Language of the Catholic Church and Western Civilization
When it comes to learning Church Latin, we all should imitate what we did as babies. Be a baby listening to our Holy Mother, the Church, at prayer, and learn Latin as you go. I’ve written some lessons I hope can help you learn Latin while praying along with the Church’s ongoing prayer. I have... Continue Reading →
(Latina pro Parvulis--Latin for Kids, pt. II) I like to get students working to read real Latin as soon as possible. Thanks to an ancient book called the Disticha Catonis, this is really possible after only a few Latin concepts have been introduced. Here's a project I've done with a roomful of 40 fifth-graders, and... Continue Reading →
Catholics have accepted some of the worst distortions of their Faith in the order of music, art, and literature without a shiver of discontent because they never really heard the "Tantum Ergo" or the "Ave Maris Stella" --not for lack of faith, but because there had never been ordinary music in the home to have... Continue Reading →
The following is how I introduce classrooms of students in local elementary schools to my weekly series of Latin lessons on the first day...
Latin by the Natural Method, Vol. 1, by Fr. William Most (1960, 2015 Mediatrix Press) 308pp. This is a wonderful first-year book for learning Ecclesiastical Latin. It's got students reading Latin stories from the very first lesson! Of course many of these, naturally, are taken from Roman legends and history and the Old Testament. But... Continue Reading →
"But to have had no Latin at all practically means that you do not know the logic or understand the categories of general grammar and those forms of language which are at the same time forms of thought..."
Everybody thinks of Latin as hard to learn. And it is-all languages are. But what sets Latin apart for its difficulty in our minds is not the what--it's the how.
Carpe diem! Now is the time…get ready to remember more, do better at your practice sentences, and even like your Latin studies.
How? With clever use of strategies and tools, of course! Organize your mind and your material, deeply encode new concepts, and actively use the vocabulary, word parts, and rules that you learn. These three things will make you master your current lessons.
#1: Create a Memory System
With a highly-inflected language, you are going to need to intensely organize your memory. Take learning nouns, for example: you’re going to have to remember the Latin word, its pertinent meaning(s), and also gender, declension, and stem for each noun. This kind of thing is impossible without creating a memory system.
At a bare minimum:
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Flashcards: the most over-used but under-utilized study aid. Latin students, I'm sure you've already been making use of them. But read through this list of ways to make sure they really work for you! Flashcards: Tips & Tricks Make the cards go twice as far. I got this great idea from a language-learning book: take the... Continue Reading →
