JACT Latin Summer School (www.latincamp.co.uk)
Courses for Teachers
Bespoke 1 or 2 week courses for people new to Latin teaching. Teachers in, or about to start at, a state school can apply to us for Classics for All for funding of up to 50% of the course fee.
We have several courses intended to assist those new to Latin teaching who:
- Have been recruited into schools straight out of universities without any formal teacher training
- Are about to embark on or indeed have just completed a PGCE (or equivalent) – we try to incorporate relevant material which the PGCE courses are unlikely to have to have time to focus on
- Have less “traditional” degrees and need to develop their Latin before teaching it to an advanced level
- Have fairly secure Latin and want to acquire working knowledge of “how it all works” for Latin teaching
- Are teachers of other subjects but have just started teaching Latin, or are just about to start
“Camp 2022” will run from Monday July 18th to Saturday July 30th at Harrogate Ladies College, just on the edge of this beautiful quintessential spa town. All courses last one week but you can “mix and match” and stay for the fortnight. (Including an optional trip to Hadrian’s Wall over the middle Sunday.) The residential fee for each 1-week course is £420 or the full fortnight is £870. Teachers have often found their schools willing to help with the fees and funding can often be sourced from CA of CfA.
A typical day involves three 1-hour group sessions with various work and preparation set to do in between. We also provide an exciting array of speakers, trips and other events which all delegates have full access to, and the tutor team consists almost entirely of experienced practising Classics teachers who you will get plenty of opportunity to speak to and ask questions.
See details below and www.latincamp.co.uk for simple online application. If you wish to discuss anything further, email Director David Stephenson on d.stephenson@warwickschool.org or call on (07796) 690167.
|
I have been teaching MFL for over 30 years but as a novice Latin teacher with no formal training and only a couple of years’ experience, I found the introductions to the CLC and the tips for teaching Latin for examinations extremely useful - supremely practical and accompanied by a wealth of examples. The discussion of pedagogy and illustration of class-based techniques were delivered by a widely experienced, insightful and supportive professional who was an enthusiast for his subject and who took obvious delight in passing on his expertise to those who shared his Classics calling. The pace of delivery, the sense of humour and the systematic approach to the training were a delight to work with. It was inclusive in manner, jocular but business-like, well informed without being distant, and wonderfully honest and un-PC in his forthright opinions - encouraging a realistically reflective approach to issues around the most effective ways of teaching Latin. I can honestly say that in 35 years of teaching, with its attendant hours of often irrelevant and unproductive INSET sessions, this training has provided me with the most practical pedagogical support and useful resources, as well as the most confidence subsequently to draw up schemes of work, plan productive lessons and generally be an effective teacher. It was frequently challenging, but also upbuilding, and always - to use the Director’s own phrase - “geeky fun.” (Michael Wager, teachers’ group 2019) |
Overview of Our Courses
All courses last one week (starting on each Monday though arriving on the Sunday before to get settled in) but most are offered in both weeks. We anticipate lots of people staying with us and completing two courses over the fortnight. They are set up to enable week 1 to flow naturally into week 2, without anyone coming for just week 2 being disadvantaged. We will discuss which course is most suitable with each individual signing up but a key intention is to be as flexible as possible.
Some courses are simply intended to improve your language if this is needed before you teach it; others, for those with stronger language to begin with, are focused more on the actual teaching of the subject from beginners through the GCSE, and then (in week 2) through to A Level.
Our different courses for teachers are:
- Intense Beginners 1: using Nick Oulton, So You Really Want to Learn Latin, book 1 and book 2 ch. 1-5.
- Intense Beginners 2: continuing with Nick Oulton from ch. 6 then actual GCSE-level language work – the aim is to be at GCSE translating standard by the end of the week.
- Near Beginners: maybe you have the very basic grammar in your system but want to begin thinking about reading some straightforward original Latin.
- Intermediate: we expect people who are pushing towards the equivalent of school GCSE level Latin to benefit most from this course which, as for the near-beginners, is intended to build up reading speed.
- Advanced: we expect people who are pushing towards A Level standard to benefit most from this course.
- Teaching Latin up to GCSE: coverage of the courses and resources available for teaching Latin from beginners up to GCSE, including how GCSE is assessed by both exam boards and how we might best prepare our students for it.
- Teaching Latin A Level: coverage of the courses and resources available for teaching Latin from A Level including how this is assessed and how we might best prepare our students for it.
Intense Beginners 1 runs just in week one and Intense Beginners 2 (which picks up exactly where week 1 left off) runs just in week two. This means that a total beginner can come for just week 1 or stay for both weeks, depending on their needs, or the odd very near-beginner could come just for week 2. (We would send the materials from week 1 so that you could double check that you’re familiar with it all before arriving.)
The Near-beginners, Intermediate and Advanced courses run for both weeks but covering different texts in week 2. This means that people can i) join any of these groups in either week, ii) join any of these groups and stay for both weeks or iii) join one group in week 1 and “move up” to another in week 2 if they wish to move at a faster pace. Depending on numbers of teachers opting in, these groups may also have school students at roughly the same level. (This is just for information - we do not see any concerns with this.
The Teaching Latin A Level will only run in week 2. One imagines that a lot of people with more secure Latin will attend the GCSE course in week 1 then A Level in week 2 but you could just come for week 2.
See below for more details on each course.
