Listen up, Latin students! This article is for you! AKA, those who are struggling because they are taking an extra class, by choice. Walking into Ms. Durham’s class always has a new surprise whether it’s a new ablative case, 3rd declension, or a fun fact about Caesar! Here are 10 things that only Latin students understand:

1. Declining Nouns

In Latin, not only do you spend your time conjugating verbs… you also conjugate nouns! These “conjugations” are called declensions. It gets worse, each noun has 12 parts to a declension. Woo hoo. For some reason we sign ourselves up for this, and somehow we love it.

2.  Ablative Case

I don’t think it is possible that there are more ablatives to learn! Latin students struggle through the pain of having to learn a million meanings for one type of word. There is ablative of means, manner, place where, agent, absolute, place to which, separation, “partitive,” AND SO MANY MORE! Sitting, staring, at that one word… but you can’t ignore it because you need to fill out the “case and construction” on your homework! What to do… what to do.

3. Where’s our trip?

All the other foreign languages get a trip. French has France, Spanish has Spain. Latin students don’t get a trip! We should have a trip to Rome, in order to learn more about Roman History — it would really help us with those last two pages of multiple choice on our tests.

4. Dead Language

We understand it’s a dead language. Spanish and French students need to stop informing us about something we know. Is it frustrating to learn all of these vocab words and sentences and have no one to show off to? Yes. But, come talk to us when we know all the roots of the words on the SATs.

5. A Pair of Caesars!

We will always understand Mr. Jacquet’s Roman History and Latin jokes. While some may find them stupid, we find them highly amusing and relatable. One in particular that will never get old is that the Republic was split in half by a pair of Caesars (scissors).

6. A, B, C

When we ask, “What’s the homework?” we usually get the response, “A + B” or “D” or the worst, “E.” We immediately understand our responsibilities as soon as we get assigned a letter. Latin students all know that “Exercise E” is worse than death itself. It’s translating English to Latin. While we may get a 95% on our homeworks for effort, we will most likely not be raising our hand the next day in class, because we all DEFINITELY made up the translation.

7. (Not So) Smart Board

We have the great opportunity to have a SmartBoard in this class. It is super helpful when we are projecting a presentation, translating, or going over homework. Just make sure that both markers are lying in their place if you try to erase, and most importantly make sure not to write in the lower right or left corner or pretty much anywhere else that is below the top of the board, otherwise the writing will not show up! We’re so lucky to have these learning tools! Oh, and I am sure Ms. Durham would like to share her hidden talent. If you take the eraser and make a circle around your writing then tap it, it will all disappear rather than taking up class time to slowly erase all your marks.

8. Smaller and Smaller

Each year, be aware that you will lose another classmate. Latin is made for the strongest students, if you can’t handle the awesomeness of this dead language then we will have to say Salve. The more declensions you have to remember, the more students leave.

9. Mary Beard

If you’ve spent one year with Ms. Durham you have probably already been introduced to the wonderful, inspiring, MARY BEARD. Everyone in Latin class wishes they had a documentary featuring them touching Roman ruins that shouldn’t be touched, and sitting on old toilets.

10. We’re a Cult

My Latin class has been informed many times that we resemble a cult, and that we are frightening. When Ms. Durham says, “Salve Discipuli” at morning meeting and the small amount of Latin students respond with, “Salve Magistra Durham,” others feel confused, scared, and feel as though we’ve planned this for a while. When in reality we’re just saying, “Hello.”