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I have returned from Christmas break to the reality of what it's like to teach my students with their lack of academic preparedness and low self esteem. They make their own glass ceilings by not being willing to take the smallest of risks. For the most part, my 7th graders know their forms through stage 6, but they are terrified to have to put it all together. Right before Christmas I noticed that they were suddenly not retaining anything (just before exams...not good).
Well, I know that I can't push them through stages 7-12 if I don't have a solid foundation with the basic of verb endings and subject verb agreement. So it was back to basics for us. I designed a conjugation worksheet that had a conjugated verb of 1st conj to copy--with pronouns and nouns (ego, tu, ancilla, nos, vos, ancillae) to work on agreement. This is followed by spaces for me to pick three more verbs of the same conjugation to "practice" with. Thus they conjugate 4 verbs of the same conjugation on the same sheet. I have other sheets for each conjugation and we are working through them. Sounds so basic, yes? But I met with great failure some years back when telling them to take a sheet of paper and to just conjugate... I had to find a middle ground somehow.
Yes, in other words, a mighty bit of hand-holding. But the biggest issue in regard to the cognitive development of these students is a basic one of developing connections (a big jump, for some reason) and the ability to synthesize and analyze material. What I've designed somehow mediates these issues, or so I think.
Could I push ahead faster if all the students were like my few true A students? Yes, but I could also push ahead faster if more of my students would just learn to take risks with something they PERCEIVE as tough.
So for instance, while I've been doing an intensive verb review during the main part of class, at the beginning of class for the warm-up I've been doing simple metaphrasing. I'll give them a list of words to metaphrase which involves not only recognizing cases but also demonstrating an understanding of function.
On day 1 they had something like puella, ancillam, servus, canis, mercatorem and amicum. Metaphrased they would look like this:
1) The girl verbed someone.
2) Someone verbed the slavegirl.
3) The slave verbed someone.
4) The dog verbed someone.
5) Someone verbed the merchant.
6) Someone verbed the friend.
The next day they had nominative plurals mixed with the accusative singulars (they have not had acc plural yet). Everyone did fine. They like these. They seem easy. Most people get them without any trouble.
Yesterday they choked when I told them they had to metaphrase two complete sentences, and longish ones at that as opposed to one word at a time. It was from a story that many balked at translating/preparing before Christmas. And, yes, most could guess at the right answer, but I wanted to force them all to arrive at the same answer and to understand COMPLETELY how they go there.
The first sentence was pecUniam meam semper servAs. They needed to write it out in this manner:
1) Someone verbed the money.
2) Someone verbed my money.
3) Someone always verbed my money.
4) You always guard my money.
I emphasized when we did this together that servAs was able to cover BOTH the subject and verb, something they still don't quite get.
The next sentence was in vIllA avArus rIdEbat et serpentem laudAbat.
1) (Treating the prep phrase as one unit) Someone verbed something in the house.
2) The miser verbed something in the house.
3) The miser was laughing in the house... ("..." because there was no period indicating that the sentence is not over)
4) The miser was laughing in the house and someone verbed something. (et after the verb gave us the notion of parallel construction).
5) The miser was laughing in the house and someone verbed the snake.
6) The miser was laughing in the house and (he) was praising the snake.
Of course, you could also have: In the house the miser was laughing and praising the snake, which is probably better anyway and does preserve some of the Latin word order.
Now, those kids who simply TRIED to do this and made mistakes BUT TRIED, faced today's sentence without a problem--even a kid who was struggling just to pass last 6 weeks!!! (I was so proud of him!) But of course, many were unwilling to venture out and totally try it on their own. One bright kid kept clamoring on that he was absent (last week) and I kept repeating (and admittedly getting miffed) that we did this YESTERDAY and if he had just tried it YESTERDAY or would even try it NOW he might get it. Here was today's:
fUrEs serpentem timEbant et E vIllA festInAvErunt.
The students freak out that the sentence is long. And when you think about it, how many students learning the traditional grammar up front way freak out as well when the sentences get long?! Ok, yes, I feel these sentences aren't too difficult at all. Then again, it isn't the 3 word sentences of stage one. And I'd rather take a week or so to review and to metaphrase intensively (because you certainly can't do this every single day!) than to forge on and leave so many kids struggling to keep up.
But the real difference between my A students and my not-A students seems to be this inability to risk being wrong, this inability to stretch oneself beyond one's comfort zone. The fear of discovering that you're stupid outways--for them--the joy of discovery and learning. Some days I think with these kids at least that my most important job isn't teaching them Latin, but teaching them how to risk learning. And I'm willing to try anything to break these glass ceilings they set for themselves....
