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Acquisition of grammar - charlmartell | ||
Tags: Learning Technique/Method | Grammar | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| charlmartell Super Polyglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 6244 days ago 286 posts - 298 votes  Speaks: French, English, German, Luxembourgish*, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch, Italian, Latin, Ancient Greek Studies: Mandarin, Japanese | Message 17 of 28 06 July 2008 at 5:36pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Another long post coming up I'm afraid. Can't be helped!
As I said above I don't know Trasymachus so can't judge. But when I use a course to get an introduction to a language I do not really mind if the stories or dialogues are not over-exciting, they have to be useful and not 'too' dumb. I want the language used to be accessible/usable/easy to remember and I want it to 'sound right'. For me Athenaze fits the bill, the Jact series "Reading Greek" doesn't, though the contents may be more interesting. The language used is as stilted as that in old-fashioned primers which I find a little off-putting. And the strange way they have of presenting vocabulary and their horrible-looking tables!
As far as I'm concerned that makes the book a no-go for me. Teaching is not supposed to make our lives as learners more difficult as it already is. As pupils we were obliged to look up new vocabulary because "learning to handle a dictionary is good for you!" True enough, but weren't we supposed to be learning Latin? Not waste time because the author couldn't be bothered to provide a proper, clear, easy to consult lesson vocabulary. This is another big plus for Athenaze, each text is preceded by a list of lexical items to be learnt, just some 10-15 basic new words per chapter, words and expressions that will come up again and again in subsequent texts. And any extra words are glossed below each paragraph for easy reference and will be glossed again whenever they turn up, till the day comes for them to be included in the "to be remembered" lesson vocabulary.
No, I haven't. I have looked at the description and will investigate it further if ever I lay my hand on free copies. I had 7 years of Latin in a highly selective secondary school, 4 years of grammar, complete with all the niggly footnotes about exceptional exceptions and 3 years of translating, you name the author, we translated him. It was all a great, big bore. I have since forgotten practically all that theoretical grammar, but know a whole lot more Latin. Because I taught myself to read it properly. But I certainly don't want to spend any more money on a primer. Anyway, I'm very suspicious of "implicit" which usually means "obvious to those who already know" but baffling to those who don't and have to reinvent the wheel.
Prior to ancient Greek I had found out how to acquire vocabulary and deal with texts. Read the text for meaning, go over the words trying to remember in what context I'd seen them, visualise and apply to my life. I sailed through the first 10 double chapters of Athenaze in no time and then hit a brick wall: the aorist tense baffled me. It shouldn't have because I already knew about aspect from Russian, though I was still having problems there too. Chapter 11 threw everything at me in the grammar section but provided very few actual examples in the main text. Up to then I had always tried to learn grammar as it was introduced, more or less successfully, but this definitely was too much. I decided to ignore what I didn't understand, just read on, remember that strange verb-forms are bound to be aorist and see if it doesn't eventually sort itself out. Lesson 13 introduced the imperfect and then it all fell into place. Because I'd come across most of the more difficult forms several times before and because the introduction of the imperfect at last clarified the notion of aspect. For Russian as well, actually. That was when I finally went over to making everthing 'sound' either right or wrong. But to be able to do that you do need a bit of basic grammar, unless you are a child who still notices and accepts the "well, that is the way we do it". After a certain age we've got stuck in our way and often don't even notice that the foreign language is different. Unless we're told, or we learn to really look and listen. We have all sorts of blind spots where foreign languages are concerned and therefore won't 'see' unless we stop and compare ours to theirs. Make anything different memorable by getting it to "sound right", morphological forms and structures, not by learning tables off by heart, but by getting our mouth, eyes, ears and brain round specific forms in specific context. It's not grammar that counts, it's practical good-sounding usage applicable to us and our world. It works wonders for passive understanding and makes actively using the language much easier and more effective. Though for active oral production we still need lots of consistent, habit-forming practice, again using what's relevant to us, therefore interesting. As interesting as we make it. Learning tables off by heart might feel very satisfying and worthwile, but we have to each time think of the practical application/implication of whatever we practice. We must not think of the name of the case but of its function: nominative means someone does, genitive explains whose it is, dative to whom something is given, accusative who is seen, heard, accused of something or other, ablative from whom/what things are taken. Of course the different cases have many more applications, but those belong to syntax, while tables only deal with forms and for practicing those one function per case is enough. If I know more than one use of a case, all the better, then I can choose whichever is most appropriate or memorable. But I've got to choose one, otherwise I'm parotting instead of practicing language in a meaningful human way. Take Latin past tense: amavi, amavisti, amavit, amavimus, amavistis, amaverunt. Anybody can learn that by heart. It means nothing, not even that we can now