John 1:1-9 with teacher's notes

[Jonathan Robie]

Micheal Palmer and I are working on living language approaches geared toward the text of the Greek New Testament. Here are notes for teaching John 1:1-9 using this approach.

John 1_1-9withteacherNotes.pdf

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We're building on this approach, so feedback is very welcome.

[Wes Wood]

In order for me to give you meaningful feedback, it would be helpful to know what your goals are for this exercise. At the end of the lesson, what should the students know?

[Jonathan Robie]

In order for me to give you meaningful feedback, it would be helpful to know what your goals are for this exercise. At the end of the lesson, what should the students know?

This is a lesson for people who know the alphabet and not much else. The goal is to teach enough Greek to understand John 1:1-9 at a basic level, including some basic vocabulary.

A little context: in the class I teach on Sunday, we are now in chapter 3, and much further along in the language, including teaching more grammar. We're now trying to create teacher's notes that expand on what I have been doing. The goal is to teach Greek as we work through the Gospel of John.

[Wes Wood]

The goal is to teach enough Greek to understand John 1:1-9 at a basic level, including some basic vocabulary.

My Download only went through verse 5.

My hesitance to respond initially was out of concern that I would comment on areas that didn't overlap with what you were/are trying to accomplish and would therefore be unhelpful. In my own classes, I communicate the specific objectives that I am attempting to teach and try to evaluate my success based on whether or not my students learned what I intended. It helps me to structure my lesson around a few major points, and it helps the students know where to focus their attention. I am not trying to say that you should follow this practice; I am trying to say forgive me if my comments miss the the mark. Also, forgive me if it seems like I am suggesting you alter your lesson.

Initial Impressions:
1) In the lesson there is a great deal of information taken for granted besides τἰς, ποῦ, and πότε. This is understandable in a setting where your audience is already familiar with John 1:1-9 in English, but it makes the lesson much less helpful for those who are not. It also makes stating your learning objectives much more difficult (if you chose to do so).

2) I think you and your students would benefit from increasing the number of the clauses you are teaching at once. It would give you more information to work with and would let you focus on overlapping vocabulary if you desired. I have found that if I focus on too small of an objective it is more difficult for me not to speed through it. It may be better to make two or three passes through the same material. E.g. Teach through the first three clauses then start at the beginning and cover those objectives again as a cumulative review.

3) I love the pictures that you are using, but I think you need more of them. If I were a part of your class, I'm not sure that I would have been able to make all the connections you are trying to make. This is especially true with the pictures on pages 5 and 6. I envision myself thinking: Girl with sister? Girl without sister? Girl with hug? Girl without hug? etc.

4) It might be better to use καί and πρός in the pictures above instead of μετὰ + gen. since they are used in the passage and could be used to convey the same idea.

5) τίς εἶ τὸ οὗτος; In addition to what has already been said, I am concerned about the verb.

I hope some of this, at least, helps.

[Jonathan Robie]

This is helpful feedback - let me respond, and I hope Micheal will also respond. We'll also upload a revised lesson (this may not be immediately).

My hesitance to respond initially was out of concern that I would comment on areas that didn't overlap with what you were/are trying to accomplish and would therefore be unhelpful. In my own classes, I communicate the specific objectives that I am attempting to teach and try to evaluate my success based on whether or not my students learned what I intended. It helps me to structure my lesson around a few major points, and it helps the students know where to focus their attention. I am not trying to say that you should follow this practice; I am trying to say forgive me if my comments miss the the mark. Also, forgive me if it seems like I am suggesting you alter your lesson.

It's fine to suggest that we change the lesson, we are trying to learn how to do something differently, and I'm sure we have a lot to learn. I don't know how you teach, or in what setting, I have not yet used a lesson in this format with a real class, I use a different format, with printed texts that I hand out to the students, asking questions about each clause and sentence. I do use pictures and activities to introduce concepts when they seem helpful, but I also use English as needed, with brief explanations. Micheal teaches ESL and SSL, and in his setting, they use no English when teaching Spanish. In this lesson, we were trying to do that. I don't know how well it would work until we try it on a class, and I'm sure we would revise it based on how that goes.

