Lukeion Greek Problems

[Cleopatra]

Has anyone's dc ever taken Lukeion Greek before, and if so, how was your experience?

 

My dd just started Greek 1a.  So far she has had problems with the typing the Greek alphabet on the Mac into Quia the program that they use  ~~~ the solution was simple but the teacher didn't know what was happening and we had to figure it out by trial and error.  Then, there was a specific program he wanted downloaded for the alphabet and my dd downloaded it and sent an e-mail asking how to use it and has never been given an answer.  Now, on her first quiz she was unable to do it because the server was down on the weekend and she only has today to complete it.  When she went in this morning, the screen blanked and then the program wouldn't let her in again because it said she only had one attempted and had used it.  When she e-mailed the instructor said he would reset it, then she proceed to spend 20 minutes trying to get into again without success.  

 

This is so frustrating.  I'd heard good things about Lukeion but this is not our experience so far.  I do believe the problems are with Quia, but really, we are having to allot 2 hours for one hour of Greek with all these problems.  

 

Okay, I will stop venting now …..  :mad:

[G5052]

Just so you know, it doesn't matter who the provider is, the first week of online classes is usually extremely frustrating for both teacher and students, and it is usually the online platform vendor's fault, not the education company.  In this case, it sounds like Quia, not Lukeion.

 

I've been teaching online for a decade at the college level, and live online for four years now (not with Lukeion BTW), and the first week is a bear.  I always feel like quitting.  Always.  Then all of the players get their equipment and the connections worked out, and it gets better.  

 

I spent all morning trying to upload content in one of my course sites, and never was successful.  I'll take a deep breath and try again shortly.  It starts tomorrow.

 

One of the classes I teach is for professors that teach online.  That started last week, but I had five emails this morning that a certain feature they have to work with on their practice course sites doesn't work now.  I have 24/7 college helpdesk support, but the vendor help desk isn't staffed today.  I'm 95% sure now that it is a vendor issue.  Sigh.

 

Hang in there!

[yvonne]

My son took Greek 1 w/ Lukeion last year. It's going to be fine. With almost any online class we've done, figuring out the technology is a pain. I have a reeeeallly low tolerance for technical issues. I just want it to work.  With the added twist of figuring out how to type in Greek, you have to just resign yourself to taking as much time as it takes this first week to sort that out. Once you're past the technical issues this first week, your daughter will probably get into a smooth, regular weekly routine with the course, as my son did.

My son's in a class right now. When he's done, I'll ask if he remembers how we managed getting the Greek font onto his Mac. Or have you already figured out how to do that?

 

Hang in there!!!  It is so worth it!

[Mom2boys]

I agree with the previous posters. For several years now we have taken online classes with various providers and there are always technology glitches the first week. It will get better! 

[Cleopatra]

Thanks for the feedback, G5052.  It's good to know that this is not unusual.  It's my dd second online course, but the first did not have regular weekly classes with a teacher.  I hope your week gets better too! 

 

Yvonne, I would love it if you could ask your ds how he is dealing with the Greek font.  Right now my dd is using the Polytonic Greek keyboard on our Mac but the accents don't always look correct when she types them, however so far when she submits to Quia they seem to be accepting them. The teacher recommended a Greek unicode download, which we have downloaded but have yet to get instructions how to use it.  There is the option also of buying a $50 program but I'd like to avoid this avenue if possible.  Thanks for your pep-talk too!  And it's nice to meet another person with a low tolerance for technical issues.

 

Thanks for the encouragement, Mom2boys.  I'll tell my dd that it will get better.  

 

[yvonne]

Cleopatra,

Haven't talked to my son yet, but I know we did NOT have to purchase the $50 option.

[Corraleno]

My DS takes Greek with Lukeion and he's always just used the Greek font that comes with the Mac; we never downloaded anything else. Can you enlarge the screen so you can see the accents better? Is she trying to type directly into Quia, or does she type into a world processor and then cut & paste into Quia?

