Course Format

The course format is generally unchanged from first semester. Towards the end of the semester, our focus will shift from the acquisition and practicing of new grammar and vocabulary to continuous reading of Latin prose and poetry and further introduction to Roman culture.

The course has three formal meetings and one informal (but required) meeting per week. During this fourth hour we will reinforce material we have learned through interactive review; periodically, quizzes will be given during these sessions. All students are required to attend at least one review/drill session each week; you are encouraged to attend more. If a student's work has become unsatisfactory, additional drill or tutor sessions may be assigned at the discretion of the professor.

In general, we will cover the material from three chapters of Wheelock every two weeks. This is a rapid but manageable pace provided that you diligently prepare assignments for the date they are due and consistently review the material. In order to target the pace of the class as accurately as possible, a syllabus for the following week will be provided every Friday.

Evaluation in this course will be frequent and take the form of graded exercises, short quizzes, longer exams, and a final. Typically, a short (15-minute) quiz will be given every two weeks and will cover 2 or 3 chapters' worth of material. Exams will be given after chapters 23 and 30. Additional unscheduled quizzes will be given from time to time.

Grading: Daily work (participation, homework assignments, and quizzes) constitutes the majority of your final grade with the remainder satisfied by exams.

Participation & Graded Homework Exercises 40%
IN CLASS Quizzes (scheduled and not) 25%
IN CLASS exams: 10% each 20%
Pre-scheduled Final Exam: 15% @ 2 pm, Wednesday, May 7
Attendance (see below) +/-

Preparation: You will have reading, composition, and/or worksheet exercises due every class period. Your preparation grade is not a measure of whether you were correct on the first attempt or answer every question in class correctly. Learning a language is an experimental process and oftentimes the experiments of even the most diligent students go awry. This grade will reflect, however, regular, careful preparation of assigned material.

Graded Homework: In keeping with the principle that practice makes perfect, exercises will be collected regularly and graded by your dutiful professor. These exercises will be due at the start of the class indicated on the weekly syllabus. Homework can receive a grade of A+, A, A-, B+, B, or B-. Any work meriting below a ÔB-' is unsatisfactory and will be given a 25. The reason for this is simple: language requires a greater degree of precision than most other disciplines. Therefore, once your comprehension of the material falls below a certain level, you can no longer accurately understand the language. Opportunities to make up unsatisfactory exercises will be given at my discretion. Late homework will be accepted only in extraordinary circumstances and will suffer at least a full grade reduction.

Quizzes & Exams: Because of the rapid pace of the course, make-up quizzes and exams will not be given without approval prior to the date of the quiz or exam - and then at my sole discretion and only in extraordinary circumstances. However, one quiz will be dropped when I compute your final average.

People learn at different rates and have different proficiencies with language acquisition. In this course, you will never be evaluated against other members of the class. Only your own abilities and efforts will be taken into account when determining evaluating your performance.

Absences: In deference to the vicissitudes of fate and health, up to three absences will be tolerated in the course of the semester. Any further absences, without my express prior approval, will result in the reduction of your course grade by 5 points. Whether your absence is voluntary or not, the result is the same. Therefore, use your excused absences wisely. Only in cases of severe personal crisis or serious medical incapacitation will this policy be altered, and then at my sole discretion.

Tardiness: The course moves rapidly and our meeting times are brief. Be on time. If you are late, explain it to me after class. Habitual, unexcused tardiness will be treated as an unexcused absence.

Honor Code: Having attended an Honor Code institution myself, I take this aspect of your Wheaton education with the utmost seriousness. In this class there is no busy-work; all assignments are designed to facilitate rapid assimilation of a language - a difficult but supremely rewarding goal. Collaborative work on assignments is allowed and even encouraged provided that all work you submit under your name represents your own knowledge, not that of your partner. Violators of academic honesty, either by cheating on quizzes or exams or in plagiarism of homework, will reap the whirlwind.

General Principles

Some of you may be taking this course to fulfill a language requirement, in which case you are to be commended for making an excellent choice. What you will learn about language in general, and about English in particular, will make your two semesters of Latin very valuable. But I cannot teach this course as if you are not going to learn how to read Latin: it is only by presuming that reading is everyone's goal that we can help you realize the side benefits of the language. And when you see what you have accomplished after two semesters, you may well want to stay on in Latin; from the third semester on we read original Classical texts.

By stressing repetition, composition, and the reading of continuous prose, this course will make it much easier for you to learn Latin; but the course relies on your willingness to work regularly and diligently. There are many paths toward the mastery of this material. My job is not only to present and explain the material, but also to help you develop the best methods for you to understand it and retain it. Your job is to keep up with the work. Therefore, I give you the following mottoes; by the time that elementary Latin is over you ought to be able to tell me what the Latin phrases below mean.

1) Absentes erudiri non possunt; Regular attendance is absolutely essential. If by some chance you are unprepared for a class meeting, you must come anyway; otherwise, you will merely fall further behind and compound your error. Attendance at the fourth hour is not optional; your attendance and active participation are required. Failure to attend a review session is equivalent to missing a regular class.

2) Ad astra per aspera; As foreign languages go, Latin is not all that difficult, and the similarities in vocabulary between it and English are a big plus in your acquisition of Latin skills. But it is different from English, and many of your English-based instincts about how language works (word order, for example) cannot be relied on. You have to expect the unfamiliar, and to work hard to make it familiar.

3) In memoriam; we will not learn Latin as a conversational language (although it could be), and most Latin learning consists of reading and analysis of written texts. Consequently, it is very important to train your memory so you can keep track of verb forms and noun forms. The more that you memorize, the more easily you can read. I can help you determine what mnemonic strategy is best suited to your needs.

It is important to realize that all exams in a foreign language are cumulative; consequently, when grades are averaged at the end of the semester I am likely to take improvement into account and not just the mathematical average of your scores. In other words, there is always a reason to be hopeful; you will not be permanently penalized for a slow start or a bad exam; a strong finish can excuse much. However, it is inconceivable that one could goof off for a semester and proceed to ace the final. It is through diligence that you will be successful and diligence that will be rewarded.

That said:

SALVE ATQUE BONAM FORTUNAM

("Welcome and Good Luck!")