Research in the academic field of Latin and dyslexia is sparse, often outdated, and largely consists of teachers' informal observations, thus lacking empirical evidence.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.

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.

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.

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.

With the changes made in the new US Standards for Classical Language Learning, pedagogy needs to develop to better meet the updated standards for student learning. One of the major changes is that reading Latin is no longer the sole pursuit of a high school Latin class (Standards, 2017; Natoli, 2018). The new standards recognise that students learn in diverse ways and that students need to learn about and interact with the cultures they are studying.

According to Second Language Acquisition (SLA) theory, developed by Stephen Krashen, the way humans acquire languages is through receiving input, usually aural, that is understandable; this is termed ‘Comprehensible Input’ (CI). Think, for example, of a parent talking to their child: when they ask the child, ‘Do you want milk?’, the milk is visible, tangible. The child understands that they are being offered milk. Parents don't just say this once, they offer it hundreds, even thousands of times. According to this hypothesis, the input (the parent talking) is comprehensible (the child understands it); the brain is trained to automatically make meaning.

The aim of this contribution is to provide a new methodology regarding the use of photogrammetry and 3D modelling in the classroom. By means of a practicum taught at Complutense University of Madrid and a survey conducted afterwards, we show the different steps of the activity, as well as the reception of the students, who learnt to elaborate 3D figures.

(The reader must decide whether to take the proposal seriously. It is no more of a maggot than Swift's modest proposal.)

Under the high cognitive pressure of a translation task, secondary school Classics students often make dictionary mistakes. Research indicates that successful students use a lemma's meta-information to engage in a feedback loop between text and dictionary. Using eye-tracking data of expert learners, this study examined how successful students employ the different types of lemma information while limiting their cognitive load. We found that students primarily manage their cognitive load by using boldface definitions as stepping-stones, but navigate through meta-information when it (1) can effectively reduce the amount of definitions and (2) refers to (morphological) features directly visible in the text. Alternatively, they use meta-information as a backup plan, when they are stuck or want to confirm a hypothesis.

At the end of January 2022 the International Baccalaureate Organisation (IBO) published the new Diploma syllabus for Classical Languages (for first assessment in 2024). The new IB Diploma syllabus has at its heart a desire to move away from the teaching of language and literature as two distinct skills, while embracing a broader range of teaching and assessment methods which do greater justice to the richness, diversity and range of skills students can, and do, develop through the learning of classical languages. In what follows, I will discuss the new IB Classical Languages syllabus and whether it lives up to these worthy aims.

Most people who use the word ‘Latin’ as the name of a language in antiquity (not Medieval or Neo-Latin therefore) seem unaware that Latin was a continuum made up of many different varieties, Classical Latin (which they identify with Latin) being only one of them. So when they talk of spoken Latin they mean spoken Classical Latin, no other variety from antiquity being available that is suitable to be spoken. This is ironic on two counts. First, the overwhelming majority of native Latin speakers did not speak Classical Latin at all. Secondly, the small minority of people who did speak it did not do so routinely as a language of everyday conversation, but only on certain formal occasions and in certain public situations. They spoke routinely the appropriate form of their first language, the form that was used by a social, cultural and educational elite. This was not Classical Latin, which was not an acquired form of Latin but one that was learned as if it were a second language. What the language they did speak routinely was like we do not know, and no doubt it comprised several different registers, as languages do. Whether they realise it or not, people who engage in informal conversations in formal Classical Latin today are not re-enacting any authentic experience that was to be had in the ancient world.

Is my PGCE drew towards its end, the prospect of my first teaching job loomed large in my mind. I had been forewarned that 50% of my teaching workload would consist of teaching Classical Civilisation, and that the majority of this would be at A Level. However, I did not have personal experience of the subject as a school pupil (I studied Latin, Greek and English Literature at A Level – there was no Classical Civilisation option), so I had no personal frame of reference or pre-formed opinion of how it might be taught best. The final research project of the PGCE course presented an ideal and much-needed opportunity to investigate the possible teaching strategies I should consider in preparation for my own teaching of the subject. I was particularly interested in how to ‘get through’ the seemingly vast amount of text which teachers often cited as a real challenge.

