DGL Detroit"It is the best flute players who deserve the best flutes." —Aristotle |
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In curtest terms, DGL curriculum boils down to this: Homeric Greek first, then Latin, then the world! DGL curriculum starts with the Greek alphabet, the exotic allure of which automatically beckons to children so inclined. (Even for an adult, a glance into a Greek text is experienced as a glimpse into another world. Not so Latin—which simply looks like English gone awry.) The exoticism of the alphabet is immediately confirmed by leaping into the SOUND and myths of Homer's Odyssey and Iliad, and continues on to the winding tales of the first historian, Herodotus. From Troy, to Ithaca, to Marathon, to Thermopylae and Salamis: It is impossible to imagine a more effective prelude to the study of Latin, English literature, or world history. For just as a deep enjoyment of Virgil's Aeneid presupposes familiarity with the poetry of Homer, so too is the prose rhetoric of Julius Caesar fully decipherable only through its Greek antecedents. Likewise, just as a deep enjoyment of Milton's Paradise Lost presupposes familiarity with the poetics of Virgil, so too is the prose of Jefferson, of Arnold, or of Orwell fully comprehensible only through the Greek and Latin models they themselves internalized from their earliest school-boy days. Add Euclid's Elements, Plato's Meno, and Frontinus' On the Aqueducts of Rome and one stands squarely in the world of STEM exploring geometry, logic, engineering, and architecture in the remains of antiquity. Even closer to earth (and the Promised Land of a sure and steady paycheck!) the future writer of computer code could find no more useful background than a basic knowledge of Greek, Latin, or the Sanskrit alphabet. Efficacy of Latin Studies in the Information Age (Alice K. DeVane: 1997) reviews evidence for Greek and Latin study as a means of improving English skills, facilitating the learning of another foreign language, and improving critical thinking skills, as well as increased SAT and ACT scores. |