What happens at a retreat?

Apprentices meet in person twice a year for a week long retreat. Each day offers a number of sessions for building fluency and experiencing Latin. 

Morning sessions begin with a Latin poet. During this first hour, apprentices work through a passage from an original and unaltered poem by Catullus, Horace, Ovid, Virgil, and others. 

Following this, apprentices receive instruction in Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata: Familia Romana by Hans Ørberg. During the retreats, apprentices move quickly usually working through one chapter each day. 

After lunch, the first afternoon session divides between a beginner group and a more advanced group. The groups will practice reading stories from the course textbook or from related readers. Apprentices will also have time to practice new concepts through various exercises. 

The second afternoon session is open to everyone. This session will review the concepts taught in the morning LLPSI session, disscuss the principles for teaching Latin, and the theories behind second language acquisition.

Evenings are free and often serve as times for games, stories, fellowship, and singing Latin songs. Apprentices may use this time to work through the chapter exercises and review for the next day’s lessons. Second year apprentices will have already completed these exercises, and can therefore serve as mentors helping first year apprentices during this time.

There will be a formal banquet the night before the last day of the retreat. 

Attendance for all retreats is mandatory.

Why is the Tirocinium taught in Latin?

 While it is true Latin is a dead language, it is, nevertheless, a language. As a language, we have specific faculties that enable us to perceive and grasp its meaning. We do this by reading, writing, hearing, and speaking. Each of these faculties contributes to the skill of thinking in the language. This is what we want apprentices to acquire and practice, and it is this that will strengthen their ability to read the Latin authors in and with the language of those authors. We do not speak Latin to speak Latin in the Tirocinium. We speak Latin in order to hear Latin as this helps us to better acquire the language on the journey towards fluency. From the instructors position, our task is to provide 100 percent Latin input (hearing and reading) along with guided and unforced output (speaking and writing). Apprentices are never forced to produce Latin prematurely and without guidance. The most important practice for apprentices at the beginning is to read and hear lots of Latin.