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Largess: Generosity in giving.  The opposite of avarice, greed, or stinginess.  As an adjective, largess is generosity with money.  Often, largess is a rather showy generosity.  The giver wants everyone to notice.  As a noun, largess is the money or gift itself.  ...

Inspired by all the swearing showing up in goal-setting books these days, I wrote a book on goals.  How to set them.  How to hit them.  All that.  Minus the swearing. Now, I am editing my way through the book. I am eliminating passive sentences, throwing out the word...

Mulct: As a noun, a mulct is a fine, a tax, or a penalty.  As a verb, to mulct is to take something of value by fraud or deceit.   Mulct is from the Latin word for penalty: mulcta. Got mulcted?  If so, someone took your money.  And, the money they took?  That’s also...

Obviate: to make unnecessary; to eliminate the need for something; to do away with; to prevent by effective measures.   Diet, exercise, sunshine and water obviate the need for most pharmaceutical drugs.   Obviate comes from the Latin word obviare “to block, to...

In preparation for a trip to France, I will be hosting a question and answer meeting in a just over an hour, on Thursday, October 20. Here is the information and the link to join the meeting: Topic: Trip to France Time: Oct 20, 2022 07:00 PM Central Time (US and...

I received this question: Maybe there's a place to ask questions, if so, could you direct me there? I have a couple kids using Vsual Latin 1. They've had some latin and I'm using this as some review. In chapter 11B - the translation portion, number 13 says "animalia...

Contrite: Remorseful; penitent; repentant.   A deep feeling of guilt for wrongdoing, combined with a desire to make amends. From Latin: contritus, “worn out, crushed, bruised”  Synonyms: apologetic, repentant, sorry Contrite shows up in one of the stanzas of Rudyard...

https://vimeo.com/761816134

In preparation for a trip to France, I will be hosting a question and answer meeting on Thursday, October 20. Here is the information and the link to join the meeting: Topic: Trip to France Time: Oct 20, 2022 07:00 PM Central Time (US and Canada) Join Zoom Meeting...

Conundrum: a difficult puzzle or problem. A seemingly unsolvable problem. A conundrum is also a riddle with an answer containing a pun. In my research, I kept running across this example: What’s the difference between a jeweler and a jailer? One sells watches and the...

Ephemeral: short-lived, lasting or living for just one day.   Synonyms: fleeting, short-lived, brief, temporal Originally, ephemeral was a medical term.   Ephemeral described a sickness or a fever lasting only one day.  Over time came to mean ‘lasting a short period...

Myriad: Ten thousand.  A myriad can also mean: an immense number. We English speakers tend to use myriad to talk about something innumerable.  For example, I ran across myriad this week while reading The Story of English by the Roberts McCrum and MacNeil.    “All one...

For years, students have been begging me to take them to Europe. For a while now, I have been exploring various options. My wife is much better at travel organization. She has put a lot of work into making this possible. So, I am happy to announce that in May, I am...

Many of you know that a few weeks ago, Google turned my email off.  No warning.  Just turned it off. Since I do a lot via email, this was rather annoying. I believe all is well now.  I have access to email once again.  Of course, I know have a pile of emails to crawl...

Google suspended my email account today.  Not sure why. When it comes to Latin, it's no secret that I prefer the Ecclesiastical pronunciation of Latin.  Also, called the Italian pronunciation. I suspect Google prefers the Classical pronunciation.  And, so they locked...

This is worth your time. https://youtu.be/--QS_UyW2SY   _______________________________________________________________________________________________ If you are learning Latin, I have written a book with all of my best tips and strategies.  It’s available as a...

Whenever I am learning a new language, one of the first things I do is look for a grammar of the new language. I know I am going to have to learn the grammar anyway, so I don’t avoid it.  Many language programs mock grammar in their advertisements. “Learn a language...

I received this question: Is there any Etymology connection between the word 'Romance' (Implying Love) and 'Romance' to Describe the Romance Languages? Or is it just a co-incidence that these two words are spelled and pronounced the same?   Here is my reply:...

I received this question: I am having my 7th grader start your Visual Latin this coming school year and am planning to add in Lingua Latina part way through per your recommendation. Can you send me a link to exactly what book(s) I will need for Lingua Latina? Will I...

Some time ago, I listened to a podcast on the Radical Personal Finance podcast. The title of the episode is: How I Taught My Children French in 1 Year By Reading. Here’s the...

Honestly, I thought I had tried all of the language courses out there.  Then, about a month ago, a reader told me to check out Language Transfer.  (Thanks, Mary!) It took me a while, but this week, I decided to check it out.   I like it.   Language Transfer reminds me...

I received this email last week: My son has completed  VL 1&2. Not knowing where to continue after that, he has been reading through Lingua Latina and (attempting to) translating Proverbs into Latin but without the exercises. I am hoping to have him take the NLE...

I received this question: Hello. My sister and I are taking your Lingua Latina course and are having trouble figuring out how to conjugate verbs. For example: The tree cant drink the water. How would we translate the word drink? Is there a paper or video or maybe even...

If you've been reading my ‘Τip of the Week’ email for long, you know I am a big fan of audiobooks.  (I missed almost the entire month of May, so I suppose I should call it the “not so consistent tip”). Whenever I am looking for a new audiobook, I always check Libby...

I made a mistake in Visual Latin, Lesson 18 Exercise B, question #4.  Here, I explain my mistake and what it should have been. https://vimeo.com/717179461

You are probably familiar with the 80/20 rule, also known as the Pareto principle.   According to the 80/20 rule, 80% of the consequences come from 20% of the causes.  Put another way, 80% of the work is done by 20% of the people.   Or, think of it this way.  Look at...

This week, someone asked me if many English words originate from Greek? Here is my reply: As best I can tell, the breakdown goes something like this. English is about 50% Latin and 50% German.  But, that is very broad. The real story is a real mess.  🙂 I’ve heard...

A few days ago, I discovered the site Chatterbug.com.   If you are attempting to learn French, Spanish or German, you may want to check it out.   Using live streams, and short videos, the hosts offer lots of opportunity to practice.   For the past few days, I’ve been...

I didn’t send a weekly email last Saturday.   I was on the road all day driving home from Colorado to Nashville. I had gone to hang out with my son in the Rocky Mountains.  He taught me to snowboard.  I am now, officially, the world’s slowest snowboarder. On the way...

While writing the Word Up series, I often consulted the book Word Power Made Easy by Norman Lewis.  (Unfortunately, I cannot recommend the book to students.  There are, oddly enough, too many innuendos in this book.)  In the introduction Mr. Lewis writes this:...

Last week I talked about French.  Even if you are older, you are likely not too old to learn French.  If you missed it, that tip (along with hundreds of others) is here: https://dwanethomas.com/tip-week-archives/ This week I am here to talk about German. I am not...

“Words matter. They help us define meaning. We think with words.  We learn with words.  Words are the fundamental tools we use for communicating.  If we use them well, we can cut and shape and polish our ideas precisely and beautifully.  If we use them sloppily we put...

Are you qualified to teach online?  Maybe.  Probably. What do I mean?  Maybe you have a degree in your chosen field.  Maybe you are certified in your chosen field. That's fine.  But, what if you aren’t? If you aren't certified, maybe you should consider certification....

Dr. Mary Hobson is one of my language heroes. Whenever I feel too old to learn a language, which is often, I read her story again.  It’s here: https://markrwayne.blogspot.com/2013/03/the-inspirational-story-of-dr-mary.html Dr. Hobson decided to take on Russian at age...