Teaching Latin up to GCSE
This course is designed to deliver the bottom line on how Latin is assessed up to GCSE, and how we might best prepare the students for this. It is not intended as "teacher training" in a more general sense. Although the course is led by a tutor there will be plenty of emphasis on interactive discussion and the participants getting used to producing ideas and resources of their own, as they will have to in school.
The sorts of components this course will cover include:
- A whistlestop tour from start to finish of the Cambridge Latin Course, tracing the storyline, grammatical progression and the course's philosophy - we are not here to evangelise the CLC but it is important to acquire a working knowledge, given how widely it is still used in our schools.
- Uses of ICT in Latin teaching with particular focus on the Cambridge Schools Classics Project website and e-resources.
- Other Latin courses available, including the most recent new textbooks
- Ideas for introducing and teaching the main grammatical constructions found at GCSE.
- Prescribed texts at GCSE - translation but also discussion of how we prepare pupils and the sorts of questions they will face in an exam. As far as possible, texts will be chosen which people actually have to teach the following year.
- How OCR and WJEC Latin is examined. (Including details on each paper.)
We also appreciate that some graduates’ school and university experiences will have had rather more emphasis on the language than others. Therefore if there are enough people for more than one group, setting will be based entirely on prior linguistic experience to enable the most appropriate pace for everyone.
We hope that the Teaching Latin up to GCSE will run in both weeks (identical course each week) if there is enough demand, but we may end up negotiating with individuals if one week is oversubscribed and the other undersubscribed. You might wish to attend this course for one of the weeks and one of the courses just reading texts to improve on your own Latin, if you are not yourself going to be teaching A Level.
This course will only run in week 2. One imagines that a lot of people with more secure Latin will attend the GCSE course in week 1 then A Level in week 2 but you could just come for week 2.
This course is designed to deliver the bottom line on how Latin is assessed at A Level, and how we might best prepare the students for this. It is not intended as "teacher training" in a more general sense. Although the course is led by a tutor there will be plenty of emphasis on interactive discussion and the participants getting used to producing ideas and resources of their own, as they will have to in school.
There will be coverage of how each of the OCR A Level Latin papers and the sorts of resources and teaching needed to prepare for it, but we will take a particularly detailed look at prescribed texts - translation but also discussion of how we prepare pupils and the sorts of questions they will face in an exam. As far as possible, texts will be chosen which people actually have to teach the following year.
We also appreciate that some graduates’ school and university experiences will have had rather more emphasis on the language than others. Therefore if there are enough people for more than one group, setting will be based entirely on prior linguistic experience to enable the most appropriate pace for everyone.
Intense Beginners 1 runs just in week one and Intense Beginners 2 (which picks up exactly where week 1 left off) runs just in week two. This means that a total beginner can come for just week 1 or stay for both weeks, depending on their needs, or the odd very near-beginner could come just for week 2. (We would send the materials from week 1 so that you could double check that you’re familiar with it all before arriving.)
Week 1: book 1 and book 2 up to chapter 5
Week 2: book 2 from chapter 6 then into GCSE level language work
We progress rapidly through the basic grammar and syntax to establish reliable building blocks, with emphasis upon practice via the medium of sentences into Latin. Even if you have studied a little bit of Latin, going back to the beginning and working through some intense and “traditionally rigorous” study should do your confidence no end of good!
The key language we cover includes:
- Nouns and adjectives of all declensions
- Active, passive and deponent indicative verbs of all conjugations
- Infinitives and imperatives
- The importance of principal parts
- The main irregular verbs
- Simple relative and concessive clauses
- Present and perfect participles
- Indirect statements
- The main uses of the subjunctive
At the end of the 2-week course, beginners sit an actual past GCSE language paper, marked with the actual GCSE marking scheme. It is not unusual for beginners to achieve an A or A* mark in this paper.
Depending on how many teachers are at this level, you may find yourself in a group with current or soon-to-be university students. We do not foresee any problems with this at all - just for information.
Near Beginners’ and Intermediate Courses
These courses are intended for people working towards A Level standard or the equivalent. They are intended primarily to increase fluency by reading more literature in the original than the confines of a GCSE course enable. We hope that people will leave with a considerably greater confidence in reading the language which will directly benefit public examination performance, not only in the language papers but also in the literature papers with a greater alertness to a wider range of authors and the linguistic / stylistic devices which they use.
A range of prose and verse authors are covered. Tutors choose texts intended to best suit the students based on the information they and their referees provide. This may consist of whole texts (e. g. an easier book of Ovid) but a lot of groups will use readers an anthologies such as:
- Wheelock – Selections from Latin Literature
- Murgatroyd – Apuleius, Metamorphoses and From Augustus to Nero
- Balme and Morwood – Cupid and Psyche and The Millionaire’s Dinner Party
- The Oxford and Cambridge Latin Anthologies
Depending on how many teachers are at this level, you may find yourself in a group with school students. We do not foresee any problems with this at all - just for information.
These courses are intended for people working towards A Level standard or the equivalent. We try to expose people to a wider range of texts and authors than they will have had time to read at school or elsewhere. An able group will read a selection of authors they may well never have encountered, to get a wider knowledge of literature, awareness of different literary styles and a better base of texts under their belt.
Tutors choose texts based on the information which the students and referees provide. Typically selections from 3-4 texts will be studied. For example, one group recently read:
- Seneca – Letters (a selection)
- Suetonius – Nero (selection)
- Tacitus – Annals 14 (selection)
- Lucan – de bello civili book 7 (in its entirety)
Depending on how many teachers are at this level, you may find yourself in a group with school students. We do not foresee any problems with this at all - just for information.