The ability to translate unseen passages is a skill tested in both Latin A-level and the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma. Higher IB candidates are expected to translate a passage of 105–125 words of Latin poetry (in this case, Ovid's Metamorphoses) as the first of their externally marked papers. The International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO) uses unseen passages to ‘measure the [students’] ability to understand and translate texts in the original language’ (2014, p. 25). The passages are marked according to two criteria: (a) meaning; (b) vocabulary and grammar. In order to access the highest grades, the students must provide a ‘logical translation [in which] errors do not impair the meaning’ and ‘render vocabulary appropriately and grammar accurately and effectively’ (IBO, 2014, pp. 28–9).

The new ITT Common Core Framework (CCF) for teachers expects trainee and early-career teachers to adapt their teaching to support all students in class (Department for Education, 2021). What used to be called ‘differentiation’ is now referred to as ‘adaptive teaching’ and full details of what it consists of, as far as the Department for Education in England is concerned, can be found on pages 19–20 of the CCF document. Much of the advice of that document is about supporting students with special educational needs and disabilities, about teachers’ need to recognise that different students have different levels of prior attainment and may have barriers to learning, and how different types of student grouping may affect learning in different ways. It dismisses as a ‘common misconception’ that students have different learning styles and warns against teachers creating ‘distinct tasks for different groups of pupils’ or ‘setting lower expectations for particular pupils’.

This article seeks to illustrate the importance of teaching the history of ancient Greece in the Primary Education Degree in Spain. The objective is to observe, from the analysis of a case study carried out at the University of Seville, how students pursuing the Degree in Primary Education acquire knowledge and how they then transfer and adapt this knowledge to a classroom of primary school students. This study highlights several methodologies and facts. It focuses on the necessity that future teachers know the history of ancient Greece in order to understand the legacy of this civilisation in today's world. In addition, it demonstrates the positive impact of integrating methodologies and techniques, such as Cooperative Learning (CL), Project Based Learning (PBL) and Gamification, both on a teacher's own learning and in their future role. This article is part of the activities of the Innovations and Didactic Group Gender and History Cliogen (GINDO-UB/187).

With regards to the latest European Recommendations, developing key competences has become an important goal of education. The purpose of this comparative study is to focus on this topic considering the teaching of Latin and Greek in upper secondary school in Italy and Spain. A multiple case study with a mixed research design was used, with 173 students and 25 teachers as participants in the quantitative part and 40 students and 18 teachers in the qualitative part. The underlined results are a) the importance of working on the learning concepts of the students of Classics, as this influences the way they study b) the teaching factors that help pupils to develop key competences are evaluation, feedback, teacher personality, interactivity and discipline. Useful paths for daily teaching and new perspectives for future research in this field are offered.

This paper will investigate the efficacy of using game-based learning to increase motivation in Key Stage 3 boys (aged 11–14) at a single-sex, non-selective free school located in inner London. During observations of classes I have seen a spectrum of varying motivation in the classroom. As such, the aim of this game-inspired motivation should, as this paper will find, have a clearly demonstrable influence on their academic studies. This will be examined through measuring both an increase in intercultural communication competence and a desire to autodidactically research these historical and classical topics. Whilst the long-term effects of this research paper on its participants will not be properly understood for years to come, what can be currently measured, I hope, can offer genuine excitement in the area of digital games and motivation.

This article presents the results of a student experiment conducted at the University of Hamburg as part of a course about scents and smells in antiquity. In the experiment, students produced their own versions of ancient perfumes. Located at the intersection of the humanities and the sciences, this project aimed to bring ancient olfactory spaces to life for the students by reconstructing and manufacturing ancient fragrances as authentically as possible. As a source for the fragrance recipes, we used the work of the physician Dioscorides, whose writing provides information on the ingredients and procedures used in the ancient manufacture of perfumes. This article illuminates the added value of such experiments by encouraging the integration of experimental archaeology into teaching processes.