The Classical Association Teaching Board (CATB) surveyed Classics teachers in the United Kingdom from 20th August to 9th September 2020 to gauge views about the impact on teaching of the national lockdown during the covid-19 pandemic. 164 teachers from both the state and independent sectors completed the survey. There were three areas of focus in the survey. First, the impact on pupils of the grade awarding process after the cancellation of GCSE and A Level examinations in 2020. Second, how confident teachers were in preparing for the 2021 examinations after the loss of five months of face-to-face teaching. Third, reactions to Ofqual's consultation process on changes to the format of the 2021 examinations. This article brings together the responses to the survey and details how the unprecedented closure of schools affected the teaching of Classics. It will also explain how the CATB continues to support Classics teachers and the teaching of classical subjects in UK schools.

I undertook research into the use of conversational, spoken Latin in the UK classroom, due to my intention to answer three specific research questions. Firstly, I wanted to find out how easy it is for the contemporary Classics teacher to implement communicative approaches to the teaching of Latin. Secondly, I wished to discover what techniques the Classics teacher can adopt to implement communicative approaches to the teaching of Latin, within the framework of active, oral communication in Latin. Thirdly, I wanted to consider how positive is the attitude of students engaging with communicative approaches to the teaching of Latin. I was introduced to this area of research on my PGCE course of study at Cambridge University. Furthermore, I was especially inspired by the scholarship of Coffee (2012), King (2011), Lloyd (2016), Patrick (2015), Rasmussen (2015) and Tunberg (2011) who have written so positively about the unique ability of communicative approaches to unlock the joy of experiencing and employing the Latin language for individuals of all ages.

Nominative determinism occurs when a person's name reflects what that person does or is, for instance Mr Baker making bread or Ms Taylor making dresses. In the Potter saga J. K. Rowling seems to have a particular fondness for nominative determinism. In her case the names often derive from Latin and Greek language and tradition.

This paper builds on the work presented previously in this journal by Poupounaki-Lappa et al. (2021), which described the development of a communicative test of Reading and Language Use of Classical Greek calibrated to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) at levels A1 and A2 (Council of Europe, 2001). In the current paper, the two tests of Classical Greek are calibrated both together and to the CEFR. In addition to describing the methodology for comparing the two separate tests of Classical Greek, the paper is also designed to be of interest to educators of other classical languages. It is hoped that they may find it useful not only by facilitating robust test design, but also by demonstrating the methods by which tests can be linked together on a common scale (as with the CEFR) or linking tests one to another (e.g., different end-of-year tests, at different points in time).

During my second placement on the PGCE in Latin with Classics, the Head of Classics explained the curriculum plan for Latin, and the use of the WJEC Level 1 Certificate in Latin which she had implemented for the students in Year 9. She was keen for the students to receive recognition for their effort in Latin and yet concerned that the pressure of an additional external exam might detract from the students’ enjoyment of the subject. I was unaware of the possibility for external exams outside of GCSE and A Level and I was fascinated by what role the certificate might play for the students as they progressed through their education.

Languages are cultural epiphenomena: they, and their varieties, emerge at stages of development in the life of a culture. In some important respects they are peculiar to their culture, and the meanings of certain terms used in the language of their culture are not therefore readily transferable to the languages of other cultures. There are culturally-laden terms that do not have semantic equivalents in the languages of other cultures. Generally speaking, translations can more easily reproduce semantic equivalents that are culturally neutral. So, the term ‘dog’ is able to be translated in most other languages, since whatever term is used has the same recognised referent. The efficacy of translation generally depends upon the nature and number of semantic equivalents that are culturally neutral. The trouble is that there is a large number of terms that are not semantically equivalent because they are not culturally neutral; the greater the number, the less the efficacy of translation. It would seem, therefore, that translation cannot in many instances convey what is distinctive of the culture of the original language.

The Intermediate Certificate in Classical Greek (ICCG) is a new qualification being developed primarily for learners of Classical Greek on limited time for whom sitting the full GCSE is unrealistic. It is endorsed by the Classical Association and Classics for All.