..Latin Difficult Exam?

[vexx]

Hi,

So I knew of Latin as being the most difficult Romantic Language and so it seemed fair the mark up being so high as it is competitive and that.
BUT, I decided to look to see how difficult (relatively) the exam got...

So basically you only need to know how to read Latin and not how to speak or write it....Wah?
I'm sure that is no easy task, but compared to French or Chinese or any other language that requires 15-minute oral and then extended respose questions+essay in that language.... pretty sure Latin looks like it is an easy language to do well in considering one just needs a solid understanding, as they also have a dictionary/translator.

Am I wrong? I so wish our school had done Latin, also because it actually seems interesting and helps with other languages.

Vexx.

[the.watchman]

In my opinion, Latin can be extremely difficult. Sure there's no oral component, but the grammar is much harder than in other languages, and the lack of a distinct word order (particularly in poetry) makes up for this lack
Also, we study the usage of the language (devices etc.) of famous Latin works

EDIT: Oh, and we do read Latin in our class

[vexx]

In my opinion, Latin can be extremely difficult. Sure there's no oral component, but the grammar is much harder than in other languages, and the lack of a distinct word order (particularly in poetry) makes up for this lack
Also, we study the usage of the language (devices etc.) of famous Latin works

EDIT: Oh, and we do read Latin in our class

yeah i have seen that word order, haha i saw something like literal translation of 'In Family Rome Is' with able to figure out it meant Family is in rome. Sure that's an very easy example but considering all that is needed is translating skills involving this, you can pretty much learn all with practice.
 so if all the language devices are known of, and you can read italian quite well (the level expected of a year 12 student), there isn't too much reason that a raw score in the 30's isn't possible, right?
perhaps most students don't make this a focus and so haven't gotten to such a level of translating & rearranging sentences.. reallly doesn't seem that hard though
(relatively, any language is difficult to learn..clearly)

[the.watchman]

No no, there is no definite word order, you can actually rearrange the words in a clause as much as you like, and it would still have the same meaning, this depends only on the word endings. So you need extra time when translating to sort out the sentence first and finding the subject, main verb etc.

Also, one of the major parts of the exam is studying and memorising lines of translations from the main text studied so that you can translate a given passage from the text in the exam without a dictionary. This can be challenging, particularly if your memory is not so good

[wildareal]

I'm actually studying for a Latin SAC this very moment. It's an Essay Sac-In English on The Aeneid. We basically get all the lines of the epic given to us in the lesson without a dictionary and we are given an essay topic and we have to write a relatively short 500 word essay in 90 minutes. It sounds easy in comparison to other languages, but I can assure it is not. The amount of depth of understanding, context and knowledge of the lines is more than in Lit or in Classics. Also for this component on the exam (as well as the translation Section A and an analysis of Techniques Section 2) the highest mark in the whole Latin cohort of 190-something in Melb was 18/20-meaning the standards are pretty high.

[vexx]

No no, there is no definite word order, you can actually rearrange the words in a clause as much as you like, and it would still have the same meaning, this depends only on the word endings. So you need extra time when translating to sort out the sentence first and finding the subject, main verb etc.

Also, one of the major parts of the exam is studying and memorising lines of translations from the main text studied so that you can translate a given passage from the text in the exam without a dictionary. This can be challenging, particularly if your memory is not so good

couldn't you just figure out the translation during the exam? or not enough time.. there's isn't that many tasks to do in the exam, so plenty of time to slowly translate! or is it a lot longer then it looks and one is short on time..

I'm actually studying for a Latin SAC this very moment. It's an Essay Sac-In English on The Aeneid. We basically get all the lines of the epic given to us in the lesson without a dictionary and we are given an essay topic and we have to write a relatively short 500 word essay in 90 minutes. It sounds easy in comparison to other languages, but I can assure it is not. The amount of depth of understanding, context and knowledge of the lines is more than in Lit or in Classics. Also for this component on the exam (as well as the translation Section A and an analysis of Techniques Section 2) the highest mark in the whole Latin cohort of 190-something in Melb was 18/20-meaning the standards are pretty high.

yeah that sounds difficult, but the exam doesn't have that XD
the devices part sounds a little strange, i'm sure its gets difficult. but just it appears only getting the translation skills up and able to do all of that in the exam can give someone the ability to get 30+ raw.
..maybe i'm wrong haha, but it doesn't seem to hard to get a scaled score of ~46 comparatively (30 raw).

[eeps]

Latin, I believe is a difficult subject to master. There are many tables you need to know/learn (i.e. tenses - indicative, subjunctive etc) and thus, students may sometimes get confused between tenses/declensions etc. Basically, what we do in my Latin class as part of testing is unseen translations, grammar sheets (english to latin), vocab tests and seen passage/grammar/comprehension (this test is rolled in as one test) tests.

Thus, as Latin is a difficult language to learn... the VCAA makes the scaling for Latin incredibly high. - i.e. if a student got 30 for Latin as a raw score it would be scaled up to 42~46 or something (feel free to correct me on that!). I'm yet to see the Year 12 Latin Exam... but I assuming that it would be challenging to say the least.

[vexx]

Latin, I believe is a difficult subject to master. There are many tables you need to know/learn (i.e. tenses - indicative, subjunctive etc) and thus, students may sometimes get confused between tenses/declensions etc. Basically, what we do in my Latin class as part of testing is unseen translations, grammar sheets (english to latin), vocab tests and seen passage/grammar/comprehension (this test is rolled in as one test) tests.

Thus, as Latin is a difficult language to learn... the VCAA makes the scaling for Latin incredibly high. - i.e. if a student got 30 for Latin as a raw score it would be scaled up to 42~46 or something (feel free to correct me on that!). I'm yet to see the Year 12 Latin Exam... but I assuming that it would be challenging to say the least.

