"The Roman gladiators
entered the cafeteria in a single-file line, thumping elongated
cardboard tubes against duct-taped cardboard shields. They wore helmets,
wrist cuffs, shin protectors.
"'Sanguinem!' the eighth-grade spectators chanted from the sidelines, pounding the tables. Blood!
"'Sanguinem!' the eighth-grade spectators chanted from the sidelines, pounding the tables. Blood!
The annual gladiator
battle at Ottoson Middle School is not only about whacking enemies with
recyclable swords. It's also about bringing a supposedly dead language
to life by doing something unheard-of in Latin classes of the past:
speaking it.
"In schools across Massachusetts and the country, teachers are throwing out the memorized charts of verb conjugations and noun declensions that were once essential to a Latin education, and instead emphasizing the spoken word. The goal is to make Latin more inclusive and more engaging for kids in 2019.
"About 20,500 students statewide study Latin, the third-most popular language after Spanish and French, according to The National K-12 Foreign Language Enrollment Survey Report. It might seem strange that students are still signing up, but Latin teachers have a way of illuminating the language's charms: It is the foundation of fields from medicine to music to poetry, and it offers a portal to 2,000 years of history and literature."
A recent Boston Globe article reported on the some of the Latin language classes in Boston and Arlington, Massachusetts.
To access the complete report, please visit:
The Boston Globe: Students learn to speak Latin, 'the un-dead language' (23 MAY 19)
"In schools across Massachusetts and the country, teachers are throwing out the memorized charts of verb conjugations and noun declensions that were once essential to a Latin education, and instead emphasizing the spoken word. The goal is to make Latin more inclusive and more engaging for kids in 2019.
"About 20,500 students statewide study Latin, the third-most popular language after Spanish and French, according to The National K-12 Foreign Language Enrollment Survey Report. It might seem strange that students are still signing up, but Latin teachers have a way of illuminating the language's charms: It is the foundation of fields from medicine to music to poetry, and it offers a portal to 2,000 years of history and literature."
A recent Boston Globe article reported on the some of the Latin language classes in Boston and Arlington, Massachusetts.
To access the complete report, please visit:
The Boston Globe: Students learn to speak Latin, 'the un-dead language' (23 MAY 19)
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