Supervisors info:
Δήμητρα Κατή, Καθηγήτρια, Τμήμα ΤΕΑΠΗ, Εθνικό και Καποδιστριακό Πανεπιστήμιο Αθηνών
Summary:
This paper explores the views of students of Secondary school on the usefulness of teaching the ancient Greek language as a compulsory course for all students. Ideas and views for the content of the curriculum are always politically charged. Earlier research, especially about the usefulness of the ancients has mainly studied the views of teachers and has highlighted their positive attitudes to the usefulness of the ancients. Researches with students are very limited and have shown that most of them have a negative attitude towards hiss lesson. We assume that the students’ views on the lesson of the ancient Greek language are based on their ideologiew for the grrek language, but also on their experiences of the teaching of the lesson. So through the research are raised questions in semi-structured interviews with eight pupils of the first and second grades of High school. The finding show that students’ views are shared about the usefulness of the ancients, as even those that initially expressed negatively about this lesson, they reported the usefulness of the ancients to specific pupil populations and in different ways of teaching. Those who support the compulsory teaching of ancients, believe that they offer linguistic and spiritual cultivation, as well as it strengthens the national identity. As concerned their views for Greek language, students adopt more easily ideological “mistakes” about Greek language than about the usefulness of the lesson of ancients. In particular, they claim that the Greek language has a special value over other languages, that it has been historically damaged, but they recognize the difference between ancient and new Greek language. As for their experiences of the teaching of the ancients, they are quite negative. The fact that ideological “mistakes” about the Greek language are more charged with stereotyped ideologies than their views about the usefulness of ancients as a compulsory lesson, combined with the negative experiences from their teaching, leads us to conclude that the students’ views about the lesson of ancients, are influenced by their negative experiences of their teaching.
Keywords:
ideologies, students, ancient and modern Greek language, usefulness of the lesson of ancients
