Reading approaches took off in the 1970s and 80s with the publication of a variety of different textbooks that undertook to teach Latin and Greek by introducing stories and short passages from the start. The basic idea underpinning this method is to get students reading accessible stories from the start and have them learn grammatical topics inductively as they come up in the stories. For example, to teach the dative, a teacher employing a reading approach might present students with a short story that prompts students to intuit the function of that case. Textbooks that employ a reading approach tend to introduce vocabulary lists at the outset of each chapter (the opposite is true for textbooks that employ grammar-translation approaches).

Many of these textbooks are widely used today. The most popular reading approach texts in Latin are Cambridge Latin Course (1970-71), Ecce Romani (1986), and the Oxford Latin Course (1987-1992). Suburani (2020) is new on the scene and has a lot of promise. In Greek, the primary reading approach text is Athenaze (3rd edition, 2016). The Italian edition of Athenaze is often cited as the best Greek reading approach textbook out there.

The development of reading-based approaches was in part catalyzed by the Civil Rights Movement, which raised serious questions about the value of studying the classical languages. To many, it no longer seemed acceptable to teach Latin and Greek with a view to forming model citizens, and the elitism the classical languages connoted was increasingly called into question. As enrollments in classics courses dropped, classics teachers sought to develop an approach that would make Latin and ancient Greek palatable to a wider audience, especially in public high schools. One way to do this was to get students reading stories as quickly as possible– a strategy that seems to owe something to modern language approaches, with their emphasis on the communicative power of language. To be sure, the “direct” or “natural” method also placed an emphasis on communication, but it assumed a more advanced type of student.

One potential shortcoming of reading-based approaches—at least for programs where tackling authentic ancient texts is a desideratum—is that they train students to read simplified textbook passages well, but do not necessarily equip them with the grammatical and morphological toolkit they need to tackle authentic ancient Greek and Latin texts. They tend to teach morphology slowly and in a piecemeal fashion, breaking up any given topic over multiple chapters with the result that students may find it difficult to recall entire paradigms.

Further Reading

Perry (1998) and Gruber-Miller (1998) discuss reading approaches at the high-school Level in the US, Hunt (2016) in the UK. Story (2003) describes the development of the Cambridge Latin Course, one of the most popular reading-based textbooks. On the use of novellas, see Ramsby (2022) and Vanderpool (2021). Sears and Ballestrini (2019) discuss the use of tiered texts to increase fluency in reading Latin.

–Gruber-Miller, J. (1998). “Toward Fluency and Accuracy: A Reading Approach to College Latin.” In Latin for the 21st Century: From Concept to Classroom, 162-75. Glenview, IL: Scott Foresman-Addison Wesley.

-Hunt, S. (2016). Starting to Teach Latin. London: Bloomsbury Latin.

-Perry, D. (1998). “Using the Reading Approach in Secondary Schools.” In Latin for the 21st Century: From Concept to Classroom, 105-16. Glenview, IL: Scott Foresman-Addison Wesley.

-Ramsby, Teresa. (2022).  “The Utility and Representational Opportunity of Latin Novellas,” New England Classical Journal, 49.1: 102-111. https://doi.org/10.52284/NECJ.49.1.article.ramsby

-Sears, L. and Ballestrini, K. (2019). “Adapting Antiquity: Using Tiered Texts to Increase Latin Reading Proficiency.” Journal of Classics Teaching, 20.39: 71 – 77. https://doi.org/10.1017/S2058631019000138

-Story, P. (2003). “The Development of the Cambridge Latin Course.”  In The Teaching of Classics,  85-91. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

-Vanderpool, Emma. 2021.  “Novellas as a Bridge to Authentic Latin Literature.” The Classical Outlook 96. 3:: 108–13.

—Talia Boylan