User talk:JManning

Welcome to Wikiversity. Thanks for your contributions at Topic:Greek Classics. We need to take care of how we use terms such as "staff". Wikiversity has participants, but not "staff" in the traditional sense. It is often useful to have a list of active participants in Wikiversity development projects (departments) as shown in this template: Template:Department boilerplate. The term "staff" is only used at Wikiversity in the context of community-designated functionaries such as custodians. I have a request, if you have a chance yould you comment on On the Soul: discussion group? Thanks. --JWSchmidt 00:43, 15 October 2006 (UTC)


 * "the necessary changes" <-- Wikiversity is very new and open to experimentation. In my opinion, the first priority is the educational mission. I think that education in a wiki environment depends fundamentally on encouragement of participation by newcomers. Anything we can do with our terminology to promote a sense of collaboration and to invite participation is positive. On the other hand, it is also positive when participants can easily recognize that they are benefiting from the experience of an expert. Somehow we need to find ways to balance openness of participation by all with a system for educational content development that allows experts to contribute high quality information that will guide the wiki-based learning experience of other participants. Personally, I like it when Wikiversity participants take a moment to explain their interests, objectives, experiences and plans. I find such descriptions to be more useful than any self-assignment of a title. In a collaborative learning environment it is good to know who you are interacting with, it helps you know who to trust and pay attention to. Actions are definitive (they "speak louder than mere words"), but a few good words that are backed up by action seem best.


 * "How can I easily write using Greek characters" <-- I'm the wrong person to ask. Beyond the set of greek characters at the bottom of the edit window (just click on them to insert them into the edit window), I have no idea what to do. I'm guessing you might want to enter greek text using your keyboard and I know nothing about that. You can try asking at Colloquium.


 * "I notice that you seem to object to what I assume could be called traditional courses" <-- The objection originated from the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees and their decisions about what constituted an acceptable Wikiversity project proposal (see). I believe it was the intention of the Board to get the Wikiversity community to think about new approaches to online learning that take full advantage of the wiki user interface rather than adapt wiki technology to the needs of traditional courses as they exist in bricks-and-mortar educational institutions. My belief is that as long as we protect Wikiversity participants from unrealistic expectations, we should be free to: "run small experiments, tests, see what works, what doesn't, and be prepared to be flexible and change, and not be too locked into stone about how things should work." The Wikiversity community is trying to discover the best ways to use wiki technology to support education. I believe the key pitfall we must avoid is suggesting in any way to participants that we have a system that involves teacher certification. At all times it must be made clear and it must always remain clear to participants that Wikiversity provides a collaborative learning environment that depends on the best efforts of volunteer contributors. The goal is to create a high quality learning environment, but we are doing "the wiki way", not the traditional way. In my opinion, the Wikiversity community needs to invent new wiki-based ways to attract experts as participants and make sure that high quality learning resources are made available to participants. However, I do not think that Wikiversity participants need to be too concerned about these issues. What is important is that each of us contribute as best we can. If contributing means adding educational content that takes the form of a traditional course, that is welcome. I have never seen anyone's contribution turned away no matter what form it took, even "traditional" or "conventional". After the content is added, other people will then think about ways to adapt the initial contribution to other forms. I have faith that eventually the community will discover what methods of presenting the educational content work best.--JWSchmidt 00:53, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Hey this is Nortonthe1st, I'm new here and I appoligieze for accidentally editing your user page, I deleted what I wrote when I realized my mistake. My question was concerning the Persian Wars' collection of lessons, I was wondering If I could take a stab at it. Peace, Norton

More stuff in the future?
Will there be any more additions to Classics? I saw that you've been absent from the site for a long time. Although I have no intention of majoring in the classics (my actual major is mathematics), I still think Greek mythology is pretty cool. I'd understand it if you were bogged down with homework. So if you want to talk to me, you can e-mail me at jhankin1@gmail.com. You could also leave your comment here, and I might still find it. Although I know very little about the Greek language, I know some things about Greek history and the myths, so I can add some stuff if you want. I should encourage my instructor to contribute. If he has time, he might find it fun, or at the very least be eager to pass along his knowledge. --160.36.118.159 15:16, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Review
The page is to general, probably need to move it to a subpage of the course your working on. Is that the greek lessons?--Rayc 05:38, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I have merged the two existing Review pages into one, which is now: Introductory Ancient Greek Language/Review. The Review should be for general purposes please. Bye for now, Erkan Yilmaz ( my talk page, wiki blog ) 20:38, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

History of Philosophy
Hello, this is Alex beta from the School of Philosophy. It has been suggested that The history of Philosophy (Ancient Philosophy) in the School of Philosophy should be coordinated with the School of Classics. If you have any thoughts on this, please let me know. (Alex beta 15:11, 23 December 2006 (UTC))

Greek Font
Hi! i don't know a great deal about computers but this site can get them for word documents along with the accents and breathing marks. I don't know if it could somehow be used on wikiversity. Storeye 10:16, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

CLAS 101, School of classics
I've strted work on this one. How do I sound? Laleena 17:30, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Introductory Greek?
I wanted to say, excellent job on the Introductory Greek course! Were you planning to do any more work on it? I have a whole two people in Topic:Biblical Studies waiting on the edge of our seats for it! :-D I just wanted to give my note of encouragement, and I completely understand the weight of classes, if that's the issue. Thanks for what you have contributed,
 * --Opensourcejunkie 14:29, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi
Hi jmanning. i just wanted to introduce myself as I am interested in learning ancient greek (and languages in general). I want to say that in addition to content, i feel that a consistent layout is also very important and i want to say that this course looks very promising. Also, I'm curious, how different is ancient greek from modern greek and how easy would it be to learn modern greek after learning ancient greek. Cheers. --RMFan1 17:55, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Intro Ancient Greek
First of all, thanks for taking time to do this. I like the way you lay everything out in tables while using english examples instead of using the phonetic transcription system.

However, I noticed you moved on to lesson 5 without lesson 4 being complete.

Here is a link that might help with typing in greek. http://www.lexilogos.com/clavier/ellenike.htm