Download new first steps in latin teacher`s manual

NEW FIRST STEPS
IN LATIN
TEACHER’S MANUAL
NEW FIRST STEPS
IN LATIN
TEACHER’S MANUAL
Lee Pearcy
Mary Allen
Thomas Kent
Michael Klaasen
Mary Van Dyke Konopka
Alexander Pearson
Department of Classical Languages
The Episcopal Academy
Focus Publishing
Newburyport, Massachusetts
2001
Copyright © 2001 The Department of Classical Languages, The Episcopal Academy
ISBN 1-58510-026-9
This book is published by Focus Publishing, R. Pullins & Company, Inc., PO Box 369, Newburyport MA
01950. All rights are reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, by photocopying, recording, or by any other
means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
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Part One: Introduction
1. Latin and Grammar
This textbook is based on two propositions: that learning
Grammar is important, and that learning Latin is a good way to learn
Grammar. It is designed for Middle School students (that is, young
people aged 12-14) whose teachers accept those propositions and know
Latin well.
Why is it important to learn Grammar? And for that matter,
why write “Grammar” with a capital letter? Grammar (with a small g)
is a description of how a particular language works, and in this sense
we say that each language has its own grammar. In English, for
example, it is ungrammatical to put a word strongly marked as an
object before its verb if a word strongly marked as a subject follows the
verb, and a sentence like “Him saw I” is ungrammatical, although
“Him I saw” is not. Latin has no such constraints on the order of
marked words, and eum vîdî ego and eum ego vîdî are both
grammatical. The two languages have different grammars.
Capitalized Grammar, on the other hand, describes how
language in general works. In this sense we can speak of a universal
Grammar, common to all users of human languages, and we can say
that Latin and English have the same Grammar (S. Pinker, The
Language Instinct 1994, 230-240). Learning Grammar gives human
beings a window into the processes by which their minds interact with
the world. They become aware of themselves thinking, and they
become better at it.
The categories and terminology that have been developed to
describe Latin grammar make a reasonably good fit with the categories
and terminology of Grammar. Nouns, verbs, their modifiers, subjects,
predicates, and many other concepts traditionally used to describe Latin
seem in fact to be applicable to language in general. Even the
distinction between vocabulary and syntax, which plays so
fundamental a part in the layout of lessons in this book, seems to be
wired into the neural circuits of the human brain.
Learning Latin is a good way to learn Grammar. Since all
languages are equally grammatical, it may seem that learning any
language would develop understanding of Grammar. In fact several
circumstances make Latin a better-than-average choice as a tool for
helping young adolescents learn about Grammar.
Because Latin has no living native speakers, nearly everyone
who uses Latin must come to it by exercising powers of analytic and
synthetic reasoning. Learners in the grammar-translation method,
which this book uses, organize and master the elements of Latin, and
they use these elements to build structures of meaning. Before these
acts become unconscious, they take place at the level of consciousness;
a student learns to recite the declension of puella before being able to
respond automatically with puellae as the plural of puella or making
either the subject of a sentence. Young adolescents of middle-school
age are beginning to develop their ability to analyse, synthesize, and
think in abstract terms. Latin at this age can be a powerful tool for the
development of their intellectual powers.
Latin, also, has evolved into a special kind of language. It is a
classicised, regularized form of the living, untidy language of the
Roman street and forum. The Romans themselves began to eliminate
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the inconsistencies of their own speech, and generations of teachers
and grammarians have continued the process. Romans before Cicero’s
generation had no difficulty in saying audîbô or audîbis (Plautus,
Captivi 619), but they quickly settled on audiam and audiês as the
standard forms of the future indicative. Even though we know that
Cicero wrote servos for servus, we choose not to follow his practice,
and yet in our texts of Donne we may find “Goe, and catch a falling
Starre,” just as Donne wrote. Unlike Latin, English preserves historical
spellings alongside its currently standard ones. Latin grammar books
tell us that “Stems in -quo, like equo-, change qu to c before u. Thus,
—ecus (earlier equos) equi, equo, ecum (earlier equom), eque”
(Allen and Greenough, New Latin Grammar par. 46, n.1). We write
equum, and so do our grammar books. The regularization and
standardization of the Latin enshrined in textbooks make it easy for
young students to recognize patterns and to use these patterns to
construct in their minds the basic grammar of the language, and so of
language in general. Latin has advantages over any living language as a
tool for learning about Grammar.
Learning Latin will often, as many English-speakers have
observed, help students to understand the grammar of English, but that
synergy only partially justifies the effort needed to learn Latin. Latin
and English have in fact very different grammars, and many of the
categories and terminology of Latin grammar do not fit English very
well.
2. Learning Latin with First Steps
The middle-schoolers for whom this textbook has been
designed are passing through a time of intense, concentrated
intellectual growth. They encounter mathematical concepts like
variables and equations, literature that demands careful analysis of plot
and character, and abstract grammatical concepts like subject and
predicate. Learning these new things can easily make learning itself
mysterious.
Learning Latin gives these young adolescents an opportunity
to become aware of their learning as it happens. In addition to learning
the language, they learn an elaborate, articulated vocabulary for
describing it, and with the help of their teachers they use this
grammatical vocabulary to develop conscious strategies for organizing
and controlling the facts of the language. Knowing this, we have kept
in mind those for whom learning, especially where language is
concerned, may not come easily. Intelligent young children often
develop unconscious strategies to cope with specific difficulties in
processing language. Studying Latin, we believe, helps these students
in their adolescence by giving them conscious strategies to supplement
their unconscious repertoire.
For many students, learning Latin is like learning to read
again. They must once again associate phonemes with symbols, learn
rules of sequencing, and extract meaning from marks on a page. In
some cases, difficulties and learning differences which students
experienced and overcame when they learned to read their native
language resurface as they try to learn Latin.
These students can use Latin as a tool to become better
learners, and First Steps in Latin has been designed to help them and
their teachers. While these features will make learning Latin easier for
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all students, they are especially important for students with learning
differences:
Elimination of distractions. First Steps has deliberately been made
austere. Everything in the book is important. A student does not have
to decide what is important to learn and what can be skipped. Nothing
can be skipped.