conjugate delevi or cucurri parrot fashion. Well, after some more drilling we might get the endings right in sequence, but will still struggle to get them right in context. Drill by all means, but in context. amavi and I think of a girl I once loved amavisti and I ask my sister who was once jilted by someone "Did you really love him" amavit, apparently she did, though he wasn't worth it amavimus, as children we all had a crush on someone, who? amavistis, didn't all of you, too, the whole class, loved your 3rd grade teacher for instance? amaverunt, my other sister and her husband saw a house and fell in love with it, love at first site. They're still living in it now and loving it, amant et nunc. Whatever form or structure I drill because I feel I need some extra practice I always drill in context. Because I've found out that that is the only way for me to really learn. Without getting bored, or tired, or frustrated. Because it means something. To me! And I hardly ever forget what I've learnt this way. Nor do I get it wrong in context, as I used to. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| apparition Octoglot Senior Member United States Joined 6650 days ago 600 posts - 667 votes Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), French, Arabic (Iraqi), Portuguese, German, Italian, Spanish Studies: Pashto | Message 18 of 28 06 July 2008 at 9:09pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Great method to use. Long posts are appreciated! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| brian00321 Senior Member United States Joined 6598 days ago 143 posts - 148 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German | Message 19 of 28 06 July 2008 at 9:47pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
That's a pretty interesting method. I thought I was the only one that did this, but when I use Assimil Spanish I usually have the 501 verb book on the side and conjugate the verbs in context as part of my active phase. Very similar to the drill method that you use. Thanks for the in-depth post. Brian 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Alkeides Senior Member Bhutan Joined 6148 days ago 636 posts - 644 votes | Message 20 of 28 07 July 2008 at 3:27am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Actually, prominent Living Latinists in Italy and various other parts of Europe recommend both Lingua Latina and Athenaze as the best approaches for learning to read those tongues without translation (or at least with as little as possible). You don't have to buy the book to view an excerpt from it. Go over here. IF you want, I can email you a few scanned pages of Thrasymachus, to let you see how it works.
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| charlmartell Super Polyglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 6244 days ago 286 posts - 298 votes Speaks: French, English, German, Luxembourgish*, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch, Italian, Latin, Ancient Greek Studies: Mandarin, Japanese | Message 21 of 28 07 July 2008 at 12:53pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Thanks for the link, I've gone and read all the sample material. Strange thing is, I once had a book written at the beginning of the 20th century, or the end of the 19th, by someone whose name I can't remember, called something like "1st Year Latin" or "Latin Reader/Primer", which started out in exactly the same manner: map of Europe, islands, in this case Ireland and England and then went on in the same vein as this Lingua Latina. I found it intensely boring, don't know what happened to it. Lingua Latina doesn't look like a bundle of fun either, maybe the 2nd book is more interesting. The last sample from Part II about the rape of Lucretia seems to point that way, but I still think that Athenaze for Greek, and the Cambridge Latin Course (for younger students) are far superior. As for Trasymachus, thanks for the offer, but no need to scan, I believe you. I have also looked at this site so I know more or less what the course is like. Thanks anyway. Edited by charlmartell on 07 July 2008 at 12:56pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Alkeides Senior Member Bhutan Joined 6148 days ago 636 posts - 644 votes | Message 22 of 28 12 July 2008 at 12:39pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Reading back, I realized I had diverted you from your exposition of how you analysed the subjunctive, my apologies, please carry on if you will. Edited by amphises on 12 July 2008 at 12:40pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| charlmartell Super Polyglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 6244 days ago 286 posts - 298 votes Speaks: French, English, German, Luxembourgish*, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch, Italian, Latin, Ancient Greek Studies: Mandarin, Japanese | Message 23 of 28 13 July 2008 at 10:31am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
You hadn't, I'm still having computer problems, lost both a motherboard and a hard disk with practically all of my language programs. So I'm using a laptop at the moment, with keys far too small and close together for my big hands. I'm used to typing with 10 fingers and now keep getting key interfering with key unless I type with 2 fingers with eyes glued to the keyboard. Not over practical. And as my normal, generous keyboard is not compatible with my laptop .... I'll get back to this thread when I've finally sorted myself out. Nearly there, have recovered most of my hard disk, I hope, from a not totally up-to-date backup disk that had also gone on the blink. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| josht Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6446 days ago 635 posts - 857 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Spanish, Russian, Dutch | Message 24 of 28 19 August 2008 at 10:07am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I was wondering if your computer is back up and running, charlmartell, as I found your explanations quite interesting. I hope you continue!
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