Latin Subject Guide
The study of languages is a key element of a well-rounded education in our globalised society, especially in today’s world where multilingualism is the norm. Languages can extend students’ ability to communicate and strengthen their understanding of the nature of language, culture, and the processes of communication.
Latin is a classical language with a significant body of literature that has held broad influence for millennia. Students who study Latin at the VCE level will learn how to read and analyse authentic Latin text, the words of poets, historians, philosophers, politicians, and citizens of the Roman Empire. Students will achieve many parallel outcomes from the skills and content essential to the study of the language, including close reading, analytical writing, systems thinking, and cross-cultural comparison.
Languages Department jeanna.cook@haileybury.com.au
Unit focus areas
Unit 1
In this unit students transition from reading adapted Latin to reading original Latin passages. They will increase their understanding of Latin by broadening their comprehension of Latin grammar, sentence structure, word order, and vocabulary. Additionally, students will extend their ability beyond translating Latin to an understanding of the content and context of any passage including its historical, cultural, philosophical and mythological background and the authors’ intentions.
Unit 2
In this unit students focus on developing their ability to translate Latin prose authors and are introduced to the works of Latin poets, such as Catullus, Ennius, Lucretius, Virgil and Ovid, and become familiar with the grammar, sentence structure, word order and vocabulary used by these authors. As part of this study, students will also continue to develop their understanding through literary analysis focusing on the content and context of works, including the historical, cultural, philosophical and mythological background, and the writers’ intentions. Additionally, they will be introduced to stylistic techniques and poetic metre.
Unit 3
In this unit students study the work of a Latin prose author or Latin poet of a genre other than epic, both analysing and evaluating the literary quality of this work and its background in the Roman world. This will continue to develop student understanding of the author’s purpose in writing the work, as well as the references to the historical, cultural, philosophical, and mythological background. Additionally, on completion of this unit the student should be able to translate an unseen passage from a Latin prose author.
Unit 4
In this unit students study Latin epic poetry through prescribed lines of a specified book of Virgil’s Aeneid. Students focus on the content, including the accidence and syntax, and context of the prescribed lines, as well as the literary, stylistic and structural techniques of the epic. More broadly, students will explore the themes and ideas of Virgil’s Aeneid as a whole and connect these themes to the context of the prescribed lines.
Pre-requisites
Students wishing to undertake Units 1 and 2 must have successfully completed Year 9 Latin (or equivalent).
Students wishing to undertake Units 3 and 4 must have completed Units 1 and 2.
Assessment
For Units 1 and 2 students complete a range of outcomes and classwork throughout each semester. There will also be an examination at the end of the academic year.
For Units 3 and 4, students complete School-Assessed Coursework (50%) subject to external moderation, and an end-of-year examination (50%)