This paper explores the merits of learning classical languages in an informal environment. It is argued that voluntary clubs offer a variety of benefits for students and teachers and may help promote the longevity of the discipline. For teachers, clubs can be a flexible way to teach Greek or Latin to the next generation in schools that may not be willing to offer one or both languages as subjects in the formal curriculum. For students, clubs can be an opportunity to learn freely and forgivingly in a relaxed and non-pressurised environment; an informal Greek club can help develop the skills of students formally learning Latin. Language clubs can also be used to make Classics more accessible into the future, as dated ideas of Classics being exclusive to only the most privileged and bright students can be disposed of. In this paper the author shall draw on her own experience as well as the experiences of students and teachers in Australia and abroad.1

If the modern oral hypothesis, beginning in the 1920s (see 17 below), about the composition of early Greek epic poetry is correct (a ‘paradigm shift’ in Homeric studies according to Casey Dué), there were many poets who over centuries, beginning perhaps in the middle-to-late Bronze Age, composed in performance many different versions of epic poems, including poems about the Trojan War, and including the subject matter of the Iliad and the Odyssey, vestiges of which survive on papyrus fragments and in the manuscripts of later authors. But the versions of the Iliad and the Odyssey that we have were not the work of many poets but, for the most part, of a single poet. The overall unity of the poems cannot be explained, or explained away, by any theory that posits multiple, successive authorship spanning many years.

In ‘Greek Inscriptions: insights and resources in the classroom and beyond’ (Liddel, 2017), I outlined some of the opportunities and perspectives that the study of inscriptions offers to learners getting familiar with the history and culture of ancient Greece at pre-university stage, and I considered the obstacles and opportunities that teachers and students face when trying to access them. That piece very much concentrated on inscriptions as a source for teachers and candidates of OCR's A-level Ancient History. In this essay I take a much broader approach to make a case for the relevance of ancient Greek inscriptions to pre-18 education, considering the ways in which they inform our understanding of Athenian society and contribute to the development of skills of analysis and evaluation of evidence. I highlight the growing significance of the Attic Inscriptions Online website, the Attic Inscriptions in UK Collections project, the newly-launched Attic Inscriptions: Education resource and the AIO YouTube channel to learners’ critical engagement with sources for the ancient Greek world.

Most people who use the word ‘Latin’ as the name of a language in antiquity (not Medieval or Neo-Latin therefore) seem unaware that Latin was a continuum made up of many different varieties, Classical Latin (which they identify with Latin) being only one of them. So when they talk of spoken Latin they mean spoken Classical Latin, no other variety from antiquity being available that is suitable to be spoken. This is ironic on two counts. First, the overwhelming majority of native Latin speakers did not speak Classical Latin at all. Secondly, the small minority of people who did speak it did not do so routinely as a language of everyday conversation, but only on certain formal occasions and in certain public situations. They spoke routinely the appropriate form of their first language, the form that was used by a social, cultural and educational elite. This was not Classical Latin, which was not an acquired form of Latin but one that was learned as if it were a second language. What the language they did speak routinely was like we do not know, and no doubt it comprised several different registers, as languages do. Whether they realise it or not, people who engage in informal conversations in formal Classical Latin today are not re-enacting any authentic experience that was to be had in the ancient world.

The collective mind often attributes the image of a modern Latin classroom to a teacher writing on a chalkboard in front of students eagerly memorising the declensions in silence. However, as part of their search for innovative and effective practices, Latin instructors have consistently expanded their gaze beyond the traditional parameters of rote memorisation for at least since the pioneering efforts of W.H.D. Rouse, looking to more innovative models presented by novel methods for inspiration and to the halls of predecessors in hopes of fostering a more engaging learning environment. Upon close comparative study between the modern pedagogical methods in Latin classrooms and the perspective of Renaissance scholar Petrarch, this study identified a commonality between the two: emphasis on dialogue between different members of the classroom and personal interpretations of preceding authors’ works for a better opportunity of comprehending the content. Grounded in the philosophies of the Socratic method, Petrarch claimed that an important element of the tradition of pedagogy finds expression in dialogues, imitation, and the significance of fully comprehending the topic in pursuit of wisdom. Likewise, many institutions of the U.K. and the United States, strengthened by the emergence of dialectic assessment applications during the Covid-19 Pandemic, are working towards a new norm in place. After conducting an in-depth interpretation of primary and secondary sources regarding Petrarch's pedagogy, as well as research of its modern developments and the applications, the comparison suggests a new direction for the Classics community to consider going forward.

