The redisplayed London Mithraeum beneath the Bloomberg building in the City of London, and the material recovered from excavation of the site, now on display in the Museum of London, provide a valuable resource for exploring aspects of religion in Roman London. And they are well worth the visit, not least because they are free to the public. Inevitably the information provided with the artifacts and the site itself emphasise what we know about them. But there are puzzling features of this material, and there is a lot that we do not know. I want to discuss some of these puzzles, not with the aim of providing answers, but to remind us that there is still plenty to be discovered about ancient religion, and also that our perspective on the ancient world is always affected by accidents of survival.

The collective mind often attributes the image of a modern Latin classroom to a teacher writing on a chalkboard in front of students eagerly memorising the declensions in silence. However, as part of their search for innovative and effective practices, Latin instructors have consistently expanded their gaze beyond the traditional parameters of rote memorisation for at least since the pioneering efforts of W.H.D. Rouse, looking to more innovative models presented by novel methods for inspiration and to the halls of predecessors in hopes of fostering a more engaging learning environment. Upon close comparative study between the modern pedagogical methods in Latin classrooms and the perspective of Renaissance scholar Petrarch, this study identified a commonality between the two: emphasis on dialogue between different members of the classroom and personal interpretations of preceding authors’ works for a better opportunity of comprehending the content. Grounded in the philosophies of the Socratic method, Petrarch claimed that an important element of the tradition of pedagogy finds expression in dialogues, imitation, and the significance of fully comprehending the topic in pursuit of wisdom. Likewise, many institutions of the U.K. and the United States, strengthened by the emergence of dialectic assessment applications during the Covid-19 Pandemic, are working towards a new norm in place. After conducting an in-depth interpretation of primary and secondary sources regarding Petrarch's pedagogy, as well as research of its modern developments and the applications, the comparison suggests a new direction for the Classics community to consider going forward.

Like all teachers, when I was in the classroom, I knew inside out the syllabus I was teaching and the papers which would assess it. I also, however, gave very little thought to how these things had come to be. I had a vague sense that the ‘Exam Board’ had created them and awarded my students their grades, but they were a black box, moving in mysterious ways. I gave even less thought to the Powers That Be above and beyond the boards and the impact they had on me and my students.

A second-order change took place in Latin Teaching in the UK in the 1960s and 1970s, with effects reaching into the present day. This Change was a shift in attitude, values and methods which Forrest describes as, ‘curriculum change on an unprecedented scale’ (Forrest, 1996, p. 42) and the ‘transformation of Latin teaching’ (ibid, p. 146). This article explores the nature of this change and justifies categorising it as second-order. Secondly, it considers the process of how the change took place, looking also at changes within the wider social field and resistance to change within Latin teaching. Both a Bourdieusian theoretical framework and a metaphorical application of chaos and complexity theory are used to analyse this change and explain some of the conflicts and crises within and around the change period. The final section of the analysis considers issues affecting the communication of ideas and the effect of social capital within the system.

In November 2014 the Reading University Classics Department held an unusual event as part of the national ‘Being Human’ humanities festival. We re-created an ancient schoolroom and invited more than a hundred local school-age students to experience antiquity at first hand (specifically, Greek-speaking Egypt in the fourth century AD, as that is the time and place for which we have the most information). Before entering the schoolroom participants donned a complete Roman school costume, removing watches, glasses, and any other visibly modern accoutrements, and learned how to play the part which they would assume once inside. Students learned how to act like an ancient child (a relatively simple process), while the classroom slaves (headed by a distinguished Oxford papyrologist) and the teachers (a superb team of three lecturers and seven undergraduate and MA students from Reading) underwent a longer training to enable them to teach in the ancient fashion.

This article investigates the different uses of the Cambridge Latin Course Explorer Tool in the classroom, and students' perceptions of this, through a case study of a Year 8 class in an all-girls' comprehensive school. Student perceptions of this tool were a particular focus of the research, exploring its enhancement of students' enjoyment of the subject, its impact on vocabulary retention, and what they considered to be a reduced difficulty of translation. However, it also brought to light students' misgivings about the tool, including a sense of guilt in some pupils, who were of the opinion that their use of the Explorer Tool could be considered as ‘cheating'. Others, meanwhile, felt that it detracted from the ‘process' of translating to the point that they believed it actively hindered their learning.

The value of classical language education is subject to a fierce dispute, waged continuously and internationally. While some dismiss Classics as useless or elitist, others herald its extraordinary formative value and the many benefits that await pupils. This article aims to give a novel overview of the public debate regarding classical language education, which is defined as follows: the controversy about the instruction of Latin and/or Ancient Greek at the secondary educational level, as it emerges from Western traditional media in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The reader is provided with historical insight into this debate that many classicists find themselves in the middle of, as well as with a logical and coherent framework of the various arguments pro and contra. The arguments are embedded in the history of classical language education, classified into categories, analysed and discussed at length. The classification of arguments hinges on the two main lines of criticism towards the study of classical languages, which are inspired by egalitarianism and utilitarianism respectively. As a backdrop to the analysis, we rely on the sociolinguistic theory of language ideology. The general conclusions of this paper are that the value of classical language education is indeed a highly ideologically charged matter, and that the surrounding public debate has known a remarkably high level of continuity.