Focus on one skill at a time. Traditional grammar describes language
in terms of single elements and categories. When language is taught by
the grammar-translation method, instruction focuses on one aspect at a
time, and in the student’s mind deliberate analysis precedes deliberate
synthesis. The grammar-translation method presents the morphology,
lexicon, and syntax of a language separately. In the grammartranslation classroom, activities target one aspect of language, and
often one cognitive skill, at a time. Dictation, for example, targets
auditory processing, and quizzes on forms test a student’s memory.
This individuation of linguistic concepts and cognitive skills
makes it possible to identify the particular concepts and skills with
which students have difficulty. A teacher can then tailor classroom
activities and assignments to reinforce the difficult matter. Students
who have difficulty with a specific skill can become aware of this
learning difference and work to remedy it.
Repetition and Review. Repetitio mater memoriae. All students
benefit from constant review of concepts, formulas, and data. As far as
possible, we have tried to make First Steps in Latin beneficial by
making it repetitious; for example, the rule for forming the perfect stem
is always given in the words, “The perfect stem is found by removing
the final –î from the third principal part.” This sentence appears five
times in First Steps. We have also tried to make sure that in the heart of
the book (Lessons IX-XXVII) every word presented in vocabulary
appears in a sentence at least once within every five chapters.
Consistency. We have also taken great pains to make the format of
each lesson consistent, so that paradigms, explanations, vocabulary,
and exercises always have the same general appearance and structure.
Students will find it easy to know how to approach each lesson and to
consult previous lessons.
A Reference, not a Text. Because middle schoolers learn from their
teachers and from each other, not from their textbooks, we have
designed First Steps in Latin to be used as a book for reference and
consultation, not as a textbook. First Steps will work best when
students turn to the left-hand pages after the new grammar of a lesson
has been presented and drilled, not before.
3. Teaching with the Grammar-Translation Method and First Steps
There are three ways to teach Latin: the oral-aural method, the
reading-in-context method, and the grammar-translation method. None
of these methods is essentially superior to the others; it is important to
note, however, that each of them has somewhat different aims, and that
each of them does different things to the minds of students.
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The three methods and the teachers who use them differ in the
value and weight they give to the four skills: reading, writing,
speaking, and listening. All give reading first priority and acknowledge
that learning to read Latin is an important goal of studying the
language, but they place varying degrees of emphasis on the remaining
three skills. First Steps in Latin emphasizes learning to read Latin
sentences but gives nearly equal weight to learning to write them, and
each lesson includes as many or nearly as many English-to-Latin
sentences as Latin-to-English. Listening, whether to dictation exercise
or to Latin spoken in the classroom, ranks third, with speaking a distant
fourth. Oral recitation, however, plays an important part in the
grammar-translation method.
In addition, the grammar-translation method places great
emphasis on developing in the student a systematic understanding of
language and an ability to describe language accurately. Parsing,
diagramming, writing synopses, and other activities promote this
understanding. The grammar-translation method can in fact be defined
by this emphasis. As its name suggests, in the grammar-translation
method no form, lexical item, or syntactical rule is used until it has
been explained. Grammar precedes translation, and students construct
their knowledge of Latin by deduction.
Most good Latin teachers use techniques from all three
methods, and the following general observations about teaching with
First Steps will be familiar to many. What may seem novel is our
insistence that the consistency and repetitiveness of the text be
reflected in the consistency of a teacher’s practice. Middle schoolers
are creative thinkers. They learn best, we believe, when their creative
thinking occurs in a framework of clear, consistent expectations.
Learning Latin, also, involves paying attention to detail. Details
become easier to organize and master when they are consistently
presented.
Good Latin teachers also use Latin. The more Latin heard,
spoken, written, and read, the better. Ten examples are worth a hundred
explanations.
Consistency. The more important an activity, the more important it is
to do it in exactly the same way every time.
Every Latin class should begin and end in the same way.
Some teachers begin every class with a review of forms or vocabulary;
others begin with spoken greetings in Latin. The choice of activity is
less important than its consistent presence.
Every time a student or teacher manipulates the language, that
manipulation should follow a clear, explicit order. Following this
practice will help students develop a sense of the basic framework of
Latin. The construction of a noun or adjective, for example, should
always be given in the order CASE, NUMBER, GENDER; verb tenses
should always be listed in the order PRESENT, IMPERFECT,
FUTURE; PERFECT, PLUPERFECT, FUTURE PERFECT; verbs
should always be construed in the order PERSON, NUMBER, TENSE,
MOOD, VOICE. Students should follow these orders in oral recitation,
written exercises, classroom games, and every time they describe a
substantive or verb.
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Repetition. Latin classes never leave the first chapter behind. Learning
Latin is not a linear process; instead, it resembles a recursive spiral, in
which a return to first principles precedes every advance in knowledge.
Some of every Latin class should always be devoted to review
of previous work, and every test should include questions on material
that the students have already learned. To some extent, the recursive
structure of grammar and the design of First Steps make some
repetition inevitable, but a good teacher will build in more.
Speaking. Language is sound in the air. This statement is true even of
Latin, a language with no living native speakers, and true even when
Latin is taught with reading and grammatical understanding as its
principal objectives.
From their first Latin class, students should be taught to
pronounce Latin carefully and accurately. Many teachers focus on the
consonants characteristic of Latin, the hard c and semivocalic v. It is
more important, we believe, to do everything possible to help students
master the vowel sounds and accentuation of Latin. A student who
becomes accustomed from the beginning to say ámô, ámâs, ámat, not
amó amás amát, and to pronouncing the differences between long and
short i and long and short e will find it harder to confuse dūceris with
dūcēris or to suppose that mīseram means “an unhappy girl.”
Even in a grammar-translation classroom there is a place for
spoken Latin. Middle schoolers enjoy learning and using Latin
greetings, commands, and requests. Plays and skits, Latin oral reports,
and other activities can reinforce a student’s knowledge of Latin
phonology as well as of other aspects of the language.
Even a teacher who does not want to speak Latin in the
classroom should make sure that no Latin is ever translated, analyzed,
or discussed until it has been read aloud, with correct pronunciation.
Listening. Learning to hear and to comprehend Latin as it is read or
spoken can promote the important skill of understanding a Latin
sentence as it unfolds. If students are to read Latin fluently, they cannot
approach a sentence as a snarl of words to be untangled by “looking for
the verb.” Instead, they must learn to process a sentence in its Latin
order, clause by clause.
