Between the Semesters

Over the summer you will have twelve weeks to forget everything you learned . . . and you can! Remember what it was like after Christmas break??? Even the best students are rusty when they return after a layoff of that length. There is one solution and that is to keep working with Greek. This can be difficult because you are traveling, doing mission work, or working a job. So let me make the following suggestions.

The UBS Greek New Testament Reader's Edition is a wonderful tool. Try reading the Gospel of Matthew a paragraph at a time. What I mean is read and study one paragraph. Then re-read it the next day. Work on that one paragraph until you feel fairly comfortable with it and then move on to the next one. By doing this you will see practical insights into the grammar that you didn't realize before. You'll also run into problems that you can't explain. Make a note of them and move on. There is nothing like reading a long-form document to help you develop the feel of the author and his style. Don't bite off more than you can chew! Start small. You can also do some study and then teach using your Greek New Testament. It will impress people beyond belief!  You might even impress yourself.  If you don't want to spend the money on such a reader, there is a great free tool on the Internet called the Bible Web App which is adjustable in its glossing. It uses an older Greek manuscript, but that should not be a problem since this is practice.

If you want an organized resource to do, then the Koine Greek Reader by Rodney Decker can be a lot of fun. It has extensive notes to explain the text so it fortifies you as you read.

An excellent tool to keep your translation abilities fresh is A Summer Greek Reader. If you do all the exercises, there is enough for twelve weeks. The answers are in the back so you can check your work.

A Graded Reader of Biblical Greek. This is another product by William Mounce.

If you struggled through the class, get the Mounce grammar and workbook and review. You can work on the exercises that we did not cover in class. Also, keep working on your vocabulary. I would also suggest that you start learning some new vocabulary for next year because vocab will still be a part of your life. You can see my 2nd Year Greek link to get the words I use. Those start at 30 occurences and go down. It may not be the same list anothers use.

The bottom line: Do something! Don't let all the work you've done go to waste!