When I first decided to tackle the daunting task of teaching myself ancient Greek, the greatest challenge was overcoming my feeling that it is simply impossible to learn such a complex and ancient language on one's own. Athenaze was the first book I bought, and I am glad it was because it gave me the confidence to continue this interest. Athenaze has students reading simple Greek in the first chapter, and I think there is some value in this alone, in that it build self-confidence. However, self-confidence is not enough to master an ancient language, and Athenaze quickly becomes disappointing due to its lack of organization. Topics are presented out of any logical order, and grammatical concepts are not thoroughly explained. Often, grammatical subjects are explained only partially, and are explained in full only after several intervening chapters. I ended up abandoning this book early on. Although it's probably good to present students with readings early on, grammar should not take a back seat. But, Athenaze is not all bad, as it gave me the confidence to continue studying Greek, albeit with a different text.