Responding to spoken commands in Latin can help students
develop this skill. Dictation (or dictâmen) is another important tool of
the grammar-translation method. From the earliest stages students can
be asked to listen to a word or short phrase, write it down, and translate
it. Successive sentences should repeat a single pattern, and students
should gradually become accustomed to longer and longer sentences.
Writing. By a paradox of a kind not infrequent in education, giving
students practice only in reading Latin is not the best way to teach them
to read Latin. Writing Latin has been a traditional and effective part of
learning to read Latin by the grammar-translation method. Active
command of vocabulary and syntax comes into play mostly in the act
of translating sentences and longer passages from English into Latin.
A typical chapter in First Steps includes nearly as many
English-to-Latin sentences as Latin-to-English. Students should
become accustomed as soon as possible to using idiomatic Latin word
order and to looking for varied ways of expressing the same idea in
Latin.
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Composition does not mean only direct translation from
English into Latin. Students may be asked to write answers in Latin to
simple questions (Quid est in picturâ? Ubi sunt librî tuî?) or to
complete sentences in which some word has been omitted. Any activity
that encourages students to produce Latin will promote their ability to
understand it.
Reading. Reading a sentence like the one which opens Cicero’s Third
Oration Against Catiline constitutes one of the most complex mental
actions that we ask our students to perform. Instruction by the
grammar-translation method aims to develop students who can read
and understand such a sentence without having to translate or decode
it, who can produce an accurate, idiomatic English translation of it, and
who can describe completely its grammatical and rhetorical structures.
Those complex abilities are made up of individual, easily
managed skills. In the beginning, conscious analysis, memorization,
and labor precede understanding. A student learns that -tis is the
second person singular ending, that it means “you,” that it is added to
the present stem of the verb to make the present active, and so on.
From these data the student can conclude with deliberation that vidêtis
means “you see.” Consistent, repetitive practice makes this process
almost automatic, so that the student hears or looks at vidêtis and
knows that it means “you see.” That automatic knowledge combines
with many other kinds to allow a student to read Cicero’s 47-word
period, from Rem publicam through vidêtis.
Latin sentences can be long, complex, and occasionally
difficult, but learning to read them need not be. First Steps tries to
make the process of learning to read Latin orderly and progressive.
Students should become accustomed to short, simple sentences in a
limited number of patterns before they see variations on those patterns.
When a new form or pattern is presented, it can be practiced by varying
the sentences in earlier lessons.
Reading is, however, an inherently unnatural act. Human
beings do not read without instruction. We must learn to read,
consciously and sometimes with difficulty. Latin teachers need to be
aware of the fundamental cognitive components of reading:
sequencing, decoding, auditory and visual processing, and the rest. In
the grammar-translation method, some classroom activities isolate one
or two of these components. Teachers need to be alert to the Latin
student who has difficulty with one or more of these components.
Together with reading and learning specialists, Latin teachers can play
an important role in helping such students become better students in all
subjects, not just Latin.
4. Conclusion
Somewhere between the mechanical action of the eye
scanning a page and the mind's assimilation of knowledge a miracle
occurs. Our understanding of the morphology, vocabulary, and syntax
of the language in which we read combines with our expectations and
sense of context to process foreign information into meaning. The
miraculous moment is brief if we are reading in our native languages,
extended if we read in Latin.
To read in Latin we must build categories about language and
form expectations about context in a more deliberate manner than when
6
we learned our native or second language. As Frank Smith puts it,
“’Teaching’ is often little more than telling children that a category
exists” (Understanding Reading: a Psycholinguistic Analysis of
Reading and Learning to Read 1988, 12). There is a great difference
between Latin and English in the morphology alone, and that
difference increases exponentially when syntax becomes involved. The
experience is more taxonomical than sequential.
We have chosen the grammar/translation method to teach
Latin because it exercises uniquely the linguistic skills involved in
building categories and forming expectations about individual words,
phrases, whole sentences, and texts. When students successfully
acquire Latin, their way of approaching language changes permanently.
Our grammar book aims to emphasize that change because we believe
that this approach to language is a unique and valuable contribution to
culture.
7
Part Two: Some Basic Tools
Learners and teachers working together must share basic tools.
Teachers must be masters of the tools, and students must work to learn
how to use them. Experienced teachers who use the grammartranslation method have a large tool kit, but some basic tools appear in
every good teacher’s box, and in their students’ hands.
1. Flash Cards
Repetition, review, consistency, and focus on one skill at a
time are cornerstones of the grammar-translation method. In learning
vocabulary, students need a system that encourages them to review and
master all relevant grammatical and lexical information about each
word in the First Steps lexicon. Flash cards can be an important
teaching and learning tool in this process, and in learning
morphological and syntactical information as well.
Both teachers and students can use flash cards. In teaching
with First Steps, we have found it helpful to make large flash cards on
8 ½ x 11 card stock for use in the classroom. These classroom cards
can be used for oral drill, vocabulary quizzes, and other exercises.
Students make their own cards on 3 x 5 blanks, and making the cards is
an important part of learning Latin. Teachers should inspect the cards
to make sure that students are following the pattern set for them by the
classroom cards.
There are three kinds of flash cards, one each for vocabulary,
forms, and rules. Each kind should be in a distinctive color. We have
used white for vocabulary cards, pink for form cards, and blue for rules
cards.
VERB
3rd conjugation
to lead
dûcô, dûcere, dûxi, ductum
ductile
introduce
Fig. 1
Vocabulary cards have the English meaning on one side, and
Latin lexical and grammatical information on the other. Cards for verbs
have the principal parts, spelled out in full, in the center and the part of
speech, conjugation, and derivatives in three corners (fig. 1). Cards for
nouns have the nominative singular, genitive singular, and gender in
the center on one side and the part of speech, declension, and
derivatives in three corners. Cards for other parts of speech follow this
basic pattern.
Forms cards have the name of a category of forms on one
side and a paradigm of endings on the other (fig. 2).
8
-A
-AE
-AE -ÂRUM
-AE -ÎS
-AM -ÂS
-Â
-ÎS
first declension endings
Fig. 2
Rules cards have the name of a rule on one side and a
statement of the rule on the other. Rules cards are used only for the
very few rules that are so useful that they must be memorized: the rules
of agreement or concord, and the so-called “neuter law.”
2. The Synopsis
A synopsis is an ordered list of all the forms of a verb in a
specified person, number, and for forms that are so marked, gender.