 

DS occasionally had a problem with the internet connection dropping out while he was in the middle of a quiz, so he'd email Regan and have it reset. In fact, now that I think about, that happened in the middle of his Latin 2 final exam last year! He was rather freaked out, but Amy reset it for him. Sometimes it takes a few hours for the reset. 

 

On the whole, Lukeion is an extremely well organized and well run organization, but sometimes these technology blips do occur — and in our experience, 99% of the time the problem has either been with Quia or with our own ISP, not Lukeion.

[Cleopatra]

Corraleno, my dd says that if she types directly into Quia and either waits too long, or types too long, Quia can shut down or lose everything, so she always types into a word document and then copies over.  

 

The only accent now that she seems to be having trouble with is the inverted breve.  She can't find the key that looks like an inverted breve; she uses the circumflex accent (I think it's option-i on the Canadian keyboard) and Quia seems to accept it.  I wish she could find a way to do a proper inverted breve though, because I wonder if she is going to have problems with it later on.  

 

They did finally reset the quiz but the response was "we'll reset it this time".  It concerned her because it was out of her control and she's a little worried if it happens again that they won't reset it.  I'll tell her it's not an unusual occurrence so she'll feel a little better.  Thanks for your help and if your ds has any tips for using the Mac, we're all ears!

[G5052]

Thanks for the feedback, G5052.  It's good to know that this is not unusual.  It's my dd second online course, but the first did not have regular weekly classes with a teacher.  I hope your week gets better too! 

 

I got my files uploaded, but I still have probably 3-4 hours of work tonight.

 

No word on the college problem.  Hopefully tomorrow.

[yvonne]

Cleopatra,

 

Typing directly into Quia might be the problem.  The Barrs warn (multiple times!)  not to type homework directly into Quia.  Mrs. Barr posted a document to the Latin I students (my daughter's taking Latin I) called "The Care and Feeding of Quia." On p. 3, she warns,

 

"Always ... complete your assignment by typing it on your own computer in a separate word processing program and saving it to your own hard drive before you open the Quia link..... DO NOT CREATE YOUR TRANSLATIONS FROM SCRATCH IN QUIA! You may not lose your work every time, but you will most certainly lose your work at some point." (Caps are Lukeion's.) 

 

Woo hoo! Maybe typing homework in a separate document and then cutting and pasting to Quia will take care of the worst of the problem?  Sounds like your daughter's already got that one under control.

 

If  your daughter doesn't have "The Care and Feeding of Quia" doc, I can forward a copy to her.  It should be on the Greek I class's home page, though.

 

My husband said that the Mac comes w/ a Greek font, but we weren't sure it was exactly the same as what Lukeion uses for ancient Greek, so we downloaded the free font that Mr. Barr suggested and linked to in one of the first set of instructions we received prior to the Greek I class. It was pretty straightforward on the Mac... download & click to install. I remember not being sure it was actually working, but, on that first set of instructions, there was a Greek sentence to type on our machine and compare to what was on the instructions. No idea what it said, but we could tell that all the characters looked the same.

 

 

Has she tried using Keyboard Viewer to look for the inverted breve?

 

Corraleno, my dd says that if she types directly into Quia and either waits too long, or types too long, Quia can shut down or lose everything, so she always types into a word document and then copies over.  

 

The only accent now that she seems to be having trouble with is the inverted breve.  She can't find the key that looks like an inverted breve; she uses the circumflex accent (I think it's option-i on the Canadian keyboard) and Quia seems to accept it.  I wish she could find a way to do a proper inverted breve though, because I wonder if she is going to have problems with it later on.  

 

They did finally reset the quiz but the response was "we'll reset it this time".  It concerned her because it was out of her control and she's a little worried if it happens again that they won't reset it.  I'll tell her it's not an unusual occurrence so she'll feel a little better.  Thanks for your help and if your ds has any tips for using the Mac, we're all ears!

 

[yvonne]

Re: deadlines, etc.

