Learning

How does one learn? I am studying Latin and am finding it very interesting and not because I can now read coats of arms or shields. What is so interesting is, understanding what part of my mind actually learns. Vocabulary has been relatively easy. Many words have cognates in English. Take "cognate" for example in Latin "to think" cognate in English means similar or comparable.

As I mentioned vocabulary has been fairly straightforward. Write it on a card read it every day for 2-4 weeks and its mine. What does not seem to stick well are the declensions, or noun varieties. I'll give you an example; the English words for this and these are hic, haec, and hoc. In Latin there are feminine nouns, masculine nouns and neuter nouns. Then there are plural of each of these. That would not be so bad, but there are six forms of each of these nouns, which end up being seventy-two if my math is correct. And most of them are unique. An example would be "that of yours” something that we English speakers don't even think about, ever.

The part of my brain that learns this type of information has had only a flicker of neural activity for years. As I wade my way through the class and attending tests, I have found that I have enlivened this area, but only by maybe three or four neurons to date. I'll keep you posted.

So what has happened by happy accident, is that my English grammar has become better, since learning Latin has forced me to learn my own language. How is that for irony? (Maybe that’s Latin too). Now before I publish my blog I always use spell check, and found that it disputed my grammar, oh well, I will keep up the study and one day will beat spell check!