Figure 3 gives a sample synopsis form. Few exercises give students
more practice in the essential patterns and variations of the formation of
Latin verbs. Even advanced students benefit from regular practice with
synopses.
A synopsis also gives students a view of the basic structure of
a Latin verb. Many students, perhaps especially those for whom
learning patterns is difficult, find it easier to acquire a new piece of the
pattern if they have seen from the beginning the whole pattern, even
those parts that they have yet to learn. We have found it helpful to give
students the complete synopsis form as soon as they have learned all
six tenses of the indicative mood in active and passive voices. Students
learn to fill out only the forms that they have learned, but they also
learn where those forms fit into the complete structure of Latin verbs.
From Latin 1 to Advanced Placement Latin, every test should
include a synopsis.
3. Sentence Diagrams
A sentence diagram is a visual representation of the syntactical
structure of a sentence. Many teachers will remember diagramming as a
fundamental part of their English courses in school; for those who have
not had much experience with constructing sentence diagrams, a good
handbook of English grammar, like Warriner’s English Grammar and
Composition, will give instructions and examples. First Steps includes
examples of a few basic types of sentence diagrams to illustrate specific
points of syntax.
Sentence diagrams become useful at several points as students
learn Latin by the grammar-translation method. Diagrams can reinforce
and explicate new points of syntax when they first appear; they are
especially useful, we have found, in explaining different types of
modifying structures, like adverbial or adjectival phrases. Diagrams can
also be used when students have difficulty with a particular sentence,
either Latin to English or English to Latin. Not every sentence need be
diagrammed, but it is important to give students regular practice in
understanding sentences in this way.
9
Part Three: In the Classroom
1. Before We Open the Book
Beginnings and endings are the most important moments in a
classroom. The first five minutes and last five minutes of any class can
determine the success or failure of everything between, and the first
days of a Latin course for middle schoolers can shape the rest of their
experience with the subject.
Middle schoolers learn from each other and from their teacher
before they learn from a textbook. They learn by seeing, hearing,
speaking, and moving. The first days of Latin class should engage all
these modes and actions and focus them on a single objective: making
the students ready to learn Latin by the grammar-translation method.
Readiness includes making a first acquaintance with:
•
•
•
•
The sounds of Latin
The Latin alphabet
The concept that endings of Latin words affect their
use
The distinction between stem and ending
Experienced middle-school teachers often spend as much as a week in
activities designed to reinforce these concepts.
The sounds of Latin come first. Even though New First Steps
does not emphasize speaking Latin, it is important for students to
develop an accurate, consistent pronunciation. Many teachers believe
that it is important that the first words that students hear in their first
Latin class should be Latin. Salvête, discipulî et discipulae makes a
good beginning; what happens next will depend on the teacher’s
facility with spoken Latin. After saying Nômen meum est
Magister/Magistra N_____________, the teacher may ask one student,
Quid est nômen tuum? and elicit the response, Nômen meum est
N________________. That student asks another in turn, until the
question and answer have moved through the class. John Traupman,
Conversational Latin for Oral Proficiency (Wauconda, Ill., 2nd ed.
1997) gives dialogues based on authentic classical vocabulary and
syntax. Songs and skits in Latin are an effective way to reinforce
accurate pronunciation and grammatical concepts. Students enjoy
memorizing and performing simple dialogues, even before they can
translate or parse what they are saying. Even the least orally-minded
teacher should make sure that no sentence is ever translated into
English without first being read aloud, carefully, in Latin.
The Latin alphabet and practice in reading Latin aloud
belongs at the end of the introductory lessons, although even on the
first day a teacher can write Salvete on the board and invite the
observation that the letter /v/ has a different sound in Latin than in
English. Latin labels on the mensae, iânua, fenestra, and other objects
in the classroom can make students familiar with the Latin alphabet and
serve as well to make games and other activities easier.
The concept that endings of Latin words affect their use
should be firmly in every student’s mind before opening New First
Steps for the first time. Activities during the first days of class can
10
inculcate this concept. Many teachers like to give their students Latin
names; it is easy to ask what feature distinguishes the names of boys
from those of girls. Simple action verbs like surgô, ambulô, and sedeô
lend themselves to several kinds of activities in which movement
reinforces learning. The teacher may give simple commands first to one
student (Surge! Sede! Ambulâ ad fenestram!) and then to the class
(Surgite! Sedête! Ambulâte!). The teacher then asks what is different
about the commands in each situation.
A more ambitious activity introduces students to the primary
personal endings. The teacher puts a chair in front of one student and
sits in it. Standing, she says, Surgô. She then gestures to the student to
stand, and as the student rises, says, Surgis. Turning to the class and
pointing to the student, she says, Surgit. She sits down again and
gestures to the whole class to rise: Surgimus. Pointing to them, she
says, Surgitis. Turning to one student and indicating the whole class,
she says, Surgunt. After this entire sequence has been repeated three or
four times, the teacher can initiate a discussion of how and why the
words differ. At the end of the exercise, the teacher writes on the board
-ô
-s
-t
-mus
-tis
-nt
and sends the students away to learn this paradigm. They are ready to
begin New First Steps.
The distinction between stem and ending is best presented
in general terms as part of the first days’ activities, after students have
learned that endings affect meaning. Students need to know the terms
“stem” and “ending,” and that part of every word will change
depending on its use, while part will remain the same.
2. A Sample Lesson
Middle schoolers learning Latin need to read, write, hear, and
speak Latin in every Latin class. They need a variety of activities in
each class; a good rule of thumb, in fact, is to divide the class period
into segments of ten to fifteen minutes each and plan one activity for
each segment.
Middle schoolers learn best when they encounter variety
within a framework of consistent expectations. The beginning and end
of each class should be nearly the same every day. Many teachers post
an agenda, prefaced by HODIE and perhaps the date or day of the week
in Latin, in the same place in the classroom every day. Students soon
learn where to look for the day’s work and the next day’s assignment.
Students often enjoy having a Latin proverb, motto, or other
expression as part of the written agenda.
We have chosen to give a sample set of activities for Lesson
V, First Declension Nouns. This lesson presents grammatical concepts,
a paradigm, and rules of syntax, and it contains several new vocabulary
words as well as sentences to be translated. Lesson V is thus typical of
chapters in New First Steps. The following activities might occupy two
or three class meetings, depending on the class’s ability and the length
of each instructional period.