I teach Spartan history at the University of Leeds both as part of an introductory course about the Greek World and also as part of a range of more closely-focused Special Subject modules for second and third year undergraduates, including Image of Sparta and Classics on Screen. I use the film 300, and other modern popular culture material, in different ways in each of these modules: as a subject in its own right for Classics on Screen, focusing on questions around what the material says about contemporary culture; and, in Image of Sparta, as a coda to the course's survey of ancient ‘images’, which allows for reflection back over the ancient material. Blanshard and Shahabudin suggest that cinematic output can be ‘…an important vehicle for discussing the values, history, and cultural politics of the classical past. It demands that we think about what are the key elements that make the cultures of the ancient Mediterranean so distinctive and worthy of study’ (Blanshard & Shahabudin, 2011, p. 1). While modern popular receptions of ancient Greek history are not actually on the AS or A Level specifications (perhaps they should be!), they have some potential for teaching at this level if a teacher wants their students to get to grips with the particular topic of Sparta.

One ‘can hardly avoid controversy’ when discussing prose composition (Pearcy, 1998, 35); the very idea seems to evoke only the extremes from a Classicist. Some avidly argue against it, labelling it a ‘useless, archaic exercise’ (Ball and Ellsworth, 1992, p. 55), some vehemently defend it, calling it ‘an invaluable virtue in all areas of education’ (Butterfield, 2013, p. 8). Others believe there are more important arguments to be made about Classics, comparing the argument about prose composition to ‘litigating over property lines when the house is on fire’ (Jacoby, 1994, xii, cited in Pearcy, 1998, p. 37). Despite this view, the debate about prose composition has recently been reignited. The recent publication in Politeia (Butterfield, Anderson, Radice & Sullivan, 2013) demanded a new prose composition option for Latin GCSE in order to bring it in line with the current A Level system and for students to ‘obtain a higher level of linguistics familiarity and facility in Latin’ (2013, p. 8). The DfE (2014) has just published the guidelines to the reformed Latin GCSE, for first teaching in 2016, which does include recommendations for such an option.

On Saturday 10 June 2016, the Ambassador of the Hellenic Republic to the UK, Mr. Konstantinos Bikas, and the Classics in Communities project hosted a conference celebrating the teaching of Greek language and culture in the UK at the Hellenic Centre in London. The conference had multiple aims: to bring together a variety of teachers, committees and associations to discuss the state of Greek language and culture education in the UK; to anticipate and confront the challenges; and to collaborate to find solutions and action plans for its survival and growth.

The educational value of play has long been acknowledged. During recent decades, much attention has been paid to video games and the multifarious ways in which they can promote and enhance learning. Μy main objective in this study is to weave game principles, learning and the notion of playfulness into assessment principles, in an attempt to investigate how what I call ‘Game-Informed Playful Assessment’ (GIPA) can affect student learning and particularly students’ experience of learning. The GIPA was designed with a view to promoting students’ agency, autonomy, collaboration and playfulness, and was introduced in an undergraduate course on Archaic Greek Lyric poetry at a Greek-speaking university. My data was generated through in-depth interviews with ten of the students that attended the course. While the GIPA was favourably and even enthusiastically received by students, the research also brought to the fore several other issues that call for attention, such as the stress that innovative assessment may provoke in students, and the readiness of students to be playful within an academic framework that typically contrasts serious work with playfulness and play in general.

Reading is an essential part of learning a language. During my postgraduate (PGCE) teacher-training placement in the UK, I observed extensive reading being used in Modern Foreign Languages (MFL) and English classrooms but saw no evidence for it in the Latin classroom. However, the practice is gaining popularity in the United States as part of Comprehensible Input-based teaching. I was interested to see if extensive reading could be introduced in my classroom without any accompanying spoken Latin and if students would be interested in it. So, I decided to try an extensive reading program for my PGCE research project. The program was positively received by the majority of students, who felt that their Latin ability had improved even after only a handful of sessions, and who appreciated the relatively stressless activity that warmed up their ‘Latin brains’. Many commented that they wanted to read for longer. This very short trial of an extensive reading program gives me much hope for a longer trial or even a permanent program in the future. I also hope that this will encourage others to try bringing extensive reading and its benefits into their classrooms.

The new ITT Common Core Framework (CCF) for teachers expects trainee and early-career teachers to adapt their teaching to support all students in class (Department for Education, 2021). What used to be called ‘differentiation’ is now referred to as ‘adaptive teaching’ and full details of what it consists of, as far as the Department for Education in England is concerned, can be found on pages 19–20 of the CCF document. Much of the advice of that document is about supporting students with special educational needs and disabilities, about teachers’ need to recognise that different students have different levels of prior attainment and may have barriers to learning, and how different types of student grouping may affect learning in different ways. It dismisses as a ‘common misconception’ that students have different learning styles and warns against teachers creating ‘distinct tasks for different groups of pupils’ or ‘setting lower expectations for particular pupils’.