My Sunday School lessons are driven by the text, but I also keep track of the vocabulary and grammar that is taught, and build on it as we go. Instead of starting with a set of things to teach, and getting to the text later, I start with the text and keep track of the things I teach as I go along. Once we have encountered a set of forms or a construct several times, I start introducing it more systematically, e.g. I just showed them where to find verb forms and primary and secondary active and middle verb endings on Mounce's summary, using forms we have encountered multiple times, helping them pick apart the morphology in specific verbs. The lessons I am doing with Micheal are based loosely on the Sunday School lessons, I'm learning as we go. In my Sunday School lessons, there are usually two objectives: (1) understand the passage well enough to answer basic questions about it in Greek, (2) a language objective based on something I see in the text. What we want people to be able to do at the end of this lesson is show that they understand the text at a basic level and can demonstrate that by answering questions, and demonstrate knowledge of basic vocabulary that we are introducing. It's a first lesson.

Initial Impressions:
1) In the lesson there is a great deal of information taken for granted besides τἰς, ποῦ, and πότε. This is understandable in a setting where your audience is already familiar with John 1:1-9 in English, but it makes the lesson much less helpful for those who are not. It also makes stating your learning objectives much more difficult (if you chose to do so).

Micheal can respond to this better than I can. In his setting, I think he would probably say that his goal is not to teach each item explicitly, because it's good for students to riddle out some things from context, instead of having each thing explicitly taught. On the other hand, we have to teach enough that they can "get it". But he will probably respond and agree or disagree with me. And this lesson has not yet been road tested.

In my Sunday School lessons, which use a different format, I fill in quite a bit with short statements in English, which is out of bounds in his ESL approach. In my Sunday School class, there is one language learning objective, and it's not "everything in this passage". It might be "distinguish the nominative, accusative, and dative of this set of words from the lesson". But there's also a content objective, which is "understand this passage well enough to answer basic questions". In practice, I tend to measure understanding by asking questions that identify the subject, object(s), and adjuncts of each verb. We're trying to use questions in a similar way here.

2) I think you and your students would benefit from increasing the number of the clauses you are teaching at once. It would give you more information to work with and would let you focus on overlapping vocabulary if you desired. I have found that if I focus on too small of an objective it is more difficult for me not to speed through it. It may be better to make two or three passes through the same material. E.g. Teach through the first three clauses then start at the beginning and cover those objectives again as a cumulative review.

Possibly, but I'm not sure I agree for a first lesson. In the Sunday School classes, I've noticed that the first lessons worked with very small bits of text, and the size of the chunks is increasing significantly as students get a grasp of the language. I still tend to ask 2-3 questions for each verb, they can now answer most of these questions much more easily than they once did, so there's much less teaching per sentence now. I also use leading questions for things that they might not understand.

3) I love the pictures that you are using, but I think you need more of them. If I were a part of your class, I'm not sure that I would have been able to make all the connections you are trying to make. This is especially true with the pictures on pages 5 and 6. I envision myself thinking: Girl with sister? Girl without sister? Girl with hug? Girl without hug? etc.

Yes, I agree that those pictures are weaker. We actually have more pictures than the ones in that lesson, but probably not enough. I think we're better with ἡ ἀρχή and ἡ τελευτή than we are with χωρὶς αὐτοῦ. I've had difficulty finding good freely-licensed photographs to illustrate some of this, it wouldn't be hard to take pictures or design an activity to illustrate μετὰ αὐτοῦ versus χωρὶς αὐτοῦ. But it is harder to find a picture or design an activity to illustrate δι’ αὐτοῦ, which is why we used the leading question:

διὰ τίνος ἐγένετο πάντα; διὰ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, ἢ διὰ τοῦ λόγου?

In general, I find that some things are much easier to illustrate with pictures and actions than others, I find leading questions when these fail, and I currently still feel free to use English phrases when these things fail. Micheal does not use English except as a last resort.

4) It might be better to use καί and πρός in the pictures above instead of μετὰ + gen. since they are used in the passage and could be used to convey the same idea.

