What has been the most important school subject in your adult life?

[OneUmberJoker]

Maths

Maths and English

It was very common in grammar schools.
Most children didn't go to grammar schools.
None of my family who attended primary-only schools, rural Scottish comprehensives or inner city secondary Moderns did any Latin at all.

Our son did it at a state school a decade ago. Some schools still offer it. I suppose it depends on the local demographics. There are no private schools in our immediate area so the kind of pupil who'd otherwise have gone to a private school will go to a state one instead. It was the only school in our area to do it. There is another across the county border in the next city along that still offer it.

"Most" indeed didn't go to grammars, but depending on the year, there were periods when a third went to grammar with 2/3rds going to secondaries. Maybe not "most", but a third is still a significant proportion.

Maths and English in terms of every day life. Professionally speaking, I think Physics was my most helpful A level.

None of them really.
I have obviously used reading and writing in my life and primary school level maths.
I did languages at school, but I could have started them afterwards.

I wasn't given the option of doing Latin unfortunately.

"’m surprised at how many people on MN have studied it, though, as it really wasn’t a common subject for state schools in my area in the 1980s / 1990s. Perhaps privately educated people here are in the majority."

There are lots of posh people on MN, but it's also a generational thing. My comprehensive school still had Latin lessons (in the lunch break I think!) until just before I started in the late 80s. My parents were able to learn it.

From school nothing specific, just literacy and numeracy. My degree was more useful as we were taught balance sheets

My state comprehensive offered Latin to A-level - I left 1990, there was a class the year below me, too. I think it was a relic from the grammar school; only the top set were offered it in year 9 (or 3rd year as we called it.) A choice of Latin or German. The next two sets had German, with no option of Latin, and lower sets had no second language at all. I think that reflected how it had been at the secondary modern. Our longer serving teachers had come ftom the grammar and the secondary modern between them, though I think the Latin teaching was new when I started lessons; she may have been an NQT. If not, she was certainly early career. For A-level, it was all over at the boys' school. (They shared a lot of subjects at A-level.)

Welsh. I grew up in a monolingual English household; becoming fluent in Welsh through school made it much easier for me to learn French at secondary school and to learn other languages as an adult, as well as the benefits of being fluent in Welsh living in Wales.

Geography which led to a Geology degree and a Geoscience masters. Then an international career. I always loved glaciated valleys, river beds and fossils as a child

Maths by far but second would be writing skills so English. I’m glad I’m at the end of my career soon as AI will soon make me redundant.

English. Everything else was a waste of time.

Maths & English without a doubt. Once you have those you can do anything

But not all of that third would have studied Latin. My husband was at grammar school from 1959 and said only the top stream did Latin. I also did Latin, albeit in a feral inner London comprehensive in the 1970s. Both of us feel that its influence on our later learning or careers was marginal.

But, annecdata aside, your initial post said that "back in the day everyone learned Latin". There was literally no day in which everyone or even the majority of people in England learned Latin. It has always been a minority subject available in a subset of schools. There was probably a 20-30 year period in which it was thought to be a key part of the curriculum for people who were likely to be progressing to professional careers.

You also say that 2/3 went to "secondaries". The central purpose of the 1944 Education Act was to ensure that everyone went to secondary school. Grammars are secondary schools. The tripartite system was grammar, secondary modern and secondary technical.

Precision in language is so important.

Impossible to answer. Everything contributed to a rounded sense of who I am and what I know and how I address problems and approach work in my adult life

The majority didn’t get an education for centuries; but those who did get an education, the priests and aristocracy would have done Latin, from the time of the breakdown of the Roman Empire onwards. My degree was Latin from fourth century BC up to Thomas More - we read works by all the famous historical figures, such as The Venerable Bede, Charlemagne, Heloise and Abelard, the Carmina Burana, Gregory the Great, Erasmus, Petrarch, you name them to Thomas More’s “Utopia”. Latin was the language of diplomacy in the times of Elizabeth 1st.

Even after that time, boys who were educated in the public schools up to the 20th century, did Classics.

My great grandfather, his three sisters and his father went to a grammar school in Victorian times. They all went to university. I don’t know if they did Latin or not, but it was required for entry to Oxford.

My grammar school did Latin O and A levels. I don’t remember specific criteria for it, but those who did it, were reasonably good at MFL.

Drama & English. Drama teaches interpersonal skills, how to observe, share & interact with others. It builds confidence & communication, fun, varied & increasingly creative as you progress.

Keyboard applications. I learnt to type on a proper typewriter and then touch typing. I reckon it's saved me hours of time!

Same here. Latin was a bedrock.

Genuine question for everyone who is saying how useful Latin has been - what has it actually been useful for?

I’ve never felt disadvantaged by not having learned Latin at school - I work in a field where a few Latin terms are used, but they were easy enough to pick up - so wondered what I am missing here!

For me it was helpful with learning other languages but also in general knowledge and science because a lot of words have latin routes so if you know Latin you can work out what things are if you don't know. For example when I worked at a Pharma company despite having no medical training I could figure out a lot of technical things from knowing Latin

That makes sense - I can actually see how Latin would be useful in medical / pharma. I think in my area Ancient Greek (which I also didn’t study!) would probably have had a similar advantage.

I do have a good knowledge of French, Spanish and Italian so perhaps that’s why I don’t notice the lack of Latin so much!

What was Latin useful for:

• Learning 4 other languages.
• Coping when I landed a job in Italy pre-internet days knowing 'ciao' and 'spaghetti' and nobody else spoke English in the company... they all thought it was hilarious that I could speak a very odd Latin/Italian combo (my colleagues had all studied Latin).
• Pretty much every job I've ever had it has been handy as some point.
• Both degrees and other qualifications it has been very useful - so many terms come from Latin and much easier to remember when you understand the translation.

DD's comp does Latin GCSE and A level - I was genuinely rather heartbroken that she didn't want to study it.

Prior to going to university to study sociology at undergraduate and masters level, I did a medical secretary diploma that not only taught touch typing to 80 wpm but also shorthand to 120 wpm plus first aid and general biology and Latin to understand commonly used prefixes and suffixes used like hyper, hypo, ectomy, otomy, ology as well as roots so that I can easily understand that histology was study of cells but hysterectomy was removal of uterus, sigmoidoscopy is examination but sigmoidectomy is removal etc. You really don’t want to get your transcription wrong!

My life didn’t turn out as expected but practically the med sec qualification plus my degrees has helped me be a better advocate for my disabled DCs.

I would also liked to learn practical skills of DIY for house maintenance and car maintenance. Gardening and food growing. Physical health (rather than competitive sport) and well-being including meditation.

Teaching for the skills employers need is shortsighted - we need to teach how to be competent individuals, relational partners and parents.