Yeah all that stuff would be so annoying to go through, it's why i would hate to ever have to study it in class.
But the exam requires none of that, it's just translating, responding in english and some parts talking about literary devices, so you don't need to know the grammar just need to know how to read!
Average score is ~46 which is ridiculous haha.

Here is last years exam, tell me if you still think it's THAT challenging to get an average score http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/vcaa/vce/studies/lote/latin/pastexams/2009/2009latin-w.pdf

[eeps]

Latin, I believe is a difficult subject to master. There are many tables you need to know/learn (i.e. tenses - indicative, subjunctive etc) and thus, students may sometimes get confused between tenses/declensions etc. Basically, what we do in my Latin class as part of testing is unseen translations, grammar sheets (english to latin), vocab tests and seen passage/grammar/comprehension (this test is rolled in as one test) tests.

Thus, as Latin is a difficult language to learn... the VCAA makes the scaling for Latin incredibly high. - i.e. if a student got 30 for Latin as a raw score it would be scaled up to 42~46 or something (feel free to correct me on that!). I'm yet to see the Year 12 Latin Exam... but I assuming that it would be challenging to say the least.

Yeah all that stuff would be so annoying to go through, it's why i would hate to ever have to study it in class.
But the exam requires none of that, it's just translating, responding in english and some parts talking about literary devices, so you don't need to know the grammar just need to know how to read!
Average score is ~46 which is ridiculous haha.

Here is last years exam, tell me if you still think it's THAT challenging to get an average score http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/vcaa/vce/studies/lote/latin/pastexams/2009/2009latin-w.pdf

GOING by the looks of the 2009 Latin Exam... it doesn't seem too bad. At my school, I THINK we've done similar tests to "Section 1 and Section 2 - Part A and B" for prescribed passages like Catullus. WE had to translation some poems of Catullus, then answer questions on a passage from another Catullus poem and also answer questions on background information on ANOTHER passage of Catullus... the tests I've done to date seem like the same format and prototype of the Year 12 exam.

[vexx]

GOING by the looks of the 2009 Latin Exam... it doesn't seem too bad. At my school, I THINK we've done similar tests to "Section 1 and Section 2 - Part A and B" for prescribed passages like Catullus. WE had to translation some poems of Catullus, then answer questions on a passage from another Catullus poem and also answer questions on background information on ANOTHER passage of Catullus... the tests I've done to date seem like the same format and prototype of the Year 12 exam.

Yep! So potential of 45+ after scaling totally possible? The other exams i had a peak at were exactly the same too..
That's what i was saying, it's not as focused on the grammar parts as i thought it would have been!

[wildareal]

Latin, I believe is a difficult subject to master. There are many tables you need to know/learn (i.e. tenses - indicative, subjunctive etc) and thus, students may sometimes get confused between tenses/declensions etc. Basically, what we do in my Latin class as part of testing is unseen translations, grammar sheets (english to latin), vocab tests and seen passage/grammar/comprehension (this test is rolled in as one test) tests.

Thus, as Latin is a difficult language to learn... the VCAA makes the scaling for Latin incredibly high. - i.e. if a student got 30 for Latin as a raw score it would be scaled up to 42~46 or something (feel free to correct me on that!). I'm yet to see the Year 12 Latin Exam... but I assuming that it would be challenging to say the least.

Yeah all that stuff would be so annoying to go through, it's why i would hate to ever have to study it in class.
But the exam requires none of that, it's just translating, responding in english and some parts talking about literary devices, so you don't need to know the grammar just need to know how to read!
Average score is ~46 which is ridiculous haha.

Here is last years exam, tell me if you still think it's THAT challenging to get an average score http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/vcaa/vce/studies/lote/latin/pastexams/2009/2009latin-w.pdf

Knowledge of Grammar is absolutely essential in the Unseen Translation. Words in Latin aren't like in English or French. They are inflected-every case NOMINATIVE ACCUSATIVE has a different ending etc. Same with verbs. There are about 70 different forms of one verb-Subjunctive, Indicative, Imperative, Passive etc. Also there is no word order, so it becomes even harder to group words. That said, the exam is not overly difficult-however they do mark it very very harshly.

[EvangelionZeta]

I'd like to reinforce that Latin gets marked extremely harshly.  It might look "easy" to answer the questions, but the system IS such that even kids who get mid-high 40s in their other subjects struggle to break 30 (from anecdotal evidence).

[vexx]

Oh okay, that would make sense for it to be marked harshly. Perhaps it is difficult to get the state average, but it just didn't appear so (i don't even do latin haa) and i still wouldn't even be able to gauge the difficulty of the exam even if you explained it to me.. so i'll just listen that it is ^__^ it is 'latin' after all.

[the.watchman]

Oh okay, that would make sense for it to be marked harshly. Perhaps it is difficult to get the state average, but it just didn't appear so (i don't even do latin haa) and i still wouldn't even be able to gauge the difficulty of the exam even if you explained it to me.. so i'll just listen that it is ^__^ it is 'latin' after all.

Also, because of its difficulty, I'd say that only the students who are good at the subject would do it, unlike in some other subjects. As a result, it would be much harder to get a good mark in it

[wildareal]

Oh okay, that would make sense for it to be marked harshly. Perhaps it is difficult to get the state average, but it just didn't appear so (i don't even do latin haa) and i still wouldn't even be able to gauge the difficulty of the exam even if you explained it to me.. so i'll just listen that it is ^__^ it is 'latin' after all.

Also, because of its difficulty, I'd say that only the students who are good at the subject would do it, unlike in some other subjects. As a result, it would be much harder to get a good mark in it

Exactly! Everyone in my cohort is very strong!