Scisne? Survey

This past week, I created a survey for my Latin I classes to complete to reinforce the verbs scio (I know) and nescio (I don't know). Within the past year, I have also been invested in creating activities for additional opportunities for input other than the usual (e.g. reading stories, listening exercises, TPR, et al.), especially activities that draw upon my students' lives and experiences, encourage convivial interaction between students, and allow for students for learn more about one another. 

So what does the survey look like?

Day 1: I created a Google Form with each question asking "Scisne...?" (Do you know how...?) with different skills. All students had to do was pull out their phones or use the student computer in my room and answer scio or nescio for each question. The skills ranged from building a fire to driving to cooking to dancing to playing an instrument to using different forms of technology to using different forms of social media. 

Day 2: I created a Google Slideshow with the results of the survey from all three of my Latin I classes. We then discussed the results.

One bonus form of input from this: exposure to and repetition of large numbers! When I was studying Latin, I barely learned numbers 1-10, let alone anything above 10, so I'm so proud that my students were able to understand the numbers! Latin numbers also behave a little differently compared English numbers. For example, for 18, 19, 28, 29, 38, 39, etc., Latin prefers to count down, so eighteen is duodeviginti (two-down-from-twenty), nineteen is undeviginti (two-down-from-twenty), and so on. This is challenging for most students (I still struggle with this because I've had to teach myself the numbers - I even keep a print-out of the pages on numbers from Allen & Greenough on my desk at all times!), but most of my students were able to follow along and understand with my guidance.

The data from the survey contained some surprising and not-so-surprising results. For example, most of my students know how to use Snapchat and Instagram, but not Facebook (that's for us old people 👴). Half of my students know how to play an instrument.

This activity also provided ample opportunities for circling and community building. For example, I asked if students knew how to speak another language (they had to decide if that included Latin or not 😉), so I asked around to find out which languages my students can speak. The results were exciting - Amharic, Gujarati, Arabic, Spanish, French! I also circled for other questions, like "What instrument do you know how to play?" and "What do you know how to cook?" 

If you'd like to see the slideshow, I have embedded it below:

Biduum Georgianum

This past April, I attended the first ever Biduum Georgianum, hosted by the Septentrionale Americanum Latinitatis Vivae Institutum (SALVI), an organization that hosts and promotes opportunities for Latinists to speak Latin actively. For most world language teachers, they can seek communities where their language is spoken and/or travel to countries where their language is spoken to get a fully immersive experience. We Latin teachers do not have the same opportunity - so SALVI addresses this need. SALVI is most famous for hosting Rusticatio, a week-long summer program in West Virginia.

I first heard about SALVI's first Biduum (essentially a weekend-long sampler of the week-long Rusticatio experience) in Georgia from my dear friend, pun partner in crime, and fellow Latin teacher, Liz. I jumped on the opportunity to go because 1) it's with her so I was guaranteed at the very least a weekend of mischief and laughter, 2) it was much cheaper than the week-long Rusticatio experience in the summer, and 3) it was within driving distance, unlike Rusticatio. My four Latin teammates at work gave me helpful suggestions, as they have all done immersion programs like Rusticatio before.

For about 36 hours at a campsite in rural Georgia, around 30 participants and I were allowed to speak only in Latin. We did a variety of group activities like games and lessons, read some Latin texts on the bodily humors, shared and prepared meals, played frisbee, went hiking, had a campfire (complete with Latin campfire songs), had conversations, and more. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and especially loved (surprise surprise) being goofy and humorous in Latin (yep, I made at least one yo-mama joke in Latin).

The SALVI dinner chant

I attribute a large part of my enjoyment of the experience to my own self-awareness. I have always considered language a tool or a toy with which to express myself and manipulate for my own amusement, so I have never had the hang-ups experienced by other Latinists who enjoy Latin purely for its literary value and scorn any active use of the language (e.g. prose composition, conversational use, et al.). My previous enjoyment of using Latin actively made me excited to make the most of my 36 hours in this Latin bubble in the middle of nowhere.

Vocabulary from various activities

Body parts

Besides my own comfort with the language, I was aware of my own emotional limits. For example, I am a strong introvert, so for my sake I did not participate in many conversations at breakfast time. I knew that I needed that time in the morning to wake up both physically and mentally. Conversation too soon in the day - before I was mentally ready and had mustered enough social energy - would have exhausted me. I also made sure to be aware of my affective filter (the impact one's mental and emotional state has on their comfort with second language use). Whenever I felt overwhelmed, I withdrew and refocused. I did not strike up conversation for the sake of conversation - that is how I am in English anyway. There were, however, some interesting conversations over dinner, such as my attempt to explain comprehensible input to another teacher.

Adds a whole new spin on "I'm your Venus, I'm your fire" 😂

My conversational Latin is still a work in progress, so I hope to acquire an arsenal of go-to phrases and expressions that could apply to most conversations. Besides immersion programs like Biduum, conversing in Latin with my teammates and reading comedy has helped me work on this. Overall, Biduum was worth it and I definitely would love to do the full Rusticatio program in the future.