Fantastic and Flexible First Form Greek – a Review

Review of First Form Greek by Memoria Press

I was very excited to be given the opportunity to review First Form Greek Complete Set, a curriculum from Memoria Press, but I was not prepared for how fantastic and flexible the lessons are.

I have purchased some Memoria Press curricula for my children in the past and so was not surprised at the high quality and rigorous nature of the First Form Greek Complete Set, but I was surprised at how easy it is to teach and how flexible the curriculum is.

Memoria Press makes top of the line classical christian homeschool curriculum, and this product is no exception. You can adjust the lessons to teach one or many with ease. You can also adapt the lessons to meet the learning style of your child without trouble. And so the First Form Greek Complete Set, really is both fantastic and flexible.

How We Began Using The Materials

My son and I started working with the First Form Greek Complete Set by using all the teaching options that come with the curriculum.

On the first day we watched the video lesson and then listened to the audio pronunciation CD. Then we began the lesson proper with a recitation (there is a saying for each lesson as well as additional materials to add such as prayers and conversational phrases) worked through the student text, using the teacher manual as a guide.

When we were finished, my son took the workbook and completed the day’s writing exercises. Then in the evening I graded his work using the teacher key.

All in all this worked well. The material is written very clearly and designed so you, as the teacher, can easily teach your child, even if you are actually learning along side him.

What You Get With the First Form Greek Complete Set

• Student Text
• Student Workbook
• Teacher Manual (this has all the information you need to teach in one spot, including inset pages from the student text)
• Teacher Key (Workbook, Quizzes, Tests)
• Quizzes and Tests Booklet
• Flashcards
• DVDs (5 discs, 8 hours)
• Pronunciation CD

Typical Week Teaching the First Form Greek Complete Set

Day 1: Opening, Recitation, Saying, Read The Lesson Together (here is where you use the audio CD and Video Lesson), Workbook

Day 2: Recitation, Reread the Lesson, Workbook

Day 3: Recitation, Workbook

Day 4: Recitation, Workbook

Day 5: Recitation, Oral Drill, Weekly Quiz or Test, Cumulative Review

Time Required to Teach Lessons

If you use all the materials that come with this curriculum as suggested in a homeschooling setting, you will find you spend about an hour a day prepping and teaching. I found that teaching foreign languages to my kids takes about the same amount of effort and time as teaching math. It is one of those subjects that needs teacher prep, consistent lessons, and daily homework.

• Time Spent By Yourself Preparing: 20-30 minutes (I used this time to remind myself how to pronounce the words and phrases, and make sure that I knew the material for the day)
• Lesson Video (only need this once a week, at the start of a new lesson): 15-20 minutes (this includes a bit of time to talk it through with your child to make sure he understands)
• Pronunciation CD (only need this once a week, at the start of a new lesson): 10-15 minutes (this also includes some time to practice what you are hearing with your child)
• Reading Lesson/Recitation Time: 20-25 minutes (includes plenty of time to discuss)
• Time for Student to complete workbook: 20-30 minutes
• Time to Grade Lesson: 5-10 minutes

Overall time you spend daily: 25-35 min on the first day of each new Lesson (basically once a week) AND 45-65 min/day

How Many Days A Week Are Required?

The lessons can be taught as little as three days a week, but I have found that my children tend to forget foreign languages unless we do them daily (on the weekdays).

Prerequisites For This Curriculum

This is a rigorous Greek program. The instructions are clear and we found that it dovetailed very nicely with the 3 years of a Greek curriculum designed for younger children that we had used until this year. Minimally your child, and you, probably need to know the Greek alphabet (how to write and pronounce the letters and sounds of various letter combinations and accents). Memoria Press makes a preliminary curriculum to teach you just that: Greek Alphabet Book.

Teaching More Than One Child Is Easy

The great part about this curriculum is that it works so well when used in so many different ways. There is even guidance for teaching the lessons to a group, in the scenario of a Co-Op class or in a school setting. If you are teaching more than one child, there are even games you can play together that reinforce the lessons.

The Memoria Press Suggested Greek Scope and Sequence

The author outlines a possible scope and sequence for learning Greek which begins with a year of Greek Alphabet Book (completed at the same time as your child works on a second year of Latin (Second Form Latin). The second year of study uses First Form Greek. In Years 3 and 4 your child can expand his grammar and vocabulary knowledge. And finally by year 5, your child is ready for Greek literature.

How We Ended Up Using The Lessons

However, my son learns best with a call-and-response oral method. He memorizes vocabulary and conjugations, and noun endings almost immediately, by creating a mental image of the items to be learned and using that image to ‘view’ the words and endings whenever he needs them. So writing repetitions that are typically used in language lessons are not valuable for him.

So we adapted the material to suit his learning style. I watch the lesson video and listen to the pronunciation CD myself as a way to prepare for the lesson, without my son. Then we read through the lesson together and I use the student workbook to quiz him orally. When he makes a mistake, I just extend the workbook time a bit and circle back through the questions until I am sure he has it down. Every so often I ask him to write the words or endings down on a piece of paper so that I am sure he can spell them. He really knows the alphabet well already, so I am not worried about him learning how to write the words. The great thing about Greek is that spelling is really, really easy once you understand the letter sounds and accents. Then on Day 5, he takes the quiz or unit test.

We spend perhaps an hour together each day working on Greek, but then I also spend about a half hour at the start of each new Lesson on Mondays getting myself prepared.

How We Liked It

My son really likes the First Form Greek Complete Set. We made it nearly all the way through the first Unit which covers The Omega Verb (Present Tense) and First Declension Nouns (Feminine), as well as enough other bits of speech like conjunctions so that you can start reading and speaking complete sentences. He enjoys the no-nonsense, clear teaching style of the material and really wants to continue using the curriculum.

A Great Option For Learning Greek That is Flexible and Fantastic

Overall, the First Form Greek Complete Set is an excellent curriculum. In many ways it is comparable to Henle Latin in terms of the methodology used and the rigorous nature of the lessons.

Learning a new language can be difficult, and Greek is not one of the more easy languages from those of us English speakers, but if you are homeschooling using a form of the classical education method, the First Form Greek Complete Set from Memoria Press is an excellent choice. You can be certain that your child will get a solid competence with the language that will enable him to progress smoothly towards being able to read classic Greek texts in the original language.