11
a. Review. At the end of the previous class, the teacher had
told the students to prepare flash cards for the three new vocabulary
words in Vocabulary V. As the students enter the room, the teacher
inspects their flash cards. When they are seated, the teacher greets them
in Latin and reviews orally the words from Vocabulary IV, adding the
three new words from Vocabulary V one at a time.
b. Etymology. The teacher asks what derivatives students
have discovered for the three new vocabulary items. Students who have
not been able to find derivatives add them to their flash cards at this
time.
c. New concepts. The teacher explains that Lesson V is about
nouns, and that the class will be thinking about and paying attention to
nouns as it moves through the lesson. After making sure that students
know what a noun is, the teacher may wish to remind the students that
English too expresses different concepts, like number and possession,
by changing the ending of a noun. The concepts case, number, and
gender should be introduced and explained, although at this point
students should not be expected to do more than become acquainted
with them. They will learn them during the following activities.
d. Sentence manipulation. The class now turns to Exercise
V.A, the Latin to English sentences. The objective of working with
these sentences at this point is to make sure that students can identify a
noun and to give them practice in applying the concepts of case,
number, and gender. Before beginning, the teacher may want to point
out that all the nouns in Exercise V.A are in the nominative case and
that singular nouns in that case end in –a, and plural nouns in –ae.
A student reads each sentence aloud, and the teacher asks
questions about it. “Is there a noun in this sentence?” “What is it?”
“What case is it?” “What number?” “What gender?” Not all the
sentences need be done in this way. Translation at this point should be
avoided, since it only distracts students’ attention from the objectives of
this activity.
e. New paradigm. The students must now begin to learn the
names of the cases in order, and the endings for first declension
associated with those cases in singular and plural. Latin teachers have
developed many techniques for helping students memorize patterned
information like this. Middle schoolers will not object to rote learning,
and they enjoy chanting, movement, and games. Teachers will want to
make sure that the new paradigm is presented in ways that make it
accessible to auditory, visual, and kinesthetic learners; for example, one
drill might begin with the teacher writing first declension endings on
the board and having the class chant the endings as the teacher points to
each one. Then the teacher erases one ending at a time, until the
students are comfortable reciting the endings without seeing them. The
students then practice reciting the paradigm while standing, clapping,
or performing some other action for plural forms, leaning right for
singular and left for plural, and so on. After the students have drilled
with endings, the teacher must prepare for the next activity by
explaining the rule for forming the stem of any Latin noun. The
students should then practice forming stems of the nouns learned so far
and declining them orally and in writing. A blackboard relay or other
game is a good way to practice this skill.
12
f. Sentence manipulation and translation. The class now
turns back to Exercise V.A. Again, a student reads each sentence aloud.
This time, the reader or another student also translates the sentence into
English. The teacher may again ask about the case, number, and gender
of any nouns in the sentence; this time, however, students should also
practice changing the number of every noun, singular to plural and
plural to singular. As this activity moves along, the teacher may want to
point out that when the number of a sentence’s subject changes, the
number of the verb will change also, and to ask the students to make
that change as well. If this is done, at the end of this activity the teacher
can call the students’ attention to the first rule of concord in Lesson V;
if not, practice with agreement of subject and verb can be the core of
another activity.
g. English to Latin. These sentences lend themselves to a
variety of activities. In the early lessons, the English-to-Latin sentences
are simple enough that they can be done orally; in later lessons, each
sentence can be given to one student to be put on the board or presented
to the class in other ways. Once students have learned to diagram
sentences, they can be divided into pairs, and one member of the group
can diagram the sentence while the other translates it into Latin.
A single English-to-Latin sentence can be the starting point for
several kinds of activities: singular-to-plural or plural-to-singular
transformations, substitutions, and so on. One student, for example,
may translate “The farmer has sung” into Latin; a second student may
then be asked for the Latin for “The farmers have sung,” a third for
“The girl was singing,” a fourth for “The girls were singing,” and so
on.
h. Roman culture. What did a Roman epistula look like?
How did a Roman send it? How long did it take to reach its
destination? How many Romans could read and write? What is the
farthest straight-line distance that a Roman letter could travel without
leaving the Roman Empire? Questions like these grown naturally out of
vocabulary and sentences, and teachers should take advantage of
middle schoolers’ curiosity by encouraging them to think about the
Roman realities that the words suggest.
Good teachers, however, will keep the students’ attention
focused on language, not culture. New First Steps is about words and
how they work, not about the Romans and how they lived, and the
presentation of Roman culture in the classroom should always be in the
context of language.
i. Homework. Homework should draw on the class’s
activities in the period before it is assigned. A carefully given
homework assignment can become the review and wrap-up with which
many good teachers end each class. (On the importance of such
routines, see Jon Saphier and Robert Gower, The Skillful Teacher 1997,
85-100.) Well-devised homework gives students further practice in the
skills and concepts that they have done most recently under their
teacher’s supervision. Additional sentences for translation, vocabularies
or paradigms to memorize, flash cards to prepare, or similar activities
reinforce what students have learned in class and play an important part
in the transfer of new information from short-term to long-term
memory.
13
Homework should never be mere busy work, and the teacher’s
inspection of it should be more than cursory. Middle schoolers need to
know that accuracy is important, and homework gives them an
opportunity to develop habits of accuracy without direct supervision.
In constructing a lesson from these activities, teachers should
give careful thought to the order in which the activities occur. In the
grammar-translation method, students always encounter the rule before
the example, the vocabulary before the sentence, and the letter before
the spirit.
The austerity of this method has advantages. At a crucial
period in their intellectual growth, middle-school students learn what a
structure of knowledge is. Their knowledge of Latin, acquired by a
systematic process of theory, practice, and review, can serve them as a
pattern for future learning in many areas.
14
Part Four: Teaching Notes
The following section of this manual offers specific
suggestions and brief comments on each lesson in New First Steps.
Lesson I: Verbs
The first lesson lays the foundation for further work on verbs,
which are the heart of New First Steps. It assumes that students have
had several days of preliminary classroom work like that described in
Part Three above. The goals of this Lesson are:
•
To become acquainted with the terms
PERSON, NUMBER,
TENSE, MOOD, VOICE;
•
•
•
To learn the concept of PRINCIPAL PARTS;
To be able to form the present stem of a regular first
conjugation verb;
To be able to form and translate the present indicative active
of a regular first conjugation verb.
