Help me teach this class

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cwconrad
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by cwconrad »

Stephen Hughes wrote:If you want another obvious one:
Jonathan Robie wrote:ποῦ κλινεῖ ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου;
If κλινεῖ were taken as the verb "rest", it would be the "rest" that meant "the broom was resting up against the wall". "Rest" as in "sleep" could be καθεύδειν. "Rest" as in "chill out" (which could involve sleeping), might be ἀναπαύεσθαι. Probably the closest synonym to the phrase used here - τὴν κεφαλὴν κλίνειν - would be καθεύδειν "sleep" (in short), or οὔτε ἔχειν προσκεφάλαιον καὶ ἡ γῆ ψυχρά ἐστιν. "to not have a pillow when the ground is cold" (cf. John 4:11).

In short, κλινεῖ can't be used to abbreviate τὴν κεφαλὴν κλίνειν, you need to paraphrase or use the phrase in full.
"To lay one's head" is idiomatic here; think of the range of expressions in colloquial English to express the same notion: "crash", "bed down", "shack up", "settle down", "stay" (= μένειν), ...
οὔτοι ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς πάντα θεοὶ θνητοῖς ὑπέδειξαν,
ἀλλὰ χρόνῳ ζητέοντες ἐφευρίσκουσιν ἄμεινον. (Xenophanes, Fragment 16)

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
Jonathan Robie
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by Jonathan Robie »

Experiences from last Sunday's class ...

Unsurprisingly, review on asking / answering questions from the previous week was needed. When they aren't studying much between classes, and classes are once a week, planning for lots of review is really important.

I had somehow misplaced the large sheets of paper with questions printed out, and that made the class significantly more difficult for the person who is newest to Greek, he had a hard time understanding my questions without printed prompts, which resulted in too much "frown and frustration" time for him. I need to make sure the prompts are at hand. A projector would be really helpful for this.

Dividing things up into a "script" with identified "players" was really very helpful.

As comments in this thread make plain, it's easy to get the grammar wrong when writing questions, so getting feedback on the questions I write is very important. But I do think that this questions-based approach is a good one. And forcing myself to learn to write more correct Greek is a good thing ... thanks for all the help!
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
Jonathan Robie
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by Jonathan Robie »

This Sunday, we'll be finishing Luke 9. As always, I would very much appreciate corrections to my Greek before I inflict my mistakes on students, and I'm interested in ideas for teaching this better.

Here's the remaining portion of the chapter:
εἶπεν δὲ καὶ ἕτερος· Ἀκολουθήσω σοι, κύριε· πρῶτον δὲ ἐπίτρεψόν μοι ἀποτάξασθαι τοῖς εἰς τὸν οἶκόν μου. εἶπεν δὲ ὁ Ἰησοῦς· Οὐδεὶς ἐπιβαλὼν τὴν χεῖρα ἐπ’ ἄροτρον καὶ βλέπων εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω εὔθετός ἐστιν τῇ βασιλείᾳ τοῦ θεοῦ.
It's a short text, but the next chunk in Luke 10 is larger than I want to tack on, so we'll have plenty of time for this text this week. I might try some more things Randall and Paul have suggested. I'm going to try acting out central vocabulary before we read the text like a play and ask questions about it.

Here is the same text segmented into dialogs:

ὁ διηγούμενος:
εἶπεν δὲ καὶ ἕτερος·

ἄνθρωπός καὶ ἕτερος:
Ἀκολουθήσω σοι, κύριε· πρῶτον δὲ ἐπίτρεψόν μοι ἀποτάξασθαι τοῖς εἰς τὸν οἶκόν μου.

ὁ διηγούμενος:
εἶπεν δὲ ὁ Ἰησοῦς·

ὁ Ἰησοῦς:
Οὐδεὶς ἐπιβαλὼν τὴν χεῖρα ἐπ’ ἄροτρον καὶ βλέπων εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω εὔθετός ἐστιν τῇ βασιλείᾳ τοῦ θεοῦ.
But before we do the dialog and question, I'm going to try introducing important vocabulary and phrases in a more Buth / Nitz manner ...
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by Jonathan Robie »

(Continuing plans for this week's lesson, starting with http://www.ibiblio.org/bgreek/forum/vie ... 642#p21641)

Scanning this quickly, there are some verbs that are pretty easy to act out:
  • βλέπω εἰς τὰ πρός.
  • βλέπω εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω.
  • βλέπετε εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω!
  • βλέπετε εἰς τὰ πρός!
I'll have to avoid the urge to get too silly and say things like ἔλεγε ὁ Σίμων;

ἐπιβάλλω is also a nice concrete verb for acting out, but we need something to put our hands on. A book will do, but we also need a plow. Like this one:

Image

(The same illustration could be used for Deuteronomy 22:10, οὐκ ἀροτριάσεις ἐν μόσχῳ καὶ ὄνῳ ἐπὶ τὸ αὐτό, but that's not our text this week ....)

