How to remember the Greek Alphabet - Alpha, beta, Gamma, delta - and Epsilon, zeta

Greek alphabet
Αα	Alpha	Νν	Nu
Ββ	Beta	Ξξ	Xi
Γγ	Gamma	Οο	Omicron
Δδ	Delta	Ππ	Pi
Εε	Epsilon	Ρρ	Rho
Ζζ	Zeta	Σσς	Sigma
Ηη	Eta	Ττ	Tau
Θθ	Theta	Υυ	Upsilon
Ιι	Iota	Φφ	Phi
Κκ	Kappa	Χχ	Chi
Λλ	Lambda	Ψψ	Psi
Μμ	Mu	Ωω	Omega

Problem
How do you learn the Greek alphabet? Use Tiny Cards from Duolingo. Once you've grasped the letters you can start their learning Greek course, for free.

They start by asking you to identify the letters on their reversing cards. You learn about four to six letters at a time.  You could do just one card a day. One every hour. Or the whole lot in one go first thing every morning. (Or when you wake at night and want to do something useful.)

You have five lots of four letters, then three. Let's start with six.

Αα	Alpha
Ββ	Beta
Γγ	Gamma
Δδ	Delta
Εε	Epsilon
Ζζ	Zeta

You have four ways to learn.
1 REPETITION - ALPHA BETA GAMMA DELTA

Αα	Alpha
Ββ	Beta
Γγ	Gamma
Δδ	Delta

Rote learning. Just keep going through and reading what the cards say. The first two letters are easy, similar to alphabet, alpha beta.

Αα	Alpha
Ββ	Beta

After that, alpha beta, gamma, delta. Say it aloud.

Αα	Alpha
Ββ	Beta
Γγ	Gamma
Δδ	Delta

All four letters end in an 'a' sound, two syllables. Not B but Beta. Like the girl's name, Elizabeth. The draft or try-out of a system is the Beta version, like a B road before you build the motorway or A road.

Now let's look at the letters while we say them. Gamma rays on the Delta. You can just say it.

Alternatively, visualize the letters A B shot like gamma rays across the delta or flat land. Alpha beta gamma delta. Emphasis on the first syllable for all four.
AL-pha
BE-ta
GA-ma
DEL-ta.

Αα	Alpha
Ββ	Beta
Γγ	Gamma
Δδ	Delta

But what does the letter gamma look like? Rather like a squared off C. (ABC).

Γγ

Gamma

The top points forwards.  The writer is lazy or in a hurry and doesn't finish it. Once you have seen the top half  pointing horizontally to the right, and the left pole, you know which letter it is, C or G. How do you remember it is G n Greek and not C? Cagoule? The letter C is in a cage? Maybe think of it like a signpost, saying Go! Alpha beta gamma delta. I remember, Alpha Beta Greek (alphabet).

You keep getting it wrong. It's rather disheartening. Eventually you get there. It's time consuming. A lesson in persistence. Greek and other children are drilled every day until they get it right.

Δδ

Delta

The D is a squashed D, not a neatly rounded D, a triangle. That is easier for a kid to write in a hurry on a hard slate. Like the doorway of a tent, back when writing was invented. A triangular Doorway to a tent on the Delta.

2 Learn the letters in sets of three or four with a sentence or vision of an action or object, or remember the sounds.
I'm going to tell you how to remember individual letters.

I'd been doing the cards for several days before I realised that the little card on the left before you start has all the letters.It is a bit blurred and looks like a symbol just to tell you want you are learning. But consider it part of the course.

Before you start each card, in Tinycards, look back at the symbol card of the Greek Alphabet on the left.

3 The next two letters are easy. E Z. (The Brits or British speakers say Zed but the Americans call the letter Z Zee, which makes it even easier for them to remember this rhyme.)
 Epsilon Zeta.

Εε	Epsilon
Ζζ	Zeta

How do you remember the letter E is called epsilon? Why do I need it? You won't need it later, unless you are spelling your name for somebody.

Okay. I might need it. I need it for the Tinycards exercise. They ask you to type in the name of the letter.

Okay. Absolute silence whilst I think. (Ep - solute silence, ep - silon. I have learned the ep- sil. How about the last syllable? Absolute silence while we carry on learning. Epsilon.

Now let's look at all six letters.