How many interactions do you have with students on a daily basis? In these interactions do you lead the conversation or do the students? Do students in your classes have the confidence to speak rather than listen? This is what this article is about: giving your students the ability to confidently assert their opinions and ideas. Classical subjects are some of the few subjects where students learn about rhetoric, what it is and how the ancients used it; yet they often do not necessarily know how to use rhetoric or employ rhetorical skills themselves. Most students, who have taken a Classical subject, will consider the term rhetoric to be connected with the sorts of rhetorical devices common in Cicero and speeches in Greek drama. However, rhetoric is used by everyone. Rhetoric is found everywhere in every type of communication, and it is almost impossible to escape from it. Rhetoric embodies everyday communication skills, how we speak, what we write, the debate in a discussion, how we present ourselves in meetings, how we teach and our online presences on Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin. Rhetoric is a useful skill and at the heart of the concept is the ability to express oneself effectively orally and in writing; what are more commonly known as communication skills. Oracy is part of everyday rhetoric: it encompasses how we are communicating with our intended audience and others around us through spoken language, body language and gestures.

This study explores the perspectives of teachers and pupils regarding the benefits and challenges of teaching Classics in primary classrooms in Northern Ireland (NI). Conducted in 2020, the methodological approach consisted of interviews with six teachers from three schools and a focus group held with eight children.1 The study identified positive impacts of teaching Classics on numerous subjects, including Modern Foreign Languages (MFL). The most pressing challenge appeared to be a crowded curriculum. Teachers and pupils suggested that training and support be offered to educators in order to optimise links between Latin, English literacy and MFL understanding. Finally, recommendations are made for the future study of Classics in Northern Ireland.

Creative writing is a teaching strategy employed increasingly less frequently as students progress through their secondary education. From my own school experience and observing other teachers, many such tasks are set in Year 7 but then later give way to the pressure of preparing students for exams. In the first Professional Placement of my postgraduate teacher training, I observed a Classical Civilisation teacher set her sixth form students to write a poem about Hector or Andromache from the Iliad Book 6. Although there was some initial reluctance, students largely engaged with the task and we were both impressed by the results. This prompted me to carry out my own research project to explore further the potential impact of creative writing, following the argument that one way into a text is to understand the characters within it.

Every Latin teacher has at some point been asked to justify why the study of Latin, a dead language, matters today. SAT scores, success in the medical and law fields, and its basis for the Romance languages are often cited as valid justifications to study Latin (see the NCSSFL “Benefits of Latin Study”); but these reasons are devoid of any true meaning or purpose, and I cringe when I hear them, even if they do help bolster enrolment.

‘Anyone can teach Latin, while teaching Greek is hard’. ‘Introductory language courses are easier to teach than intermediate/text-based courses’. These are views that the author of this article has heard voiced in Classics departments on both sides of the Atlantic. They reflect underlying assumptions about language teaching that often have very practical effects on who is assigned what kinds of teaching, and how those instructors approach their task.

Research in the academic field of Latin and dyslexia is sparse, often outdated, and largely consists of teachers' informal observations, thus lacking empirical evidence. This mixed-methods study aims to address a gap in the literature, exploring the experiences of secondary students with dyslexia learning Latin, French, or Spanish while examining the relationships between dyslexia and examination results in those languages. After purposive sampling, semi-structured interviews with seven dyslexic students, aged 16 to 29, were conducted and 349 GCSE and IB grades, of which 51 were of dyslexic students, were collected from two secondary schools. Reflexive thematic analysis of the interviews revealed seven themes: accessibility, benefits, challenges and barriers, class size, methods and strategies, motivation, and strengths. The results of three chi-square tests showed no significant association for Latin or Spanish, but a significant association between dyslexia and examination results in French. Whereas positive learning experiences for students with dyslexia hinged on the appropriate teaching method and the perceived support rather than the language per se, higher exam achievements were also dependent on the level of orthographic transparency but not on the degree of orality of the language learnt. Future research in the field should explore the experiences and achievements of students at different educational stages and with different learning difficulties doing Latin.

My experiences both as a learner and as a teacher of Latin have led me to the conviction that speaking Latin advances a more nuanced understanding of the language, and leads to an enhanced level of reading fluency and greater ease in engaging closely with the text. Even after having studied the language to any degree of competence in a passive capacity, bringing it into active use does not come without some investment of time and effort. With the intention of facilitating access to the benefits of speaking Latin fluently, I have set out some recommendations for those who would like to explore this approach, and put together an overview of its recent spread in formal teaching, and in research, around the UK and Europe. It is my hope that in drawing attention to the rapidly increasing number of initiatives, this article will promote cross-fertilisation of ideas between the disparate influencers in the field of Latin pedagogy.