That £4m on Latin lessons should be spent on a modern foreign language

[newnortherner111]

www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/latin-state-schools-england-williamson-b1894202.html

Latest idea from the Education Secretary. Given that the Prime Minister has been in a Catholic church at least once, did he not tell Gavin Williamson that the Catholic Mass is usually in the local language now, and has been for over 50 years?

Encouraging learning Spanish for example would be much better and actually have a use in real life.

@DGRossetti Quite possibly, but at least my crappy opinions are limited to this forum and won't be adversely affecting the nation's young people. Unlike those of your Tory mates.

The GCSEs have just been reformed. I don't teach MFL but I know it is considered much harder

There has been a recent consultation for re-reform. I don't know about harder. It's more challenging. If they stopped the deliberate attempts to mislead and accepted a more straightforward approach to questioning, it would be easier for the majority. As it stands, they learn so, so much and then get caught out by unnecessary twists and turns which make things so frustrating for them. I am fluent in two MFL's and sometimes need to listen to a question twice or re-read something several times before I realise what they're getting at. It shouldn't be that complex at that level.

[quote PartridgeFeather]@DGRossetti Quite possibly, but at least my crappy opinions are limited to this forum and won't be adversely affecting the nation's young people. Unlike those of your Tory mates. [/quote]
What on earth makes you think I have Tory mates ? Regulars to these boards will know very well I have a deeply socialist streak.

Or was it just because I've still got some Latin from my local comprehensive schooling ?

I think the your was a reference to Gav and Co, as in one's Tory mates....

No, it was aimed at the person who posted it, who told me in Latin that my head was up my arse (unless I'm mistaken, which is very possible in this heat) and I think a person with socialist leanings might've concurred with my sentiment that it is in fact GW's head up his respective arse and then suggested possible solutions for removing him from post, instead of bantering at me in a dead language that GW wants everyone to learn because his mate Boris can quote it.

Whatever, it is wine o'clock here, ciao.

@PartridgeFeather

No, it was aimed at the person who posted it, who told me in Latin that my head was up my arse (unless I'm mistaken, which is very possible in this heat) and I think a person with socialist leanings might've concurred with my sentiment that it is in fact GW's head up his respective arse and then suggested possible solutions for removing him from post, instead of bantering at me in a dead language that GW wants everyone to learn because his mate Boris can quote it.

Whatever, it is wine o'clock here, ciao.

I was pointing out your Latin was erroneous as far as I could see. You were talking about the head of an arsehole, not having your head up your arse.

I refer you to Romanes eunt domus upthread.

One of the first programs I wrote (in Apple BASIC) formed the endings for any given noun. Because I was doing Computer Science and Latin O Levels.

Oh , I won't mediate again then. Mea culpa and all that. Pax.

Go on then, what's "Thread Killer" in Latin?

interfector/interfectrix fili!

My son loved Latin and hated modern languages. He found the subject matter deadly boring in French and Spanish (endless iterations of what we had for breakfast, my day at school etc etc). Cambridge Latin Course was much more interesting - robbers and fighting, arson and innuendo as I recall! Given that many of our politicians, judges etc, started off with a classics degree, isn't it a good thing to be introducing these subjects to the widest range of children?

Given that many of our politicians, judges etc, started off with a classics degree, isn't it a good thing to be introducing these subjects to the widest range of children?

I don't think that follows tbh. The fact that many of our judges and politicians have a Classics degree is in large part an indicator of the types of schools and universities they went to, rather than an indicator that classicists necessarily make the best politicians and judges. I strongly doubt that teaching Latin in state schools will result in a rebalancing of the proportion of state school and private school educated politicians and judges.

Also, while I sympathise with your son getting bored with the MFL curriculum (I do too, and I teach it!) surely the better answer to that is to change the MFL curriculum rather than teach a language nobody speaks. Our reputation for being unwilling and incapable foreign language learners is embarrassing and surely just confirms what everyone must think of us wrt Brexit.

www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/jacob-rees-mogg-takes-latin-test-live-on-air-and-fails-spectacularly-284441/

Yes, we already had a reputation for not speaking other languages well before Brexit. But instead of recognising this as an issue and trying to fix it, people in the UK seem to want to dig their heels in and make it even more difficult to learn other languages. It's sad and I don't see it changing anytime soon, even with some extra Latin classes (although I'd like to be wrong!)

Latin would really only be relevant to spanish, italian, portuguese and french. Not really helpful if you're learning German, Finnish or Russian.

