Hic! Haec! Hoc!
Last Friday’s Latin III class featured a review of one of the language’s most common demonstratives — hic, haec, hoc, meaning ‘this’. Demonstratives are defined as pronouns that “designate a person or thing for special attention, either with nouns as Adjectives or alone as Pronouns.” according to the Dickinson College Commentaries.
In order to refresh our memories regarding the pronoun’s declension, Mr. Taylor led us through an exercise as fun and eccentric as his personality. He marched us into the horse stance, the classic martial arts pose, and then with the fists in the air, began punching and yelling the declension like the cult everyone jokes we are (the pledge is pretty frightening, to be fair)!
While unserious, not only do these exercises help us memorize forms and highlight their emphatic use — but it also shows how Mr. Taylor keeps class fun, engaging, and a little ‘corny’… in a fun way.
It’ll be difficult for me to forget the forms now…
image sourced from Dickinson College Commentaries!