Words & Ideas William J. Dominik, Editor   ISBN:  0865164851 xxvii + 281 pages, including index softcover, approx. 9" x 6"

Words & Ideas softcover

I'd like to just write, "Buy this book" and be done with this review because if your high school student wants to study Latin and Greek roots, this book would in most cases be a perfect fit.  Of course, choosing curricular items just isn't that simple. We homeschoolers need more information than that; so I'll try to provide you with all the information you'll need to be able to make a sound decision about this book.

Words & Ideas is one of the most unique texts I've encountered.  It defies categorization.  Okay, so the back cover does categorize it as "Etymology, Vocabulary Building, Reference."  However, it blends cultural aspects of Greece and Rome together with the study of Greek and Latin roots.*  History and etymology are married and become one inseparable subject.  Because most textbooks are developed for either "vocabulary" or "history" or "math" or some other single subject, it's exciting to find one that treats the reader to a slice of true-to-life learning.

In preparation for this review, I read:

• Preface
• A Note to the Teacher
• Introduction
• Chapter 1
• Chapter 2
• Chapter 3
• 1/2 of Chapter 4
• Chapter 5
• Chapter 8
• Chapter 9

The first three chapters are on roots study, which the author** calls word building.  The next six chapters are on mythology; medicine; politics and law; commerce and economics; philosophy and psychology; and history.  Three appendices and three indices follow.

The author gives the option to the instructor to either present the chapters singly and in order or to present the first three chapters concurrently with the last six chapters.  I tend to think we'll implement the second suggestion, though we may cover Chapter 1 prior to beginning the concurrent study of the last six chapters.  I believe that the first chapter provides the best description of word building with Latin and Greek bases (roots) that I've ever encountered.  Words & Ideas would provide a good background to a parent trying to teach word roots to a student at the elementary level.  The information in Chapter 1 lays the groundwork and would provide a good foundation for the parent/instructor if they have little prior knowledge.  Chapter 1 is an excellent primer for all roots studies, though it will have to be strained through the parent for young students.

The first three chapters, as I've mentioned, are different from the latter six.  They cover word building.  Each of these three chapters discusses the bases, combining forms, prefixes, and suffixes; presenting text and tables as necessary.  The first chapter has one page of exercises at the end of the chapter consisting of a few questions and a table to fill in.  Chapter 2 provides about 7 1/2 pages of exercises and Chapter 3, the same.  The tables are excellent, requiring the student to fill in the meanings at times and at other times asking for derivatives or asking for the proper Latin or Greek base necessary to complete the English word.  The variety of work with the prefixes and roots keeps the work interesting, yet provides enough practice to allow the student to become familiar with them.

By the way, the reasoning behind my choice to follow the author's suggestion to work on chapters 1-3 and 4-9 concurrently is based on my reading through the first three chapters and getting somewhat overloaded and numbed by reading through prefix after adjective after verb, ad nauseam.  The concurrent suggestion is likely the better method.

Chapters 4-9 are the meaty chapters, filled with juicy morsels of information.  I'll list part of the sequence of the chapter on philosophy and psychology. 

• A long paragraph on "Inquiry" followed by "Word Study" with a bit more instruction and then two tables to complete.  In one of the tables the learner is asked to define five Greek words, provide their meanings, combining them with the base psych-, and provide the meanings of each word.
• A "Word Study" on "Logos" and "Knowledge" followed by a table asking the student to provide English words derived from about 10 or so Greek and Latin words.
• Aspects of Greek philosophy are briefly mentioned.  The following table asks the students to provide English derivatives (words derived from the Greek and Latin) for the Greek and Latin words.
• The Pre-Socratic philosophers are covered next in about three pages.
• Socrates and Plato are quickly covered in about four pages, followed by a Word Study section on a few words based on their names (Socrates and Plato).

Much more is covered in this chapter.  Six pages of exercises round out this chapter.  Some of the questions are:  "The Greek word that we translate as 'virtue' is arete."  "Briefly explain how arete differs from modern western ideas of 'virtue' and why Socrates seems to have had difficulty in defining arete anthropine ('human virtue')."  "Explain the meaning of xenophobia, dependency, and amnesia by giving the meanings of their Greek or Latin bases."

The History section is similar: 

• A couple of paragraphs discussing the definition of history and a few questions for consideration are followed by "Word Study" and two short tables to complete. 
• A table supplying the Greek/Latin words and meanings (with the "English derivatives" column blank) follows "Questions for Consideration" about methodology and the tools of history,
• A section of short biographies on the major Greek and Roman historians is followed by a few select excerpts of their writings.  Quite a few thoughtful questions "For Consideration" are also included.
• Two pages of short answer/essay questions and a table to fill out end the chapter on history.

Of the latter six, these two chapters are quite representative of how Chapters 4-9 are laid out. 

As I paged through Words & Ideas when I first received it, reading bits here and there, I asked myself, "Where's the teacher's book?"  Within 10 minutes I had my answer--there is none.  In "A Note to the Teacher" it is explained that almost all the answers are in the chapters themselves, can be easily deduced after reading the specific chapter, or can be found by consulting a dictionary that contains etymologies. (or online)  The questions are excellent, but will require the homeschooling parent to read the chapter in order to answer them, unless, of course, the homeschooling parent is well versed in etymology and the culture of Rome and Greece.  I'm not.  I'll have to do some homework myself because some of the questions aren't as straightforward as the "Note to the Teacher" might lead one to believe.  Personally, I would appreciate a teacher key/guide.  You might label me lazy; I would optimistically label me, "Busy, with the ability to prioritize."