Students should be told that they will be expected to know terms that
are introduced in SMALL CAPITALS. Reinforce the concept of stem and
ending by pointing out that in paradigms throughout this book, the
unchanged part of the word will be in black and the part that changes,
in red.
Students will need practice in the three ways of expressing the
present tense. Every verb (except, of course, those modified by non) in
Exercise I.A should be translated in all three ways; teachers who use
Latin in the classroom can use the prompt aliter to elicit the responses.
Lesson II: Imperfect Tense
The second lesson introduces two tenses, the imperfect and the
future. For the most part, students find the future tense unproblematic
but find the concept of the imperfect difficult to grasp. The difficulty
lies in understanding that tenses are subjective. The imperfect describes
the action as the speaker thinks of it, not as it actually is. If the speaker
thinks of the action as ongoing, continuous, repeated, habitual, or
interrupted in past time, he or she will present it as imperfect.
Successful strategies for presenting this concept include:
•
•
•
Constant practice in translating imperfect verbs in several
ways. In addition to those listed in the lesson, students should
become accustomed to the auxiliaries “kept (on),” as in “I kept
(on) loving,” and “began,” as in “I began to love.”
Graphic presentation of verbs on a time line (Figure 4).
Emphasis on “was/were + -ing” as the sign of an imperfect
idea in English. It is important to emphasize that “–ing” is an
essential part of the expression, in order to avoid later
confusion with perfect passives and other auxiliary uses of
“was/were.”
Students can now begin to practice transforming verbs from
present to imperfect to future: laudâmus/laudâbâmus/laudâbimus. In
15
preparation for the next lesson, the teacher may want to emphasize that
these are the tenses formed from the present stem.
Lesson III: Perfect Tense
Many teachers associate the term “aorist” with Greek, where it
names a morphologically distinct tense, but it is useful for helping
Latin students understand that the perfect tense in Latin describes two
distinct concepts: action of undefined duration in past time (the aorist),
and action in the past whose effects endure in the present (the true
perfect). Students should be told that the perfect is the normal past
tense in Latin, and that in translating a sentence like “You sang” from
Latin to English they should use a perfect tense.
Lesson IV: Pluperfect Tense
Students who have mastered the concept of stem, tense sign,
and personal ending find no difficulty in learning to form the pluperfect
and future perfect tenses. More often they struggle to understand the
concepts behind these tenses. Informal English often uses a simple past
to express completed action before another action in past time: Haec
erat urbs, de quâ poetae scrîpserant, “This was the city about which
the poets wrote.” English also commonly uses a present tense to
express action before another action in the future: Si poeta vênerit,
carmina bona canêmus, “If the poet comes, we will sing good songs.”
Accordingly, students often offer “have” or “had”
indifferently as translations for the perfect and pluperfect, and they find
the future perfect, which has nearly disappeared from all but the most
formal written English, as mysterious as “thee” and “thou.” Although
in the previous lessons students gained from learning a variety of
translations for a single tense, in this lesson they will find their task
easier if the teacher insists on the one-to-one equivalence of the Latin
pluperfect and the English “had,” and the Latin future perfect and the
Latin “will have.”
A time line may help students see the relationship of the tenses
to one another.
perfect
pluperfect
future
present
imperfect
future perfect
Fig. 4
The vocabulary for Lesson IV presents nouns for the first
time. Students must learn that there are four essential pieces of
information for every noun: nominative singular, genitive singular,
gender, and meaning.
Lesson V: First Declension Nouns
Sample activities for Lesson V have been given above, in Part
Three.
16
Lesson VI: Second Conjugation
Because the rules of formation for the present system (present,
imperfect, and future tenses) are the same for first and second
conjugations, Lesson VI gives students an opportunity to review and
consolidate their knowledge of these forms. Lesson VI also follows up
the distinction between subject and predicate, introduced in Lesson V,
by presenting some important grammatical concepts and techniques:
•
•
Direct objects
The distinction between transitive and intransitive verbs
When they have finished this lesson, students should be able to:
•
•
•
•
Identify the subject and direct object of a simple sentence, in
Latin or English
State what case the subject or direct object is
Correctly translate simple Subject-Object-Verb sentences
Diagram a simple S.O.V. sentence in Latin or English
The statement, “If a sentence has a verb in the first or second
person, its subject cannot be a noun,” may seem to be contradicted by
sentences like Senex multa didici. Senex is not, however, the subject of
this sentence (Allen and Greenough par. 282); instead, it is in
apposition with the subject contained in the verb didici.
Lesson VII: Perfect, Pluperfect, and Future Perfect Tenses
Since students have already learned how to form the perfect
system of regular first conjugation verbs, this lesson and others like it
present no entirely new grammatical information. Teachers should take
advantage of this opportunity to review and consolidate the students’
knowledge of verb formation and translation.
Gapping (sometimes called “ellipsis”) is so pervasive a feature
of Latin that we have chosen to present it in explicit terms early in New
First Steps. Students should be encouraged to find examples of it in
English and Latin and to use it in the sentences they write. For further
comments on gapping, see G. Knudsvig and D. Ross, “The Linguistic
Perspective,” in R. LaFleur, Latin for the 21st Century 1998, 29-30.
Lesson VIII: Second Declension Nouns
Like Lesson V, this lesson deals with nouns. Students have
already encountered the rule for forming the stem of any Latin noun,
but the teacher may want to emphasize that it applies to all declensions.
Students should practice forming the stem of all nouns presented so far.
On hearing that “Masculine nouns of the second declension
have a nominative singular ending in –us or –r,” some students
conclude that the nominative singular ending can be –us or –r
indifferently. The teacher will want to emphasize the four essential
pieces of information about every noun, first presented in Lesson IV,
and to point out that the nominative singular is immutable.
Since the vocative differs from the nominative only for
second-declension nouns in –us, paradigms in New First Steps at this
17
point do not include it. The vocative will be treated in New Second
Steps.
Lesson IX: Second Declension Nouns (Continued)
Our presentation of the difference between nouns like liber
and nouns like puer is pedagogically functional but historically
inaccurate. The -e- does not disappear from the oblique cases of nouns
like liber but has in fact intruded itself after an original nominative
*libros lost its ending (Allen and Greenough par. 45). There are very
few nouns like puer, in which the stem and nominative singular are
identical. Puer and vir are the only such nouns in New First Steps.
