I ran across this book in looking for ancient Greek resources for the boys, it seemed so beautiful! I finally dug out from under my mountain of work to reach out to the author, Therese Sellers who in turn connected me with her publisher, Ascanius. Long story short, the twins and I have been enjoying several books from Ascanius, not just Alpha is for Anthropos so there are a few more reviews on the way.
Alpha for Anthropos is gorgeous. Illustrated by
Each page contains a letter of the Greek alphabet and has an original song or nursery rhyme to go with it. They help teach and reinforce the pronunciation, some are sung according to children’s songs like, “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” and others have their own rhythm. Something I noticed a while back about ancient Greek is that there are a lot of parallels to music in the pronunciation. One accent makes the pitch go up while another does the opposite; another accent makes the duration of the sound a bit longer. So to me, the rules make perfect sense, but hearing it pronounced and sung makes all the difference! With that in mind, Therese has a website where she has recordings of each of the songs, using both the modern pronunciation and the ancient. It turns out that ancient Greek is beautiful to hear. Given what I know about music and learned about the pronunciation, I am not surprised in the least, but had never heard someone singing or speaking it. We love to listen to the audio, and sing along with it. The songs aren’t difficult, and the twins often sing them to themselves.
Alpha is for Anthropos is a wonderful introduction to ancient Greek, in a format that makes it accessible to younger students, but students of all ages will love this. It’s available via Amazon.com and the Ascanius Store.
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