Why Study Latin?

Latin is phonetically more simple than English. Learning Latin allows students to learn a language that follows simple phonetics and forms the basis of the longer, more difficult words in English.

 

English grammar is very difficult to learn. It is hard for students to analyze something they use instinctively (and sometimes incorrectly). Because it is not inflected, English grammar is abstract. The only way to tell if a word is a noun, verb, pronoun, or adverb is to internalize the abstract idea of what a noun, verb, pronoun, or adverb is. English and Latin teachers everywhere will assure you it is much easier for students of all ages to learn the parts of speech in Latin than in English.

 

Most of the Literature, History, Law, Medicine, Philosophy, Theology, Science, and Poetry of the Western Canon has been written in Latin. For almost two thousand years, Latin was the language of choice for scholarly, artistic, literary, or scientific writings. Latin students are able to read primary source documents of the subjects that they are learning. 

 

Latin grammar is a logical language, and it’s inflections give an understanding of language syntax and linguistic structure that most modern languages do not. Most multi-syllable English words come from Latin. Latin roots provide ~80% of the vocabulary of the Romance languages (i.e. French, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, and Spanish.)

 

The structure of Latin gives each word a clear purpose in a sentence. The process of “decoding” a Latin sentence trains students to think through language in a detailed way rather than by feel. 

 

The best schools in the US and Britain have always emphasized Latin. In the past decade, there has been a huge resurgence of interest in Latin among schools that wish to boost their academic performance. They have good results!

 

Studies conducted by the Educational Testing Service show that students who study Latin in high school score significantly higher on the verbal portion of the SAT college entrance exam than students who have not studied any foreign language and students who have studied modern foreign languages.