Αα	Alpha
Ββ	Beta
Γγ	Gamma
Δδ	Delta

Εε	Epsilon
Ζζ	Zeta

Alpha Beta Gamma Delta Epsilon Zeta.

Zeta rhymes with beta.
Alpha beta
Gamma delta
Epsilon Zeta.

That's enough for a coffee break session.  Read it again.
Alpha beta
Gamma delta
Epsilon Zeta.

I went into Wiki looking for Greek letters to copy. But the Greek letters are all in complicated tables, for example, comparing Greek with Phoenician - which is very similar to Hebrew. However, Wiki added one handy thought. For the benefit of mathematicians:
(PS - Greek symbols are used as symbols in mathematics, physics and other sciences. Many symbols have traditional uses, such as lower case epsilon (ε) for an arbitrarily small positive number.)

So, I went into Simple Wiki and found a simple table. Here it is:

Greek alphabet
Αα	Alpha	Νν	Nu
Ββ	Beta	Ξξ	Xi
Γγ	Gamma	Οο	Omicron
Δδ	Delta	Ππ	Pi
Εε	Epsilon	Ρρ	Rho
Ζζ	Zeta	Σσς	Sigma
Ηη	Eta	Ττ	Tau
Θθ	Theta	Υυ	Upsilon
Ιι	Iota	Φφ	Phi
Κκ	Kappa	Χχ	Chi
Λλ	Lambda	Ψψ	Psi
Μμ	Mu	Ωω	Omega

How To Remember Lower Case Letters
Now we can recognize the capital letters, we need to know the little letters.

A alpha is easy, the same as the English.

Beta, looks like a letter b carried around like a flag on a pole so everybody can see it.

Gamma is harder because the lower case reminds me of a y. Think of it as like the lower part of the right side of the letter G. It has a hanging tail like a lower case g (which I write facing the other way to the printed g you see here). We'll just have to go back to the idea that early writers simplified the letters. 

Just keep looking at the first three letters, the pairs of upper and lower case, then the first four, then the first five, then the first six.

The lower case d and e are easy. But the person who write the lower case z must have been an art student, adding a fancy squiggle on the end. Or maybe he or she fell asleep while writing. ZZZZ zzz
Ζζ.
 When you are ready, go on to the next letters in my next post.

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, learner and teacher of languages.

Learning Afghan Languages: Pashto; Persian Dari; Numbers 1,2,3

Problem
How do you recognize another language? How do you understand what people are saying - at last the general subject matter?

The ladies in the gym's sauna are chatting away. I cannot understand a word they say. I cannot even tell which language they are speaking. Yesterday a pair of ladies from Morocco and Egypt were conversing in Arabic.

Today a pair born in Afghanistan were speaking in another language. I learned that Afghanistan has two major languages.

They speak enough English to speak to me. (I was speaking to one of them earlier in the swimming pool.)

My first question is:
How can I tell I identify a language from Afghanistant? Is it more sing-song than English, like Welsh and Italian? Is it more guttural like German?

Answers
They said, more gutteral, like German.

I was not convinced.

I asked which country's language are you speaking?

They are speaking the language of Afghanistan, the main language, officially called Dari (also commonly called by the old name, called Farsi or Persian), although they can get by in both, the other language being Pashtu (also spelled as Pushtu or Pushto).

Which of the two languages you are speaking?

I decide that they only way for me to identify which language is which, if not by pronunciation, is by vocabulary. That may reveal the different letters. So I start by asking for the numbers one to three in both languages.

English - official language one pashtu/ pashto - official language two dari (also called Dari Persian or Afghan Persian)
one - yak - yo
two - dua - du
three - dree - sree?

What is hallo and goodbye?
Salaam aleikum. (As in Arabic.)

Thank you

Translation Tips
Duolingo does not yet have Arabic or any of the Middle Eastern languages. I am learning the Hebrew, Russian and Greek alphabets on Duolingo. (The Japanese and Hindi are both being prepared but have not yet reached the draft or beta stage allowing you to try out and debate translations on the first version before it is finalised.

Google translate gives Pashto and Persian but translates both into cursive scripts which I cannot read. Dari language is not in their long list.
However, if you type into Google translate Pashto you are offered the link:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.gkapps.translate.psen

The Reverso dictionary gives Arabic and several European languages and Hebrew but not Pashto nor Persian.

