Several years ago, my family hosted a Spanish-speaking family from Mexico: a mother and her three children. The mother spoke no English, and my wife spoke no Spanish, so I had to speak with her entirely in Spanish. I had studied Spanish in school for 8 years, but it had been a long time since I practiced and I was worried I wouldn’t remember all of my grammar rules and vocabulary.
When we began speaking, however, I realized that this Spanish-speaking mother never learned all of the Spanish grammar and vocabulary that I did in my classes. She was not an educated woman and spoke with simple language, as a child. I struggled at times to think of the right words or phrases, and she would eventually realize what I was trying to say, but she would say it in a much simpler way than I was attempting to say it. I didn’t know to speak Spanish simply, and my learning was making my speaking more difficult than it needed to be.
I believe the same thing happens in our study of Latin.
I have been studying Latin since I was a teenager–almost 30 years.