 

Lukeion is super, super strict about meeting deadlines, no extensions except in case of... I don't know... death, probably.  LOL   I was worried about that when my son took the first class there, but you would not believe his time management skills now!  These students grow so much in a Lukeion class. My son learned so much more than "just" the Greek from his Lukeion class last year. He knows how hard he worked in that class. He earned the grade to show for it, and he's proud of it.  Greek 2 was the one class he wanted to be sure he could take this year. Almost seems ironic, doesn't it? All that work, but he loved it.

 

This year, all three of my kids are taking Latin w/ Lukeion. I'm hoping it doesn't kill my daughter, but as they say... What doesn't kill her will make her stronger.  Her study habits will have made a 180° turn if she makes it to May!  LOL   Truly. It is a little scary, but it has been completely worth it for us. An absolutely invaluable experience.

 

 

[JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst]

Quia often has problems and is very sensitive.  Particularly during quizzes.  For homework always have the assignment typed into a document and then copy and paste.  (Don't make the mistake of cut and paste-btdt it was awful.)  We have found that when taking quizzes everyone else in the family has to be off the internet (including Netflix or anything similar), we turn off wi-fi on any computers being used, and don't run the microwave if you have wi-fi.

 

The Barrs do warn students not to wait until the last minute to finish a quiz for this, among other, reasons.  If you have a technology blip this gives time for the reset-which doesn't necessarily happen immediately.  It can take a few hours, especially if they are teaching classes during that time.

 

Maybe this will help with some of the font issues:  https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3260302?tstart=0

[Cleopatra]

Yvonne, my dd is typing into Word and copying over.  I've checked in Word and the inverted breve still looks like a circumflex (option-i).   :huh:

 

We downloaded the Greek unicode that Mr. Barr recommends, but when she chooses it as a font and types in Word, the characters come up as English characters.  Conversely, if she uses the Greek Polytonic keyboard option on Mac, the characters come up as Greek and there are only a few accent problems.  I'm not sure if you have to do something to turn the Greek Unicode font "on" or not, but it doesn't give us Greek characters and when I've tried to download it again, it says we've already downloaded it, so I'm kind of puzzled.

 

I'm so glad to hear that in spite of some glitches, your experience has been so good.  It's great when a course teaches life skills as well as academics.

 

ETA:  She has used the keyboard viewer to look for the inverted breve and has only found the circumflex.  This may be the key that is used for the inverted breve, but Mr. Barr doesn't seem to have much information in this regard and only directs us to the Greek unicode font which doesn't seem to be working either as it should.  Sigh!  I'm sure we'll get it worked out at some point!

[Cleopatra]

Jumped, I am quickly learning to be very careful with Quia!  The only reason this was quiz was last minute was because Quia was down for the weekend, which Lukeion knew about ahead of time.  She could have done the quiz early but wanted to make sure she'd studied properly so the only other option was last minute.  I hope Quia being down is not a regular occurrence.  

 

Thanks so much for the link.  I will get my dd to look over it.  Right now she's grateful for any help she can get to get the/a font working properly.

[JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst]

Jumped, I am quickly learning to be very careful with Quia!  The only reason this was quiz was last minute was because Quia was down for the weekend, which Lukeion knew about ahead of time.  She could have done the quiz early but wanted to make sure she'd studied properly so the only other option was last minute.  I hope Quia being down is not a regular occurrence.  

 

Thanks so much for the link.  I will get my dd to look over it.  Right now she's grateful for any help she can get to get the/a font working properly.

 

Quia is down for maintenance fairly often-every couple weeks or once a month and typically during late night hours Pacific time.  Over the past few weeks it has been down more than normal according to my kids. 

 

Where we live internet deliver can be shaky and if we have an internet brownout we can often loose connection with Quia just long enough to reset an exam but only disrupt delivery of a class. 

 

Sorry I don't have more info about Greek-my kids are/have been Latin and grammar students. 

[JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst]

nm- double post

[Cleopatra]

Thanks, Jumped.  My dd is going to make sure that she gets her work done early on it to allow for any glitches.

