While often characterized as a dead language, Latin fairly bursts with benefits to middle school scholars: vocabulary development, eased assimilation of foreign languages, foundations of grammar, increased standardized test scores, rich connections to the past, and foundation for sciences, logic, theology, and law.
Capturing these advantages for Chesapeake Academy sixth-graders, Kim Dynia developed a Latin curriculum for sixth-grade students that serves to support Writer’s Workshop courses by building semantic and syntactic skills. Designed around short stories, the course offers a context for vocabulary development and a springboard for exploring the foundations of English grammar through the lens of one of its primary sources—Latin!
Students exploring ancient Roman writings from classic scholars build cultural literacy foundations as well as etymological research skills. Dynia’s “Expanding English Vocabulary” component connects Latin and English vocabulary, focusing on Latin roots. Dynia has incorporated multimodal techniques from the Orton Gillingham reading method to speed recognition of Latin word parts. There is nothing dead about that language!
“Cogito ergo sum.” (I think, therefore I am.)—René Descartes