Possibly. But μετὰ + gen is a better antonym, and easier for people to "get it" if we find or create better pictures of "with" versus "without". In my Sunday School class, I feel very free to introduce an antonym when I introduce a word, teaching the two together, or to introduce a small cluster of semantically related words at the same time. But when I introduce an "extra" word, it's always a common word that they are going to encounter in the text as we progress.

5) τίς εἶ τὸ οὗτος; In addition to what has already been said, I am concerned about the verb..

Perhaps it would be better to start with this statement:

οὗτος—ὁ λόγος— ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν.

Then use the leading question:

τίς ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν;

And when they answer ὁ λόγος ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν, then reinforce it with ναί,ὁ λόγος ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν. οὗτος—ὁ λόγος— ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν.

[Jonathan Robie]

Micheal and I have started collecting images here:

• https://www.pinterest.com/jonathanrobie ... ent-greek/
• https://www.pinterest.com/jonathanrobie/john-1/
• https://www.pinterest.com/jonathanrobie/john-2/

For χωρίς, I added the following images today.

μετά



χωρίς



μετά



χωρίς



μετά



χωρίς

[Wes Wood]

It's fine to suggest that we change the lesson, we are trying to learn how to do something differently, and I'm sure we have a lot to learn. I don't know how you teach, or in what setting, I have not yet used a lesson in this format with a real class, I use a different format, with printed texts that I hand out to the students, asking questions about each clause and sentence. I do use pictures and activities to introduce concepts when they seem helpful, but I also use English as needed, with brief explanations. Micheal teaches ESL and SSL, and in his setting, they use no English when teaching Spanish. In this lesson, we were trying to do that. I don't know how well it would work until we try it on a class, and I'm sure we would revise it based on how that goes.

I meant that my goal in responding is to give feedback that aligns with what you are doing. If it seems that I am going an entirely different direction, it is very likely I misunderstand what you are doing or didn't communicate what I had intended. That is one reason why I asked for clarification about your goals. The more information I have about what your objectives are, the less likely it is that miscommunications will occur. The section below is a great example of helpful background information.

In my Sunday School class, there is one language learning objective, and it's not "everything in this passage". It might be "distinguish the nominative, accusative, and dative of this set of words from the lesson". But there's also a content objective, which is "understand this passage well enough to answer basic questions".

Possibly, but I'm not sure I agree for a first lesson. In the Sunday School classes, I've noticed that the first lessons worked with very small bits of text, and the size of the chunks is increasing significantly as students get a grasp of the language. I still tend to ask 2-3 questions for each verb, they can now answer most of these questions much more easily than they once did, so there's much less teaching per sentence now. I also use leading questions for things that they might not understand.

Now that I think I understand what you are doing a little better, I think you are right. Just to be sure we were on the same page though, I wasn't suggesting you cover more text. I think the total amount of text covered is perfect.

Yes, I agree that those pictures are weaker. We actually have more pictures than the ones in that lesson, but probably not enough. I think we're better with ἡ ἀρχή and ἡ τελευτή than we are with χωρὶς αὐτοῦ. I've had difficulty finding good freely-licensed photographs to illustrate some of this, it wouldn't be hard to take pictures or design an activity to illustrate μετὰ αὐτοῦ versus χωρὶς αὐτοῦ. But it is harder to find a picture or design an activity to illustrate δι’ αὐτοῦ, which is why we used the leading question:

διὰ τίνος ἐγένετο πάντα; διὰ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, ἢ διὰ τοῦ λόγου?

In general, I find that some things are much easier to illustrate with pictures and actions than others, I find leading questions when these fail, and I currently still feel free to use English phrases when these things fail. Micheal does not use English except as a last resort.

There is no doubt that some things are easier to do with pictures than others. I will definitely be following along with this project as it unfolds. It seems very different from any other approach that I have seen.

[Wes Wood]

The new pictures you have posted are very nice.

[RandallButh]

οὐ <χώρις> ἀλλὰ <χωρίς>

παρακαλῶ.

[Jonathan Robie]

οὐ <χώρις> ἀλλὰ <χωρίς>

παρακαλῶ.

Thanks - I'll fix this above and on Pinterest.