Today was my final Literacy through Latin lesson with my Year Five Class. I've been teaching on the project for two years now and it's been a big part of my university life. It's also had a lasting effect on my life as a whole as well as it's directed me to a full time career in Primary School teaching. I've had great fun sharing my love and enthusiasm of the language with the children.
My fondest memories of the last two years include seeing the children come up with crazy concoctions of Roman food, singing a variety of fun songs translated into Latin, helping the children make their own Roman coins and watching the children write their own Latin sentences. There have been many challenging moments where things haven't gone quite to plan but I've found every single moment in the classroom gratifying and enjoyable. In today's lesson, the children went over the some of the things we'd learnt in the past year, using many games. The lesson started with us handing out Latin Easter cards that had been made by the class the week before. They were able to read their cards that had been created by their classmates and tell the class what they had learnt about them. We gave them dominoes with some of the Latin vocabulary from the year that needed to be matched with pictures that represented them. It was great to see the children matching these with ease, particularly when the children proved they remembered some of the more complex things such as plural endings. The children were happy to link the words on the dominoes with English to help them match them. The children then revised the use of the present tense in Latin, using a blow up ball to pass around and show us how the verb is conjugated. The final part of the lesson was to practice a Latin conversation including asking who they were, how they were and where they came from. Pupils came to the front of the class to practice their conversations and show off their use of Latin. We ended with Easter chocolates and many lovely comments from the class on their love of Latin.
I have really enjoyed being part of the Literacy through Latin project. I think it is a fantastic opportunity for the students and children involved. I have learnt a lot during the project and will certainly miss the time I have spent in the classroom teaching something that I find fascinating with these wonderful children.
Written by Rhiannon Birdsall, 11 April 2014
My fondest memories of the last two years include seeing the children come up with crazy concoctions of Roman food, singing a variety of fun songs translated into Latin, helping the children make their own Roman coins and watching the children write their own Latin sentences. There have been many challenging moments where things haven't gone quite to plan but I've found every single moment in the classroom gratifying and enjoyable. In today's lesson, the children went over the some of the things we'd learnt in the past year, using many games. The lesson started with us handing out Latin Easter cards that had been made by the class the week before. They were able to read their cards that had been created by their classmates and tell the class what they had learnt about them. We gave them dominoes with some of the Latin vocabulary from the year that needed to be matched with pictures that represented them. It was great to see the children matching these with ease, particularly when the children proved they remembered some of the more complex things such as plural endings. The children were happy to link the words on the dominoes with English to help them match them. The children then revised the use of the present tense in Latin, using a blow up ball to pass around and show us how the verb is conjugated. The final part of the lesson was to practice a Latin conversation including asking who they were, how they were and where they came from. Pupils came to the front of the class to practice their conversations and show off their use of Latin. We ended with Easter chocolates and many lovely comments from the class on their love of Latin.
I have really enjoyed being part of the Literacy through Latin project. I think it is a fantastic opportunity for the students and children involved. I have learnt a lot during the project and will certainly miss the time I have spent in the classroom teaching something that I find fascinating with these wonderful children.
Written by Rhiannon Birdsall, 11 April 2014