Au contraire - it is heavily inflected, and because learning it therefore necessitates coming to serious grips with grammar, it's a great foundation for Russian and German.

Another great foundation would be modern Irish, which is also a heavily inflected language. You could kill two birds with one stone by studying Irish - heavy inflection plus MFL.

Or, of course, we could just teach English grammar properly and sensibly from primary through into secondary, so that kids have sufficient general grammatical understanding to pick up a more inflected language with less difficulty (and also understand more about their own). I don't think there’s room on the secondary curriculum to add Latin or Irish as well as another MFL. There already aren't enough lessons per week to teach an MFL properly.

It's far easier to illustrate the vagaries of grammar with a language where you have to take multiple rules of grammar into account every time you open your mouth or take pen to paper.

The fact that many of our judges and politicians have a Classics degree is in large part an indicator of the types of schools and universities they went to, rather than an indicator that classicists necessarily make the best politicians and judges.

Especially if you take Boris ad an example.

@mathanxiety

Latin would really only be relevant to spanish, italian, portuguese and french. Not really helpful if you're learning German, Finnish or Russian.

Au contraire - it is heavily inflected, and because learning it therefore necessitates coming to serious grips with grammar, it's a great foundation for Russian and German.

Another great foundation would be modern Irish, which is also a heavily inflected language. You could kill two birds with one stone by studying Irish - heavy inflection plus MFL.

Or, if you want to learn Russian or German, you could go ahead and learn them, without wasting a few years learning something else with a peripheral connecton.

@mathanxiety

It's far easier to illustrate the vagaries of grammar with a language where you have to take multiple rules of grammar into account every time you open your mouth or take pen to paper.

It's very easy to inoculate children against all desire to learn any language ever again, by sentencing them to the dreary learning of complex and tedious grammatical rules.

I speak Hebrew and a smattering of Arabic and I didn't find Latin particularly useful in that respect. I'm not anti-Latin but I wouldn't exaggerate its usefulness. You can learn the grammar directly through the target language.

I didn't do French A-Level and yes, still being on train tickets is an exaggeration, but I've worked with enough people to know that while not all Europeans are fluent in multiple languages, the UK expectations are on the lower end.

The German system is really just as bad as the old 11-plus in the UK: there's been research showing strong correlations between social class and which school a child goes to. Immigrants and children of immigrants are much less likely to get into Gymnasium.

Good luck finding a UK school where Russian is taught by a well qualified teacher.

'Complex and tedious' describes most of mathematics beyond basic algebra, yet very few people question the inclusion of maths in the curriculum.

Teaching correct grammar and usage is a path to even the playing field. People are judged and dismissed on the basis of their poor grammar. It holds them back in their careers.

Learning 'complex and tedious' grammar in a language other than their first teaches students to pay attention to detail, to carry and apply several parameters in their heads all at once, while at the same time understanding the big picture of what they are hearing and reading or writing. It's essential when taking any MFL beyond a basic conversational level.

I don't know why schools aren't teaching or offering languages more relevant and useful i.e. Urdu, Punjabi, Polish, Chinese / Mandarin etc.

French and Spanish seems to be where it's stuck for the last 40yrs.

My daughter first got interested in all things relating to Japanese culture, starting teaching herself how to speak Japanese when she was still in Primary from the “Japanese from Zero” books and had to go all the way round the houses after leaving school to get into uni and find a course that allowed her to further her studies in Japanese and Chinese linguistics without having jumped through many previous hoops.

Fortunately a friend of ours taught her Urdu and Punjabi as well but her boyfriend's Mum is a deputy headteacher of a primary school where a large number of kids don't have English as their first language.

My daughter's plans to be on placement in Japan were setback due to Covid so she has spent this summer helping her with lesson plans, flash cards and worksheets to teach the basics in different languages which she's enjoyed doing but I really don't get why schools don't introduce it even at foundation level in schools.

The earlier they start learning another language the easier it is for them.

My Mum studied Latin and enabled her to understand many European/modern languages and she taught us about the root and meaning of words and therefore has actually given us a great depth and breadth of language & word understanding, which we now pass on to our children.

If you get over the concept of Latin only being taught in expensive, exclusive schools then you can realise just how useful it is in understanding MFL and English and all sorts of other things too.

One of the reasons I think that children drop a modern foreign language I agree is the nature of the teaching in some cases, and the perception or reality that it is difficult. The same would probably happen with Latin.

I'm still not convinced though that supporting Latin is better than more support for modern foreign languages, or indeed English at a lower level.