Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Summer Latin Institute - DAY 3

I really needed to catch up on some sleep last night. I was in bed by about 9:30, with my cell phone and my Moreland and Fleischer by my side in case any students tried to call me.

At 10:48, one of my advisees called (students are apportioned among the faculty for advisement)—we faculty had encouraged our advisees to check in with us nightly during the first week even if they did not have any specific questions (but they usually do have specific questions). She was bubbling with energy and enthusiasm, as well as a certain tone of fear, anxiety, and desperation characteristic of the Institute.

She told me what she had studied, and what she had yet to study, and assured me that she was prepared to pull an all-nighter if need be (note the ascending tricolonic structure of that last sentence, something our students will be seeing in spades when they begin reading Cicero's first Catilinarian in a few weeks). Then we went over one future-less-vivid conditional sentence together. She did a beautiful job of following our prescribed approach to attacking these sentences: (1) identify the tense and mood of the verb of the protasis and the verb of the apodosis; (2) determine the type of condition; (3) review your translation formula; (4) now and only now are you ready to translate.

I went back to sleep and had pleasant dreams; not, as I recall, about Latin or the Institute. 

More soon... 



  1. You're on-call 24/7? I get it that this is an intensive program, but 24/7? Wow. If I give students my phone number, I ask them to call during reasonable hours. Just because they're up at 3 AM doesn't mean I have to be. Is it really necessary for you to be available by phone every minute of the day? I'm astounded.

    (in this case, Anonymous = your cousin Janice)

  2. Thanks for your comment, Janice. The 24/7 availability of the faculty really is necessary, because given the pace of the program, our students will not succeed if they start morning drills with any lingering questions about last night's exercises. To date, I have not been called after midnight. Ideally, students call with very specific questions that I can answer in under a minute. Thanks for reading!