It all STEMs from Latin:  

Demonstrating the practicality of Latin in a culture of educational vo-tech.

Patrick McFadden

St. Mary’s Episcopal School

Slides available at: http://alterisaeculo.wikispaces.com/ACL+Institute+2015

It all STEMs from Latin:  

Demonstrating the practicality of Latin in a culture of educational vo-tech.

Patrick McFaddenSt. Mary’s Episcopal School

68th Annual ACL Institute

The University of Connecticut

June 25-28, 2015

What We Know

Improves vocabulary

SAT/ACT

Critical thinking skills

Analytical/mathematical reasoning

Historical context

Facility in language acquisition

Articulate communication

The Problem: “The Last Biparitisan Cause” - Zakaria

“We don’t need a lot more anthropologists in the state. It’s a great degree if people want to get it, but we don’t need them here.”

“I was making a point about the jobs market, not the value of art history. . . . [A]rt history was one of my favorite subjects . . . and it has helped me take in a great deal of joy in my life that I might otherwise have missed.

Excerpted from Youtube.com. Excerpted from Youtube.com.

Is it Hopeless?

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 49.3 (1985) : 577-585.

“Laurence Barrett's pre-election piece on Candidate RonaldReagan [Oct. 20] was a slick hatchet job, and you knowit. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves for printing itdisguised as an objective look at the man.”

“Your story on "The real Ronald Reagan" did it. Why didn'tyou just editorially endorse him? Barrett glosses over Reagan'sfatal flaws so handily that the "real" Ronald Reagancame across as the answer to all our problems.”

“Hatchet Job?” Time 24 November 1980 : 11.

Is it Hopeless?

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 49.3 (1985) : 577-585.

• Viewers perceive identical news stories/articles biased against their candidate or position.

• Disconfirmation bias: Positive comments go unmarked; Negative comments are stimuli.

• Best informed perceived most bias.

Is it Hopeless?

“Creating the right climate,” LAS News: College of Arts and Sciences, The University of Illinois, Winter 2015, 4-5.

Katharine Hayhoe and/vs. Andrew Farley

“[M]any scientists and educators believe the ‘knowledge deficit model’ will convince skeptics. . . . [M]ore information will not work if the issue runs counter to a person’s value system.”

Image: Amazon.comHayhoe, K. and A. Farley. A Climate for Change. New York: Hatchette Book Group, 2011.

Connect to Values

Latin is about INNOVATION

-allows Growing Markets

-fosters Design Thinking

-teaches STEM Skills

“Charles M. ‘Chuck’ Geschke.” GreatLakesGeek.com. 28 October 2011

Tim O’Reilly, “OSCON 2014 Keynote: Technical and Cultural Revolutions.” Youtube.com 23 July 2014

INNOVATION is our Contribution

Richard Ogle, Smart World (2007)

Fareed Zakaria, In Defence of a Liberal Education (2015)

Design Thinking: d.school, Institute of Design at Stanford

Image: Amazon.com

Iimage: Amazon.com

http://dschool.stanford.edu

Transformative Ideas

Richard Ogle

Triple Breakdown

-Culture of Compliance (Standardized tests/right answer)

-Focus on Analytical Reasoning (No liberal arts/arts)

-Don’t Cultivate Imaginative Thinking (Few resources)

Image: richardogle.typepad.com

Transformative Ideas - Ogle

Innovation vs. Transformation

. . . . . . .

Four Principles

#1 Not outside the box -> Find new box

#2 Find a new space: Hot Spot

#3 Look for a Cold Spot -> Nothing happening

#4 Trust the 4 I’s: Intelligence, Imagination, Intuition, Insight

Image:wikimedia commons.

American Education Works

Fareed Zakaria, “Why America’s obsession with STEM education is dangerous” The Washington Post Web. 26 March 2015.

Steve Jobs explained that “it’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough — that it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our hearts sing.” (Quoting Wired Magazine Web. 29 August 2011.)

US, Israel, and Sweden 27th, 28th, and 29th in math and science scores.

What do you say to that?

27th in Math/Science = 1st, 2nd and 6th in Venture Capital

“Winning Team / Losing Team – New Chant.” Youtube.com. 15 January 2012.

Bloomberg Innovation Index

Year US Sweden Israel China

2015 6 7 5 22

2014 3 2 30* 25

2013 1 5 32* 29

2012 7 5 29* 32

http://www.bloomberg.com

*Israel is often #1 in R&D, but 60th in manufacturing capacity.