 

We have now figured out that we have to use the Greek Polytonic keyboard AND the IFAO Greek Unicode font at the same time to get the inverted breve.  Now the problem is that she cannot get the inverted breve above the Greek character, it appears as a character of its own.  Argh!  :huh:

[Jamee]

My son is in the 1a class too, and it's been a very trying first week, especially for someone who has never formally studied a language or has been in an actual class.  It also doesn't help that we have a massive timezone difference being in Japan--he takes the class at 11PM.  He missed the first homework assignment because the site was down.  And we're still trying to figure out the keyboard issues.  (Windows doesn't have polytonic Greek.)  I think this is going to be more of an experience than anything else.  I just hope DS catches on before it's too late to get a passing grade.  

[Cleopatra]

My son is in the 1a class too, and it's been a very trying first week, especially for someone who has never formally studied a language or has been in an actual class.  It also doesn't help that we have a massive timezone difference being in Japan--he takes the class at 11PM.  He missed the first homework assignment because the site was down.  And we're still trying to figure out the keyboard issues.  (Windows doesn't have polytonic Greek.)  I think this is going to be more of an experience than anything else.  I just hope DS catches on before it's too late to get a passing grade.  

 

Your ds and my dd are in the same class!  Neat!

 

Luckily my dd did her homework early and had it submitted.  It was the quiz that was the issue ……….. the teacher said afterward that Quia was only down for an hour but the note on the Quia site said it would be down from Sat morning until Sun at 7 pm. so she waited until Monday to do the quiz and then had the problems with the connection dropping.  He had to reset the quiz for her and then made a very pointed remark in class about it.

 

I've already e-mailed that we read that Quia was down for basically two days, so if your ds says that too, that's at least two of us.  Does the homework count for the actual mark?  I don't think so, but even so, I guess they are looking for good study habits.

 

I do realize that Lukeion have high standards and I really appreciate that, but I thought that they would be a little more understanding during the first weeks while these problems get sorted out.  It's not like only a couple of students are having problems ……. there are many of them.  And I don't understand why they can't give better instructions for using the Greek font …??  They must have these problems at the beginning of every single course, so you'd think that they would already have a FAQ sheet about it.  It took me about 4 e-mails to learn that we had to use the Greek Polytonic keyboard and the IFAO Greek unicode font together; perhaps it's obvious to them but to a student starting out, it is "Greek" to them, and good instructions would be helpful.

 

In any case, tell your ds to hang in there!  It has to get better! …….. doesn't it? :sad:  

 

P.S.  My dd says she thought he was having trouble getting into the homework and wonders if he was finally able to get into it?

 

She also wants to know if you've seen this help page for typing Greek in Windows:  http://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/greek-fonts.asp?pg=3

[Jamee]

Thanks for that link!  We got the keyboard shift, but I couldn't find the polytonic.  It wasn't as obvious as it was on the iPad--we have a keyboard for that.  He said he had e-mailed about the site being down when he went to submit his homework, but I'm not sure if he actually did.  I knew it was going to be tough, but I guess I thought there'd be a bit more introduction and how-to.  (it also didn't help that we couldn't sign up for the class until about 10 days before it started. :ohmy: ) He had worked a bit on the alphabet prior, but not nearly enough as we should have this summer.  I think it's coming along. We are just trying to get him to understand that this isn't like other classes, and keep him awake and alert for class. LOL  It is pretty amazing that they're translating the first day.

[Cleopatra]

You're welcome!  

 

I wish there had been a little more introduction and instruction too, but I think it's at the level where they give you something and you have to figure it out for yourself. 

 

Do you have the Weekly Study Checklist?  I get my dd to come to me each day with it to make sure everything is checked off.   Luckily she did 3 levels of Elementary Greek, so it's been reasonably easy for her so far.  I can't imagine starting at square one in this course.  Your ds will probably have to work very hard at the beginning but it should get easier as he goes along.