John concludes sharing his thoughts on how to work with upper level kids we get from traditional classrooms:
All my best efforts I’ll save for the first year students, and let the word of mouth filter up. 3rd year students may see a stuffed animal or prop in the classroom and ask: what’s that? I’ll respond: “oh nothing, just some fun stuff I do with Latin 1. You don’t want to do that, do you? Now let’s get back to our serious work.” If they end up begging for it, I might do it for 5 minutes with them at the end of class, and let it grow from there, but only after they’ve made it clear that they want it.
If you don’t teach lower level classes, just put some props in the back of the room (they’ll notice), and then when they ask, say “oh that’s just some fun stuff I used to use when I taught first year, younger kids. It’s not really serious, so I’m not using it this year with you guys. You’re too old for that, right?” Don’t offer, but don’t close the door. See if they take the bait. But if they do, just give them a little bit. Make it come from them.
I really think reading is the bridge between traditional inherited classes and CI. If they are looking at a big readings and doing lots of work with it, students will think they are doing serious work. Conversely, if we do too much spoken work with these students, or make it appear less rigorous, they will be less likely to take us and the class seriously. I am taking the traditional textbook, selecting the best stories from that text, and creating as many embedded readings as I can. These I will use for Latin 1 and 2, and for 3 review at the beginning of the year.
I’m sure I’ll change my mind a few more times on this before the year starts, but that’s where I stand right now in terms of this big difficulty. Most important is to avoid getting burned, as has happened to Ben, Jeff, and so many others in our ranks.