The so-called “Neuter Law,” the rule for the nominative and
accusative of neuter nouns given in this lesson, is one of the few rules
worth memorizing verbatim. If students know it by heart, it can be used
to help them distinguish subject from object in sentences like Factum
puerum terret.
Lesson X: Third Conjugation: Consonant Verbs
In the present system, third conjugation consonant stem verbs
differ only in detail from verbs of the other regular conjugations. They
represent a class of verbs in which a short vowel connects stem to
ending, and their present stem can in fact be described as the second
principal part minus -re, as in the other conjugations. (For a fuller
explanation, see Allen and Greenough par. 174.) We have found,
however, that students find it easier to learn the present system of the
third conjugation when it is presented as an exception to the general
rule.
In practice, most successful Latin students probably master the
present tense of third conjugation verbs by simply memorizing -o, -is, it, -imus, -itis, -unt as a special variation on the standard endings, like
the special endings of the perfect active.
Students will need a great deal of practice in learning to
differentiate present tense verbs of the second conjugation from future
tenses of the third. Many teachers incorporate a thorough review of
verbs presented so far into this lesson and the next.
Lesson XI: Third Conjugation: Consonant Verbs
This lesson gives students another opportunity to review the
formation of the perfect system and to practice differentiating the three
tenses.
Students usually find it self-evident that two or more nouns
become plural and require a plural verb, but pointing out the fact and
practicing with the first sentences in Exercise A provide an opportunity
to reinforce the importance of the First Rule of Concord and the general
concept of agreement. In learning Latin, students also learn that the
parts of a sentence are inter-connected.
Lessons XII and XIII: Adjectives
Learning the paradigm of a regular adjective like bonus
requires students to review the endings of first and second declension
nouns. Every effort should be made to help them see even at this early
stage that case, number, and gender are abstractions, distinct from the
18
letters that represent them. If they practice declining nouns with
adjectives, including combinations like liber bonus, fîlius noster, and
poeta magnus, they will find it easier to understand this distinction and
deal with third declension nouns and adjectives when the time comes.
Teachers may want to point out that meus, tuus, noster, and
vester often, and multus usually, precede the noun they modify, and
that when the possessive adjectives appear with other adjectives
modifying a single noun, they are not connected by a conjunction. Thus
“the large, unhappy girl” is puella magna et misera, but “my large
teacher” (Ex. XII.B, 4) is meus magister magnus or magister meus
magnus.
Students will need a great deal of practice in recognizing that
the possessive adjectives agree with the noun possessed, not with the
possessor.
Students should practice reciting the paradigms of adjectives
like bonus-a-um across the genders rather than down the cases: bonus,
bona, bonum; bonî, bonae, bonae; bonô, bonae, bonô; and so on.
Doing so will help them when they come to learn pronouns.
Lessons XIV and XV: Fourth Conjugation: I-Verbs
The conjunction quod allows sentences from this point to
include subordinate clauses. At this stage, students do not need to know
the difference between main and subordinate clauses, but some teachers
may want to point it out.
Students will need some drill to make them familiar with the
use of -que. Repetition of pairs like factum et verbum, factum
verbumque will develop this familiarity.
The genitive is the case of one noun that modifies another. We
have subsumed under the category “possessive genitive” a few uses
that some grammarians might class as subjective, but this is a
distinction without a real difference (Allen and Greenough par. 343, n.
1).
Confusion sometimes arises in students’ minds over the
difference between possession shown by a genitive and possession
shown by one of the possessive adjectives presented in Lessons XII and
XIII. If students have enough practice with possessive adjectives before
meeting the genitive of possession, this confusion is less likely to arise.
If it does not arise, there is little to be gained by mentioning it.
Since the fourth is one of the regular conjugations, learning
this new class of verbs should not present much difficulty for most
students.
Lesson XVI: Third Conjugation: I-stem Verbs
Learning these verbs tests students’ sensitivity to vowel
quantity, since in the present system they are everywhere identical to
fourth conjugation verbs except for their short -i- before the personal
ending in the second person singular and plural, third person singular,
and first person plural. Donatus and some other Roman grammarians in
fact lumped third and fourth conjugation verbs together. Visually
minded students may find it helpful to see that in the present tense,
these verbs follow the pattern of fourth conjugation only at the corners
of the paradigm:
19
→ capiô
capis
capit
capimus
capitis
capiunt ←
(Some teachers may be accustomed to calling these verbs “third
conjugation IO verbs.”)
Lesson XVII: Third Conjugation: I-stem Verbs
Like other lessons dealing with the perfect system, this lesson
gives students a chance to review and consolidate their knowledge of
verbs. By this point, synopses should be a regular classroom activity.
Prepositions are introduced in this lesson, but only two are
given. In appears only with the accusative case; only in Lesson XXIV
will students learn a list of prepositions governing the ablative. If
students are encouraged to use the translation “towards” for ad
whenever possible, later confusion with the dative of indirect object
(Lesson XXXI) may be avoided.
Lesson XVIII: Irregular Verb: Sum
Sum must be memorized. Students may need help and practice
in distinguishing the imperfect and future of sum from the regular
pluperfect and future perfect active endings.
In the vocabulary, amîcus appears as an adjective, “friendly,”
instead of its more common use as a noun meaning “friend.” Teachers
may want to point out the substantive use of this adjective to prepare
students for the appearance of that concept in Lesson XXV.
Lesson XIX: Third Declension Nouns
The third declension needs careful presentation, and students
should not be expected to be fully competent in recognizing and using
third declension nouns until the end of the series of three lessons (XIXXXI) dealing with them. At the end of Lesson XIX, students should be
able:
•
•
To decline any of the third declension nouns in the vocabulary
To give the case, number, and gender of any third declension
noun in the vocabulary, and to give the use of any noun in the
Exercises.
Throughout the lesson, emphasis should be on nouns and their forms.
Lesson XX: Third Declension Nouns
Students sometimes mistake neuter nouns like onus and opus
for second declension masculines. Drilling with noun-adjective pairs
like opus magnum may alleviate this confusion. Practice with pairs of
third declension nouns and first and second declension adjectives is a
good way to review and consolidate students’ knowledge of the third
declension.
