Societas Via Romana - Discussion Archives

OK, I'm supposed to teach Latin to this graduate student (actually, she graduated this week from graduate school) and I was wondering on the format of teaching her. I still have the Ecce Romani books, but I'd love to snip out some of my own compositions and let her try and do them, of course, progressing as we go.

Also, anyone know about what I should charge her? I was thinking like 10-15 dollars an hour, but keep in mind she is a teacher, so her salary isn't large. However, this will take time and effort, and I already have a near-full time job + school full time, so this will be a quite a work load. However, I love teaching Latin so it is not that big of a problem.

Anyone have any advice or answers?

Gratias vobis ago.

Q. Valerius Scerio

Does no one tutor privately?

Salve Scerio,

My Latin is not good enough to teach it. However, 10-15 USD sounds like a reasonable price to me. I once offered English lessons to students with problems, and I asked about 10 per hour (or a bit less). But since private Latin tutors are hard to come by... I guess it's normal that they are a little more expensive.

Hey, by the way, if you want to, you could expand on our Latin teaching material on the site?

Vale bene,
Draco

Consider the question of what to charge from a (modern) economic point of view: How much would I have to pay you to give up an hour of your leisure time each week?

Your wage rate is equal to your marginal price of leisure. Marginal just means considering each successive hour on its own.

For example, let's say that you earn $10/hour at your current job. Since you are already busy with school as well as work, I might have to pay you $15 to get you to give up an additional hour a week, an hour that you might otherwise spend watching TV, reading for pleasure, visiting friends, etc. $15 is your marginal rate for that one additional hour.

As your leisure continues to disappear, it becomes more and more valuable to you. To get you to work a second hour per week for me, I might have to pay you $17 for that additional hour, and so on.

Since, as has been pointed out, you enjoy teaching Latin and also gain some experience in instruction which is valuable to you, you can deduct the value of your enjoyment and learning from the amounts that you arrive at when considering the loss of your leisure time. Thus you might only charge $12 for the first hour and $14 for the second.

After you explain this "sliding scale" to your prospective student, it should be easy for her to decide how many hours she wants to study with you. After all, the first hour per week is likely to be the most useful, and yet be the most economical. The second and third are likely to be of declining importance yet be more and more expensive. Where ever you end up at in your negotiations, you are both likely to feel that you not sacrificing too much or being taken advantage of.

Tergestus

(Future candidate for Quaestor)

Ummidia omnibus S.D.!

I have only just found this highly interesting site so my reply must be somewhat out of date. You asked about the best text to use in giving Latin tuition? Even if this is no use to you now, it might help anyone else in this situation.

After teaching Latin to university entrance in UK for many years and having known Ecce Romani well, I would still say that the CLU (The Cambridge Latin Course) is second to none and is also excellent at introducing the Roman way of life, history and culture in a natural and beautifully presented style. It also seems to manage not to be too babyish for an older candidate. The new revised editions are simply gorgeous to read and the illustrations and pictures are wonderful. I enclose a link to the Book I of this course but this CCP website (Cambridge Classics project) that runs thi above Latin series also contains information about new schemes of independent learning in Latin that might suit an adult embarking on it even better.

http://www.cambridgescp.com/latin/clc/o ... neA_b1.php

Hey, by the way, if you want to, you could expand on our Latin teaching material on the site?

It would be really good if we could have a wiki for the Latin language. There are several tricky bits that I think I could help out with. But I think if I were involved it would have to be little and often - I am, you see, also learning Python and JavaScript.

Martial - what an excellent idea! I'll see what I can do.

I see from your website, O Quinte, that you are already making progress towards this goal.

Don't let the thought of me, standing over your shoulder, anxiously waiting for you to complete this project, and tapping my feet in anticipation interfere with your other work, which I'm sure is just as important

Ah, Scriboni, I am working towards this, but it will be a little while. I won't be able to start until I move, which will be within this next week. I'd give it a little longer. Worry not, I'm anxious as well.

salvissime,

Scerio

Terribly sorry about the delays, Martialis, as I'm still without internet at my house. I have also thought about going ahead and downloading the current wiki and putting it up instead...

Then again, wouldn't it be better to merely do it at unilang.org instead? Wouldn't another language wiki be superfluous? Looking forward to advice before preceding.