If I print that picture on pieces of paper, or one piece of paper in the middle (it's a small class), and put a book within reach for variety, I can now say things like:
  • ἐπιβάλλω τὴν χεῖρα ἐπ’ ἄροτρον.
  • ἐπιβάλλω τὴν χεῖρα ἐπ’ ἄροτρον καὶ βλέπω εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω.
  • ἐπιβάλλω τὴν χεῖρα ἐπ’ ἄροτρον καὶ βλέπω εἰς τὰ πρός.
  • ἐπιβάλλετε τὴν χεῖρα ἐπ’ ἄροτρον καὶ βλέπετε εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω!
  • ἐπιβάλλετε τὴν χεῖρα ἐπ’ ἄροτρον καὶ βλέπετε εἰς τὰ πρός!
  • ἐπιβάλλω τὴν χεῖρα ἐπί βιβλίον.
  • ἐπιβάλλετε τὴν χεῖρα ἐπί βιβλίον καὶ βλέπετε εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω!
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
Jonathan Robie
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by Jonathan Robie »

I don't have any great ideas for introducing εὔθετός without just giving the English word. Anyone have any useful ideas for this?
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
Jonathan Robie
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by Jonathan Robie »

A continuing frustration: I really need freely distributable images for the kinds of things you see in biblical texts. For this class, I think I can claim fair use, so I can print out this image if I decide I want an illustration of a house:

Image

(Again, this Sunday's lesson starts here: http://www.ibiblio.org/bgreek/forum/vie ... 642#p21641)
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
RandallButh
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by RandallButh »

Jonathan Robie wrote:I don't have any great ideas for introducing εὔθετός without just giving the English word. Anyone have any useful ideas for this?
Try a children's puzzle where the cut-out pieces of fruit or animals are different shapes and then place one where it is εὔθετος and then another where it is not. A jigsaw puzzle could also work, but they are small pieces for showing a number of people at once.
Jonathan Robie
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by Jonathan Robie »

RandallButh wrote:
Jonathan Robie wrote:I don't have any great ideas for introducing εὔθετός without just giving the English word. Anyone have any useful ideas for this?
Try a children's puzzle where the cut-out pieces of fruit or animals are different shapes and then place one where it is εὔθετος and then another where it is not. A jigsaw puzzle could also work, but they are small pieces for showing a number of people at once.
Ah - we have plenty of that kind of thing in surrounding Sunday School classes! That could work.
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
Jonathan Robie
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by Jonathan Robie »

What remains is mostly this phrase:

πρῶτον δὲ ἐπίτρεψόν μοι ἀποτάξασθαι τοῖς εἰς τὸν οἶκόν μου.

Would waving good-bye be reasonable for ἀποτάξασθαι?
  • ἀποτάσσω. (waving hand good-bye, then turning around to leave)
  • ἀποτάσσετε!
  • (picking a victim) οὐκ ἐπιτρέπω σοι ἀποτάσσεις!
I might want to pick a sequence of actions for πρῶτος and δεύτερος ...
  • πρῶτος ἀποτάσσεις, δεύτερος πορεύεσθε!
I'd be surprised if there aren't a few composition mistakes in that ...
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
Jonathan Robie
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Re: Help me teach this class

Post by Jonathan Robie »

I think the overall plan is something like this:

1. Socialize for a little while

2. First part of text
ὁ διηγούμενος:
εἶπεν δὲ καὶ ἕτερος·

ἄνθρωπός καὶ ἕτερος:
Ἀκολουθήσω σοι, κύριε· πρῶτον δὲ ἐπίτρεψόν μοι ἀποτάξασθαι τοῖς εἰς τὸν οἶκόν μου.
Act out the parts mentioned above (to be refined) to make sure people grasp the basic meaning. Review question forms used in previous weeks. Ask questions about the above text (note to self: make sure I have printed copies of these questions in large print):
  • τίς εἶπε;
  • τί θέλει ὁ ἄνθρωπος πρῶτον ποιῆσαι;
  • τίνι θέλει ὁ ἄνθρωπος ἀποτάξασθαι;
I need to add a few questions ... then on to reading the second part of the text:
ὁ διηγούμενος:
εἶπεν δὲ ὁ Ἰησοῦς·

ὁ Ἰησοῦς:
Οὐδεὶς ἐπιβαλὼν τὴν χεῖρα ἐπ’ ἄροτρον καὶ βλέπων εἰς τὰ ὀπίσω εὔθετός ἐστιν τῇ βασιλείᾳ τοῦ θεοῦ.
Then acting out what's needed, and asking appropriate questions, which I still have to work out.

After that, of course, we get to discuss what this means for us in our lives. But that's the part that doesn't go on B-Greek.
ἐξίσταντο δὲ πάντες καὶ διηποροῦντο, ἄλλος πρὸς ἄλλον λέγοντες, τί θέλει τοῦτο εἶναι;
http://jonathanrobie.biblicalhumanities.org/
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