Latin Can’t Help That! Says Who?

• Mt. Sinai Medical School Dean, Dr. David Mueller does: "people who look at the same problems through different lenses will make us better in the long run."

• 50% of Medical School admissions reserved for

“HuMeds”

• No Pre-Med; No Organic Chem; No MCAT

• By end of second year indistinguishable

Julie Rovner, “A Top Medical School Revamps Requirements to Lure English Majors” www.npr.org, 27 May 2015

http://dschool.stanford.edu

The IBM – A Better Computer?

http://superuser.com/questions/78634/installing-ms-dos

The Apple Better for Humans?

Image: toastytech.com

How can methodology foster STEM skills?

Critical Thinking

Logical Organization

Reasoning and Extrapolation

Coding

Rethinking Organization

TOC of Allen and Greenough

Even Syntax is organized by Morphology

How WE think, not the way all students think.

Oriented toward Comparative Grammar and writing instruction.

Morphological Organization

AP Latin Course and Exam Description Effective Fall 2012. apcentral.collegeboard.com

Critical Thinking and Reorganization

TCDR

Topic ClassDescriptionRelevance

A hammer is a tool

which has a handle and a weighted head.

It is used to pound things.

Image courtesy of amazon.com

Walter, T., G. Knudsvig, and E. P. Smith. Critical Thinking: Building the Basics. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2002.

Critical ThinkingTCDR

A hammer is a tool

which has a handle and a weighted head.

It is used to pound things

Bicycle

Taiwan

Critical ThinkingTCDR

A bicycle is a mode of transportation

which has two wheels and is powered by human energy by pushing pedals with the feet.

It allows travel easily in crowded cities, OR

it allows travel with zero carbon emission, OR

it allows recreational travel even to minors.

Critical ThinkingTCDR

Taiwan is an island OR

nation

province

renegade province

Implications for grammar exposition?

Critical ThinkingTCDR

A hammer is a tool

which has a handle and a weighted head.

It is used to pound things

locative

indirect statement

circumstantial clause

Critical ThinkingTCDR

The locative is a case

which occurs only in words expressing place and has forms identical to the genitive (1st/2nd decl.) or to the dative (3rd decl./plural).

It expresses where an action happens with just a place word.

“What do I see?”“What do I have?”“So what do I expect?”

Critical ThinkingTCDR

The indirect statement is a noun equivalent

which consists of a clause having an accusative subject and an infinitive verb

It embeds reported speech as the object or infrequently as the subject of a verb of speaking, vel sim.

N.B. NOT a use of the infinitive or a use of the accusative.

Critical ThinkingTCDR

The circumstantial clause is an adverbial modifier

which consists of a clause introduced by the conjunction cum and a verb in the subjunctive mood.

It shows the time of (“when”), the cause of (“since”), or a concession regarding (“although”) the main clause.

N.B. NOT a use of the subjunctive.

Critical ThinkingTCDR

Why TCDR?

Pronoun or Accusative vs. Direct Object

Prep. Phrase vs. Ablative of Means

Infinitive vs.Verb in Indirect Statement

The Latin Sentence

The University of Michigan Elementary Latin Program.

Syntax: Sentence Bases

Syntax: Adjectival Modifiers

Syntax: Adverbial Modifiers

Semantics: Ablative Without Prep

Metaphrasing

English Sentence:

S V +/- O (or PN/PA)

The Strategy

What do I see? – Morphology

What do I have? – Syntax

So what do I expect? – Syntax/Semantics

Metaphrasing

English Sentence:

S V +/- O

him

S V him

sees

S sees +/- O

id

S V it OR it V O

Metaphrasing

puellam

S V the girl

milites

S V the soldiers OR the soliders V +/- O

Caesar dixit milites

Caesar said that the soldiers V +/- O

Didone

with Dido verbing, S V +/- O

Major metaphrasing

Catilina ubi eos quos

Catiline V +/- O when S V those whom S V

STEM Skills: Coding

STEM Skills: Coding

Coding

Coding

Why is Latin Practical?

Latin fosters Innovation – Geshke, O’Reilly

Latin brings in the humanistic insights for Design Thinking –d.school, Steve Jobs

Latin helps articulate STEM findings.

Latin teaches STEM skills of critical thinking, analysis, problem solving, and coding

Where now?

Let’s present this at STEM conferences!