recognition, in which you are asked to prove that you can recognize the new forms in contrast with other forms. Finally, there’s a section of production, in which you are asked to produce the new forms in contrast with other forms.
Part C is devoted to grammatical explanations of the forms introduced in part A and B.
Part D collects additional supplementary readings from Euthyphro and Symposium. They are for practice in the comprehension of Greek, which will be tested by the accompanying questions that are to be answered in Greek.
Part E consists of composition exercises.
Finally, Part F is a summary of the vocabulary that appears in the unit.”
In other words, except for section E, all the drills consist of listening and speaking. This enables one to work way faster than by writing. It’s also an excellent way of internalizing the language and vocabulary, because all the forms are presented in the context of short phrases, never as isolated paradigms (these follow in the section on grammar and in the appendix). Thus, you also get plenty of comprehensible input, and you’re forced to think in the language as well because all the drills are Greek → Greek, not Greek → English.
Secondly, the book is very thorough, both in scope and depth. In contrast to Kendrick’s Ollendorff, it covers all the basic grammar and then some. It has a thorough discussion on pronunciation and many sections devoted solely to practicing pitch accents. By the end, you’ve read the entire Euthyphro and 1/3 of the Symposium and learned over 1000 different lexical items. Thus, the transition to “real” Greek should be smoother because from the beginning that’s exactly what you’ve been reading.
The book is also very useful for self-study because all the drills are structured in such a way that you can check and correct your answer immediately. For me, this has been a big advantage compared to Zuntz and Athenaze.
On the downside, I quite frankly think the course is too demanding for absolute beginners. There’s so much information and so many exercises that I think you’ll be overwhelmed unless you have a foundation to build upon, or a teacher to guide you. At least I was! Furthermore, in keeping with the conversational approach of the course, it’s clear that all the readings and exercises were recorded, and that this recording was meant to be used together with the text. Unfortunately, I’ve been unable to find these recordings anywhere. Instead I simply read the text myself, and that almost always works fine. Still, it would be an amazing improvement if the recordings were available, especially given the limited supply of Greek audio-materials. Judging from the text they’re probably in the range of 100 hours! There’s also a couple of improvements that could be made to facilitate the independent student. The most important is that the sections containing supplementary materials and composition exercises could be given answer-keys or translations. Lastly, the text itself is out of print and difficult to find.
To sum up, I would be very interested to hear what someone more competent than me thinks of this textbook. At the very least it seems to be worth knowing about. In theory, many of the drawbacks could be improved. Answer keys could be written for the composition and supplementary sections. Someone skilled in pronunciation could re-record the drills, making sure to maintain proper vowel-length and pitch. I think this would make the course a great resource for those past the absolute beginner stage. The biggest obstacle right now is probably availability. A high quality scan would be ideal, but at this point I’m only aware of a scan of the first volume. Those with knowledge of the dark arts may easily find it in the usual places.