Tips
http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Languages_of_Afghanistan
http://wikitravel.org/en/Dari_phrasebook

Dari is written with a version of the Perso-Arabic script.

Dari alphabet and pronunciation (الفباى دري)

ح (he) is also known as ی جیمی (ye-jimi), and ﻩ (he) is also known as ی دوچش (ye-docešma)

http://www.17-minute-world-languages.com/en/dari/
http://wikitravel.org/en/Dari_phrasebook

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. See later post on Afghan foods. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Recognising Greek Words and letters

Problem
I have trouble knowing if a word is Latin or Greek. Other people seem to be able to recognize Greek words instantly. And read them. Why is this?

Answer
Scientists recognize mathematical and scientific symbols. We use the Latin alphabet. Anything outside this alphabet used in scienic is Greek For example, an ohm is a horse shoe shape letter.

Rays are known by the first three letters of the Greek alphabet. Alpha rays. Beta rays. Gamma rays. Alpha, beta, gamma, delta.

The letters 'pi' and 'theta' are used.

In algebra sigma, like a letter E, is sum, or summation.

Tips
Years ago I tried printing out the Russian and Greek and Hebrew alphabets and displaying them on the walls. I 'd read that somebody did this for his children. I think it was Gilbreth the motion study expert who I read about in the humorous book Cheaper By The Dozen, which was later made into a film.

I did not have a lot of luck with my printed alphabets. I never learned the whole lot. However I have now printed out a small version to tape inside the back of a diary or notebook. By looking at it for a few seconds at least one day a week for a year, wherein I am sitting on a train, I hope to eventually know every letter.

Learning the alphabet is a good thing to do on a plane or a train. Reading down the alphabet is quite short. You are less likely to go past your stop.
http://www.rapidtables.com/math/symbols/greek_alphabet.htm
http://www.rapidtables.com/math/symbols/Basic_Math_Symbols.htm

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker, teacher of English and learner and teacher of other languages. Please share links to my posts. 

Learning Hebrew with Duolingo, Hebrew Alphabet song, Hebrew Keyboard

I started learning Hebrew with Duolingo. It is still in the Beta stage. That's the experimental stage when you can try it out and give them feedback so they can iron out problems.

Foreign Alphabets
I had been getting along fine with the Russian on Duolingo, but was stuck on the first lesson of the Hebrew, although I already knew many of the Hebrew letters.

The first thing I did with Russian was to copy out the letters and stick the guide in the back of my diary. I shall now do this with the Hebrew.

Reciting Alphabets
I can recite the Hebrew alphabet, but it's all a bit jumbled: aleph bet (vet), gimal dalet, hay vuv, zayin... kalph lamed, mem nun, pay Fay, tsadick, coo-f, raiy-sh, shin, samech ay-in, tough ...

Alphabet Songs
In English we have a song for the alphabet.
ABCDEFG (ay bee see dee ee e f f gee
HIJKLMNOP (aitch i jay kay - el-em en-oh pea
QRSTUV queue ah ess tea you vee
WXY Zee double yew ex why zee.

Maybe there's a song for the Hebrew alphabet sung in English of course.
aleph bet vet gim-al duv
..... shin t u v or something like that.

Well - what do you know - would you believe it, there are several on Youtube. Here's the first one I found:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiCzoTs1AdE

Installing The Hebrew Keyboard For Windows
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/17424/windows-change-keyboard-layout

Installing The Hebrew Keyboard For Mac

If you're using Mac: Open System Preferences. Click the International button. Click "Input Menu". Scroll down until you see Hebrew, then put a check next to it. Put a check next to "Show input menu in menu bar". To change the language to Hebrew when you type, click on the American flag on the top right of the menu bar, and then choose Hebrew.

Virtual keyboard: https://www.branah.com/hebrew

Here's a site which teaches you the Hebrew letters of the alphabet and the vowels.
http://www.cartoonhebrew.com/hey

1 I had already downloaded the Hebrew alphabet. So now when I click on the small UK flag up pop several other alphabets I have chosen to use.

The problem is, I don't know where the Hebrew letters are under the QWERTY keyboard.

I am looking for an answer which I shall upload shortly.

I have found one website which shows the Hebrew letters and I have printed it. I can stand it up beside my keyboard. The theory is that you toggle or press escape and the Hebrew will come up, click a second time and then go back to qwerty.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author, speaker, language teacher.