Under the high cognitive pressure of a translation task, secondary school Classics students often make dictionary mistakes. Research indicates that successful students use a lemma's meta-information to engage in a feedback loop between text and dictionary. Using eye-tracking data of expert learners, this study examined how successful students employ the different types of lemma information while limiting their cognitive load. We found that students primarily manage their cognitive load by using boldface definitions as stepping-stones, but navigate through meta-information when it (1) can effectively reduce the amount of definitions and (2) refers to (morphological) features directly visible in the text. Alternatively, they use meta-information as a backup plan, when they are stuck or want to confirm a hypothesis.

Considering the concept of critical teaching, teachers should seek to ensure the active participation of students, emphasisng the adoption of student-centred and group-centred teaching methods, which will provide students with relevant motivation for learning. From this perspective the current article focuses on a teaching proposal for the course of Ancient Greek Language in Greece and Cyprus, presenting the method of jigsaw-based cooperative learning as a teaching practice which promotes both active student participation and group cooperation. According to this teaching practice, the teacher actively involves the students in the learning process, promoting higher-level cognitive, metacognitive and emotional functions. Not only is this method compatible with the broader contemporary pedagogical and didactic principles, which aim to provoke students' interest, cultivate their social skills and relationships, develop their personal self-perception, and create autonomous and fulfilled personalities, but also it is harmonised with the main aims of the Ancient Greek Language Curriculum in these countries, which are fully aligned with both their education policy and their societal needs.

Relatively little literature specific to the discipline of History aims to translate theory into practice in regard to designing effective online and flipped learning experiences. This article synthesises current literature into practical advice and reflects on previous experience as an aid to historians (a) tasked with developing online or flipped units or (b) who have transitioned online and are seeking ways to improve. Feedback from students and learning analytics from a flipped unit at a large Australian university underpin the paper's advice. Student feedback and behaviour, coupled with the reflections of the unit's designers, encourage (1) prioritising effective educational media and recording practices over the production of digital material with the longest shelf life, (2) explicit consideration of unit structure and support offered to students, (3) readings which consider the student perspective, (4) enthusiasm about the delivery format, and (5) the overarching importance of constructive alignment.

This article investigates the different uses of the Cambridge Latin Course Explorer Tool in the classroom, and students' perceptions of this, through a case study of a Year 8 class in an all-girls' comprehensive school. Student perceptions of this tool were a particular focus of the research, exploring its enhancement of students' enjoyment of the subject, its impact on vocabulary retention, and what they considered to be a reduced difficulty of translation. However, it also brought to light students' misgivings about the tool, including a sense of guilt in some pupils, who were of the opinion that their use of the Explorer Tool could be considered as ‘cheating'. Others, meanwhile, felt that it detracted from the ‘process' of translating to the point that they believed it actively hindered their learning.

This paper builds on the work presented previously in this journal by Poupounaki-Lappa et al. (2021), which described the development of a communicative test of Reading and Language Use of Classical Greek calibrated to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) at levels A1 and A2 (Council of Europe, 2001). In the current paper, the two tests of Classical Greek are calibrated both together and to the CEFR. In addition to describing the methodology for comparing the two separate tests of Classical Greek, the paper is also designed to be of interest to educators of other classical languages. It is hoped that they may find it useful not only by facilitating robust test design, but also by demonstrating the methods by which tests can be linked together on a common scale (as with the CEFR) or linking tests one to another (e.g., different end-of-year tests, at different points in time).

The representation of the ‘dying Socrates’ was extremely popular among artists during the 17th and 18th centuries, while there are several artworks with this concept during the early 19th century. This article's main aim is to use the methodological tool of the Grammar of Visual Design in forming a teaching proposal based on the Harvard University ‘Artful Thinking Project’. This teaching proposal can be applied to a Language, a Philosophy or a History course. As a second aim, we propose a new typology for that era's artworks on the subject of the last moments of Socrates.

This paper aims to investigate whether, by activities designed as a journey from present to past, students will gain an in-depth knowledge of Roman culture and civilisation, proving interest in them, and a better understanding of the contemporaneity and the community they are living in. Latin language and Roman culture are the basis of the European culture, and this subject is often perceived by students as useless, currently, because Latin is a dead language and Roman culture seems to be too far from their reality. I believe that it is necessary for students to have knowledge of the Latin language and Roman culture not only to know what was before them, but also to gain a better understanding of the world in which they live through the studying of this subject.