20
Lesson XXI: Third Declension Nouns
I-stem nouns are in fact less regular than our presentation of
them suggests. Some teachers may be surprised by our use of the form
in - s as the regular accusative plural. We have tried to give the forms
used by authors that students are likely to read if they continue with
Latin, and this form is usual in Vergil and Cicero, and in the best
modern texts of them. We have been less insistent about the ablative
singular, which also varies. The ablative navi, for example, is at least as
common as nave. Cicero even quotes an accusative singular navim
(Topica 61). Teachers, and sometimes our students, may find it helpful
to bear in mind that the apparent systematic regularity of Latin is a
grammarians’ fiction.
Lesson XXII: First Conjugation: Present System Passive Voice
The distinction between active and passive is one that students
have used in their native language all their lives, but now they must
acquire those categories. Explicit over-verbalization of the concepts can
be helpful to them; the first sentence of Exercise XXII.A, for example,
might sound like this: “Rogâbitur, ‘He/she/it will be asked,’ the action
will be done to him.” Prompted by the teacher’s “Rogâbit?” the
student might respond, “Rogâbit, ‘He/she/it will ask,’ he will do the
action.”
This lesson also introduces uses of the ablative case. The
distinction between agent and means is easy for students to see, but in
translating from English to Latin they often trip over the English word
“by,” which can render both constructions. Asking them to say which
ablative will be used to translate “by your words” or “by poets” may
help to reinforce the distinction.
Since students will learn six uses of the ablative case, they
should become accustomed in this lesson to describing ablatives as,
e.g., “ablative singular feminine, ablative of agent.”
Lesson XXIII: First Conjugation: Perfect System Passive Voice
Students have not yet seen periphrastic forms, and teachers
may want to remind them that in Latin as in English, some verbs
require auxiliary or helping verbs. Because students know that sum
means “I am,” many will be tempted to translate amâtus sum as “I am
loved.” Some may find it helpful to know that the fourth principal parts
that they have learned are in fact past in tense, and that therefore a past
participle + present helping verb = a perfect tense; past + past =
pluperfect; and past + future = future perfect. Hence we introduce,
without comment, the term PERFECT PASSIVE PARTICIPLE for the fourth
principal part. Constant practice, however, is the best way to teach the
correct translations and uses of these periphrastic forms.
Lesson XXIV: Prepositions
Eighth graders seem to have little difficulty with this lesson. It
has proved surprisingly challenging to younger middle schoolers, who
find it difficult to learn eight little words with somewhat similar
meanings. Some strategies for reinforcing the differences between these
words include
21
•
•
Kinesthetic: students follow instructions to sede/sedête or
mane/manête in mensâ (or capsâ, or some other suitable
classroom object), sub mensâ, ex mensâ, and so on.
Visual: some students find a diagram helpful.
ab
ex
in
Fig. 5
sub
It is worth insisting on the translation “along with” for the preposition
cum to head off possible later confusion with the conjunction cum.
Lesson XXV: Third Declension Adjectives
This chapter presents third declension adjectives. We begin
with adjectives of three terminations, although they are less common
than either two-termination or one-termination adjectives, because they
can easily be assimilated to the pattern of first-and-second declension
adjectives, which the students have already learned. Thus students can
concentrate on learning one thing at a time: first, in this lesson, that
many adjectives use third declension i-stem endings; in the next, that
some of these adjectives use the same endings for more than one
gender.
Of the three uses of adjectives, the substantive needs most
attention. Students may be invited to use the classified list of adjectives
on p.89 to construct sentences about good, dear, tired, angry, or
unhappy men or women. Point out also that English sometimes uses
adjectives in the same way in phrases like “the dead” or “the brave.”
Lesson XXVI: Third Declension Adjectives
Students will need practice not only in declining nounadjective pairs like omnis vir or puella felix, but in recognizing
different cases, both of such pairs and of single adjectives. Because
their first third-declension paradigm, that of consonant-stem nouns, had
–e as the ablative singular ending, students often yield to the temptation
to think that omne or breve are ablative. Teachers should emphasize
that –i is the ablative singular ending for adjectives of this kind.
Students enjoy learning that the family is irregular: mâter,
pater, frater, senex, iuvenis, and their dog, canis, though parisyllabic,
do not follow the pattern of i-stems.
Lessons XXVII and XXVIII: Second Conjugation Passive Voice
Since the second conjugation is regular in formation, these
lessons present few new concepts and provide an opportunity for
review. Emphasize that the change from active to passive form is a
22
matter of changing only the ending; the rules for the formation of
tenses remain in force.
Lesson XXIX: Fourth Declension Nouns
Learning the fourth declension gives students an opportunity
to practice the difference between long and short -u-. Teachers should
emphasize the distinction in pronunciation.
Lesson XXX: Third Conjugation: Present System Passive Voice
Before beginning this lesson, students may need to review the
active voice of consonant and i-stem third conjugation verbs. In
presenting the paradigm, point out that the -i- of e.g. capitur is part of
the stem (hence black in our chart), whereas in e.g. dûcitur it is part of
the ending (hence red). Point out also the distinction between dûceris
(present) and dûcêris (future).
Lesson XXI: Third Conjugation: Perfect System Passive Voice
This lesson introduces two uses of the dative case: indirect
object and dative with adjectives. Because both may be translated using
the English word “to,” students often confuse the indirect object with
the accusative of place to which. This confusion arises especially in
translating from English to Latin. When the preposition ad was
introduced in Lesson XVII, students were encouraged to use the
translation “towards,” and a reminder of this possibility may be helpful.
The verb dare is irregular because its present stem ends in
short -a-. Students may need to be asked why dare is irregular, or to
have this irregularity pointed out to them.
Lesson XXXII: Fifth Declension Nouns
The last three chapters of New First Steps provide ample
opportunities for reviewing the heart of the first year of middle school
Latin: the indicative voice of regular verbs of the four conjugations,
active and passive, and nouns of the five declensions.
Diês is usually masculine, but it is occasionally feminine,
especially when it refers to day as the opposite of night or to a specific
day: eârum (sc. epistulârum) in alterâ diês erat adscripta Non. Apr.
(Cicero, ad Familiares 3.11); and of course diês irae, diês illa.
Lessons XXXIII and XXXIV: Fourth Conjugation, Passive Voice
Careful practice with ingens and sapiens will give students a
head start on the present participle active, which will be presented in
Lesson XIII of New Second Steps.
23