It would be handy to have daily lessons plans, but I think that the author might be concerned with insulting instructors since most instructors write their own lesson plans to fit the needs of their own classes.  I doubt the author had very many homeschooling instructors in mind when he wrote the text.  Since the textbook is intended to take 12 to 15 weeks, one very simple way to design daily lesson plans is to take 252 (total number of pages of instruction) and divide it by 15 (number of weeks).  The result is 16.8 pages.  However, since we seldom get everything finished each week (goals too high), we would aim for 20 pages a week and hope that we would finish the book in 15 weeks.  I might try to write up a schedule that would allow for Chapter 1 to be finished first, then I would take the 20 pages a week, divide it by 5 (number of weekdays), and have the student do about 4 pages a day.  One day a week the student would work in chapters 2/3 and the other four days a week would be spent working through Chapters 4-9.  That would probably work well enough, even though it would be handier to have it all laid out in the book.

While reading, I tried to look out for things that a few homeschoolers might find offensive.  Some topics mentioned (only mentioned, mind you, not dwelled on) are marital relations, menstruation, pregnancy, a word derived from vener- (extended form of Venus' name), morning sickness, contraception, abortion, infanticide, issues and words derived from Eros, the womb, manic depression and other psychological maladies.  There could be other things that could be offensive; I'm not so talented at figuring out what could be offensive since there is a myriad of things people could be offended by.  Considering that the expected audience is college students, these issues aren't really out of the scope of the course.  (I hate even to list any of these words because this web page will end up with unnecessary traffic.)

A couple of other things that I can quibble about are that the tables are almost too tiny.  The student is supposed to fill in roots study tables in each chapter, but the tables are too small for anything but a 0.7 mechanical pencil or one of those Sakura Micron pens.  I think that the tables could conceivably be enlarged on a copier machine*** and then put in a 3-ring binder.  I think, though, that I would prefer a larger workbook format so that all the short answer questions could be answered right in the book, but it's not like we can't work around these minor inconveniences with the use of notebook paper.  It would also help if the questions were numbered so that checking the answers would be easier.  I'm sure that there will be other things to quibble over when we actually start using this book, but I doubt there will be anything major.  Of course, what I prefer may be exactly what you detest--another case of "Your mileage may vary."

A few positive features not emphasized elsewhere:

• I'm really pleased with the short quick biographies of the historians and the philosophers in their respective chapters.  It makes keeping everyone straight rather easy.
• Many of the questions require the student to go beyond simple recall.  Higher-level thinking skills are often required to compose answers.
• The readings are high school level (at least) and have a respectful tone that seems to treat the student as a fellow learner.
• Sporadic "Word for Word" cartoon strips (Michael Atchison Enterprises) give the student a bit of a break now and then, while still keeping with the theme.
• The Table of Contents is very detailed and the Introduction provides objectives and other valuable info.

When compared to other roots programs, Words & Ideas is a cut above.  The authors' knowledge of ancient Greece and Roman culture and history runs deep.  Because of this, the book has a richer texture than a simple study of roots only (like with my other web page).  While it's true that this text may not be exhaustive in its coverage of roots, it doesn't skimp.  Plus this text provides a great amount of history and shows how the Latin and Greek languages and cultures are still influencing us today.

I've been wondering about how to list this class on a high school transcript.  Since it is only 15 weeks' worth of work, I believe that it could be worked into a year-long high school English class credit as the vocabulary element.  Depending on how you look at it, it's not strictly a language arts text or strictly a social studies/history book.  So depending on the system you're using to record your student's class work, you might be able to split the time between an English credit and a social studies/history credit.  There's also the option of finding three more weeks' worth of vocabulary study and giving a semester credit for a class called "Vocabulary" or something similar.  It may not be a cut-and-dried type of course, but a way can be found to give high school credit for it if you really want to.  Or maybe it would just be easier to use it right at the end of 8th grade.

Just so you know, I did get a little bit bored at times, maybe because I've recently reviewed Greek and Roman mythology (Ch. 4) while reading Hamilton's Mythology and The Odyssey.  Also, it dragged a little bit, to me, in Chapter 9 (History).  It's not a laugh a minute; that's for sure.  But then it's not supposed to be, is it?

Studying Greek and Latin roots in the context of the cultures they evolved from distinguishes this curricular item from the other roots studies on the market.  Words & Ideas may technically be a textbook, but it's cut from a different mold.  The author didn't segregate all the language arts portions of the information away from the social studies aspects of vocabulary expansion and language learning.  This cross-curricular approach makes the learning experience all that much richer.  It gives depth and breadth to the study of Greek and Latin roots, which likely makes the information more easily assimilated and remembered.

Words & Ideas is a good book--plain and simple--and earns my highest recommendation.

Words & Ideas is available at Amazon.com and also at the publisher's web site--Bolchazy-Carducci.  But Amazon.com still has usually has free shipping on books over $25. Don't forget to have a dictionary with good etymologies on hand!

Information provided from the back cover of Words & Ideas:

Unlike most etymology and word building books, this one presents words within their historical, social, literary, scientific, and cultural media.  Instead of focusing mainly on general or only on scientific vocabulary, Words & Ideas introduces words from a range of disciplines: something for everyone!

No more tedious lists of word roots, suffixes, and prefixes in isolation--words come to life in the context of the ideas behind them.  Clever cartoons illustrate word origins; exercises provide practice to solidify word building principles.  Finally:  Meaningful, engaging etymology and vocabulary building!

About the Editor:
William J. Dominik is the author and editor of several books and numerous other publications on Latin literature and other subjects; he is also the founding editor of the journal Scholia.  He has taught widely in Classics and the Humanities at a number of universities and is currently Professor of Classics at the University of Otago.