Well, I know that I can't push them through stages 7-12 if I don't have a solid foundation with the basic of verb endings and subject verb agreement. So it was back to basics for us. I designed a conjugation worksheet that had a conjugated verb of 1st conj to copy--with pronouns and nouns (ego, tu, ancilla, nos, vos, ancillae) to work on agreement. This is followed by spaces for me to pick three more verbs of the same conjugation to "practice" with. Thus they conjugate 4 verbs of the same conjugation on the same sheet. I have other sheets for each conjugation and we are working through them. Sounds so basic, yes? But I met with great failure some years back when telling them to take a sheet of paper and to just conjugate... I had to find a middle ground somehow.
Yes, in other words, a mighty bit of hand-holding. But the biggest issue in regard to the cognitive development of these students is a basic one of developing connections (a big jump, for some reason) and the ability to synthesize and analyze material. What I've designed somehow mediates these issues, or so I think.
Could I push ahead faster if all the students were like my few true A students? Yes, but I could also push ahead faster if more of my students would just learn to take risks with something they PERCEIVE as tough.
So for instance, while I've been doing an intensive verb review during the main part of class, at the beginning of class for the warm-up I've been doing simple metaphrasing. I'll give them a list of words to metaphrase which involves not only recognizing cases but also demonstrating an understanding of function.
On day 1 they had something like puella, ancillam, servus, canis, mercatorem and amicum. Metaphrased they would look like this:
1) The girl verbed someone.
2) Someone verbed the slavegirl.
3) The slave verbed someone.
4) The dog verbed someone.
5) Someone verbed the merchant.
6) Someone verbed the friend.
The next day they had nominative plurals mixed with the accusative singulars (they have not had acc plural yet). Everyone did fine. They like these. They seem easy. Most people get them without any trouble.
Yesterday they choked when I told them they had to metaphrase two complete sentences, and longish ones at that as opposed to one word at a time. It was from a story that many balked at translating/preparing before Christmas. And, yes, most could guess at the right answer, but I wanted to force them all to arrive at the same answer and to understand COMPLETELY how they go there.
The first sentence was pecUniam meam semper servAs. They needed to write it out in this manner:
1) Someone verbed the money.
2) Someone verbed my money.
3) Someone always verbed my money.
4) You always guard my money.
I emphasized when we did this together that servAs was able to cover BOTH the subject and verb, something they still don't quite get.
The next sentence was in vIllA avArus rIdEbat et serpentem laudAbat.
1) (Treating the prep phrase as one unit) Someone verbed something in the house.
2) The miser verbed something in the house.
3) The miser was laughing in the house... ("..." because there was no period indicating that the sentence is not over)
4) The miser was laughing in the house and someone verbed something. (et after the verb gave us the notion of parallel construction).
5) The miser was laughing in the house and someone verbed the snake.
6) The miser was laughing in the house and (he) was praising the snake.
Of course, you could also have: In the house the miser was laughing and praising the snake, which is probably better anyway and does preserve some of the Latin word order.
Now, those kids who simply TRIED to do this and made mistakes BUT TRIED, faced today's sentence without a problem--even a kid who was struggling just to pass last 6 weeks!!! (I was so proud of him!) But of course, many were unwilling to venture out and totally try it on their own. One bright kid kept clamoring on that he was absent (last week) and I kept repeating (and admittedly getting miffed) that we did this YESTERDAY and if he had just tried it YESTERDAY or would even try it NOW he might get it. Here was today's:
fUrEs serpentem timEbant et E vIllA festInAvErunt.
The students freak out that the sentence is long. And when you think about it, how many students learning the traditional grammar up front way freak out as well when the sentences get long?! Ok, yes, I feel these sentences aren't too difficult at all. Then again, it isn't the 3 word sentences of stage one. And I'd rather take a week or so to review and to metaphrase intensively (because you certainly can't do this every single day!) than to forge on and leave so many kids struggling to keep up.
But the real difference between my A students and my not-A students seems to be this inability to risk being wrong, this inability to stretch oneself beyond one's comfort zone. The fear of discovering that you're stupid outways--for them--the joy of discovery and learning. Some days I think with these kids at least that my most important job isn't teaching them Latin, but teaching them how to risk learning. And I'm willing to try anything to break these glass ceilings they set for themselves....
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