Customer Reviews

Learn to Read New Testament Greek - Workbook: Supplemental Exercises for Greek Grammar Students

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

At last, a supplemental workbook has been made available for Black's well-loved beginning grammar, Learn to Read New Testament Greek. This workbook corresponds directly to Black's text, providing drilling and translation exercises for Chapters 1-25.

The workbook only makes use of inflected forms extant within the New Testament or Septuagint. Thus one is able to rid himself of the laborious task of translating forms alien to the focus of his studies.

The student who takes the time to work through these exercises will find the hours of preparation richly rewarded as he begins reading the New Testament for himself.

As far as I can tell at this point, the book and workbook make a reasonable match even though not written by the same author, Black, as the main text. What is needed -- or did I miss it? -- is an answer key, for self-study, or for the teacher in the classroom.

For those reviews that critique the lack of an answer key, here is the reasoning why straight out from the Preface of the Workbook:


In the Preface of Learn to Read New Testament Greek Workbook

Pages viii-ix

This workbook does not contain an answer key to the sentences. This decision to omit the answer key from publication is profitable for the student for two major reasons. First, informal surveying of past Greek students has shown that at least a third of Greek students admitted to having a "serious" temptation to look at the "back of the book" in order to complete their translation homework (in one instance, over half of the class!!). Removing the answer key is an obvious deterrent to this specific temptation. We quickly recognized an additional benefit in removing the answer key from the workbook: in doing so, we are encouraging the student to confer with other students for help, discuss the problem at hand, grapple with it together, and produce a translation through teamwork. We see this as positive reinforcement that solidifies what the student learns in the classroom. In addition, we would encourage instructors to reserve the first few minutes in class to ask the students if they need clarity on a specific sentence. If you are an instructor and would like to have an answer key for your own reference, please contact the authors through Broadman and Holman at www.bhpublishinggroup.com/contact.asp to receive the complimentary answer key.

I am taking Greek in a classroom setting using Dr. Black's text. The professor suggested we purchase this companion workbook. I found it useful at the beginning because I could use the text to check my answers. As we have transitioned into mostly doing translations, I find the workbook nearly useless. It sits on my bookshelf, unused. Why?

The workbook is rich with Greek sentences to practice translations with--the primary method we, as a class, are using to learn--but there is no answer key. There are so many ways to mess up a translation that it's a waste of time for the new student to even try, in my opinion, without answers or an instructor/experienced person to check behind me. Without that check, I'm afraid that I will lead myself astray.

This would be an *amazing* workbook with an answer key. Until it has one, I can't go higher than 2 stars.

Very good workbook to go with the Grammer book. Really makes it much easier to retain the material from the grammer book after I've gone through the exercises in this workbook. I highly recommend getting this workbook.

Layout is good, and there is ample practice sentences.

**The only issue (for me, in my situation) is that there isn't an answer key in the back of the workbook. The editor explains why in the beginning of the book, and the publisher is willing to send you the answer key if you email and ask for it. I did receive it since I'm using this (and the textbook) for review purposes. But the answer key has serious problems. (1) there have been at least five to seven mistakes in the Greek-->English translation PER chapter, and I'm only ten chapters into it. They are clearly just the mistakes of someone going too fast in translation because I've only studied Greek for three months, and I can see the errors. (2) there is NO key for English to Greek sentences, which is problematic if there's no teacher... (3) Not all the exercises have a key.

If you're looking a fresh way to review between semesters (intro and intermediate) without just going back through your old exercises, then I think this is a good supplement as long as you use it in conjunction with the textbook.

The workbook needs the text book to go along with it and it is not easy to do on your own. You need to be in a class room setting in my opinion.