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Three years ago I had a student teacher who I was determined to let do her own thing. Sharp gal, now a strong teacher in another state. However, she had this idea that just because you said "READ THE CULTURE SECTION" that that was enough. If memory serves she assigned it for homework and then the next day said, "any questions?"
Now, I might add that this was at the beginning of the school year with a group of 7th graders that comprised my "class from hell". They are the class that inspired me to MASTER classroom management. Up until that point my management skills were ok, and worked with a generally cooperative group. But this class taught me that I didn't know squat about classroom management. (And if you still haven't bought Harry Wong's _The First Days of School_, why not???)
She was stunned when they seemed to do so poorly in the house section of the test.
First, keep in mind that young students have yet to develop *study* skills. If you teach middle school, you should always keep in mind that you are teaching study skills as much as Latin and Roman culture. One of the things I do for the first stage is have them do a House practice quiz--3 blank house maps on front, 3 on back. (I may have mentioned this elsewhere.) I have them do one or two a day, saving the last one for the night before the test. End result? 90% do very well on labeling the house. And we are teaching a skill--that to determine whether you KNOW the rooms of the house, you have to practice labeling a house. You and I might just look at a picture and not at the captions and review until we have it. But these kids (esp the kids at my school) don't know how to do that.
The other thing that students have a difficult time doing--especially students that do NOT read enough (and ours don't)--is VISUALIZING things. So today's chapter was about what Caecilius's day was like. We pushed back desks and basically acted it out. I read from the book and would have various students do things. One kid was Caecilius, some others were slaves (they wore trashbags for tunics), we draped a bedsheet on Caecilius for a toga, he gave out pennies to clients who then marched him off to the forum. We spread out bulletin board paper to be the couches in the triclinium and I had students recline on the left elbows while the slaves brought in plates with pictures drawn on them of food.
I guarantee you they will retain more information from reenacting the culture section than doing a review worksheet over it. That's not to say I don't use worksheets, I do. They are great to leave with a substitute teacher, for a start. But some days need to have no grading attached, and I can guarantee you that today was one of them.
We will be doing something similar with the layout of Pompeii in a chapter or two in order to help with visualizing the city.
Some culture sections, of course, do not lend themselves to such activities. But it is worth keeping in mind that not everyone learns well from reading. We shouldn't be snobs about it, even though our chief goal is to teach reading (of Latin). Besides, it was fun.
Now, I might add that this was at the beginning of the school year with a group of 7th graders that comprised my "class from hell". They are the class that inspired me to MASTER classroom management. Up until that point my management skills were ok, and worked with a generally cooperative group. But this class taught me that I didn't know squat about classroom management. (And if you still haven't bought Harry Wong's _The First Days of School_, why not???)
She was stunned when they seemed to do so poorly in the house section of the test.
First, keep in mind that young students have yet to develop *study* skills. If you teach middle school, you should always keep in mind that you are teaching study skills as much as Latin and Roman culture. One of the things I do for the first stage is have them do a House practice quiz--3 blank house maps on front, 3 on back. (I may have mentioned this elsewhere.) I have them do one or two a day, saving the last one for the night before the test. End result? 90% do very well on labeling the house. And we are teaching a skill--that to determine whether you KNOW the rooms of the house, you have to practice labeling a house. You and I might just look at a picture and not at the captions and review until we have it. But these kids (esp the kids at my school) don't know how to do that.
The other thing that students have a difficult time doing--especially students that do NOT read enough (and ours don't)--is VISUALIZING things. So today's chapter was about what Caecilius's day was like. We pushed back desks and basically acted it out. I read from the book and would have various students do things. One kid was Caecilius, some others were slaves (they wore trashbags for tunics), we draped a bedsheet on Caecilius for a toga, he gave out pennies to clients who then marched him off to the forum. We spread out bulletin board paper to be the couches in the triclinium and I had students recline on the left elbows while the slaves brought in plates with pictures drawn on them of food.
I guarantee you they will retain more information from reenacting the culture section than doing a review worksheet over it. That's not to say I don't use worksheets, I do. They are great to leave with a substitute teacher, for a start. But some days need to have no grading attached, and I can guarantee you that today was one of them.
We will be doing something similar with the layout of Pompeii in a chapter or two in order to help with visualizing the city.
Some culture sections, of course, do not lend themselves to such activities. But it is worth keeping in mind that not everyone learns well from reading. We shouldn't be snobs about it, even though our chief goal is to teach reading (of Latin). Besides, it was fun.
