LATIN
Harry Potter, zombies and casting spells during classes
Aiming to modernise her classes and adapt them in the best possible way to the affinities of her modern students, Savremena’s Latin teacher Natalija Stanković pleasantly surprised her students when she based her lesson around the Harry Potter franchise, as a way to inspire some Halloween spirit for the upcoming costume party. Natalija impeccably dressed for the occasion, came to her lesson in a black robe resembling that worn by the teachers at Hogwarts, the school for witchcraft and wizardry from the Harry Potter movies.
Students discussed magic, magical symbols and rituals in English upon which they had to decipher further instructions in Latin with the help of the Caesar cipher method to figure out which ingredients go into certain potions. This way, three languages - Latin, English and Serbian were incorporated into the lesson and Latin which is a dead language was able to come to life once again and shine alongside two modern language one of which, English is even considered to be the language of the future.
Students were divided into four houses (Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin), and with the help of their magic wands and some magical ingredients, they learned how to cast a spell that would for example make them dream of their crush uttering the words SOMNIUM AMORIS. In addition, students learned some basic spells in Latin which they can use to defend themselves or launch an attack, depending on the situation they’re in.
The part of the lesson where students were the most creative was when they fought against the Monsters of Halloween, by applying what they had learned about werewolves, witches, mummies, zombies, ghosts and other such ghouls and their new-found magic skills against them. They waved their wands and cast their spells, selecting the most effective one against each monster. When paired with a mummy, they used the Incendio spell, because the only way to beat a mummy which is covered in bandages is to incinerate it.
We hereby invite you to take part in our little school of magic with the Crafting potions and spells presentation that was used in class.