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  • Course Overview
  • E-Tutor
  • First year components
  • Materials
  • Time commitment
  • Entering the examination
  • Exam structure
  • Duration/End Date

We are not enroling new students at this time.

Students currently studying towards the OCR AS and A Level examinations will be supported by the Distance Learning programme until Summer 2024.

If you are a current student and need to enrol in modules to allow you to complete the course please email learning@cambridgescp.com to complete the process. 

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Your e-tutor will always be an experienced, enthusiastic Latin teacher, who knows the course well and is familiar with ways to help you with any issues which may arise during the course. He or she is unlikely to be involved in this project for the money! Rather your tutor will want to help you get the most out of your study of Latin and the Roman world.

When you enrol for the course, we will send you, by post, amongst other materials, an Independent Learner's Guide, detailing what work to undertake in each session. For examination courses (Eduqas, AS/A Level), sessions are held online. Almost all sessions have a designated assignment to send to your e-tutor. Your e-tutor will mark your work and return it to you, with ideas on how you might improve and, like any tutor, will try to explain an idea or concept to you if you are not certain about it. You do not have to send work if you do not wish to do so, of course, but we strongly recommend that you do, as this will both inform you of how you are progressing, and help your e-tutor to assist you in your learning.

Most of our e-tutors tell us that they would like to be contacted by their students more frequently, rather than less, and no limit is placed on the amount of times you may contact your e-tutor.
All e-tutors have completed a Criminal Records Bureau disclosure and are competent in sending, receiving and marking work electronically. Should you have any concerns about your e-tutor at any stage, you can contact our office at any time.

The components for the first year of the new A Level in Latin correspond to the old AS level in that there is language study and study of the set texts. There is an Language (01) component and an Literature (02) component. In preparation for the first year A Level exams (AS), you will need to study both language and literature. The overall OCR code for the AS Latin qualification is H043.

You can achieve just an AS qualification with the new A Level. Or, you may continue your studies into the second year for a full A Level in Latin. With the current syllabus, you have up to Summer 2024 to sit the four exams.

As a prospective A Level Independent Learner, you will need to ensure that you are in the correct cycle for the literature set texts in order to acheive a full A Level. For example, if you were to begin your course in Autumn 2023, you would then be in the next cycle for the set texts.

Please note -  a major difference between the new A Level and the old is that the examination result you acheive at AS level cannot be carried over to the second year examinations. In other words, you cannot improve your overall result through combining the first and second year examination grades. For example, should you receive a C grade at AS level, you cannot hope to improve this result by achieving an A grade in the second year exams. You are therefore, somewhat compelled to sit all the exams at the end of the two years. Of course, you can sit the AS examinations at the end of your first year of study, and then resit them at the end of the second year, along with the second year exams.

You may, of course, take the course for your own pleasure or purposes and not sit the exams.

Literature (H043/02):

For examination in 2023:

Prose (Group 1):

Cicero, Pro Cluentio, taken from Murder at Larinum, 1–7 and 10–11

To purchase: Cicero, Pro Cluentio, A Selection, edited by Matthew Barr, Bloomsbury Publishing, ISBN: 9781350060340

In 66 BC, Aulus Cluentius Habitus was tried for the attempted murder of Statius Albius Oppianicus the Elder. The prosecutor was Sassia, Cluentius' own mother. Marcus Tullius Cicero, the famous statesman, orator and lawyer, defended Cluentius in his Pro Cluentio, a persuasive oratorical tour de force. The selections in this edition prove that Cicero was not above using character assassinations in his speeches, first attacking Oppianicus the Elder, then Sassia in a vivid, melodramatic narrative which distracts and diverts the jury from Cluentius' alleged crimes. (From Bloomsbury.com)

Verse (Group 3):

Virgil, Aeneid Book XII 1–106, 614–727

To purchase: Virgil Aeneid XII, edited by James Burbidge, Bloomsbury Publishing, ISBN: 9781350059214

Aeneid XII is the final book of Virgil's Roman epic. The war fought between Aeneas' refugee Trojans and the people of Latium here reaches a bloody, moving climax. The OCR selection contains two scenes of rich emotion focussed on the Italian war-leader Turnus as he reacts to military defeat and crisis, followed by the full narrative of the decisive single combat between Turnus and Aeneas with which the poem concludes. This is one of the great passages in Latin literature – grand in content and style, complex and challenging in its subject matter.  (Bloomsbury.com)

Language (H043/01):

Latin Unseens for A level, edited by Ashley Carter, Bristol Classical Press, 2005, ISBN 978-1-85399-681-8

Latin Beyond GCSE, John Taylor, Bristol Classical Press, 2017, ISBN 9781474299831 [This is the second edition. If you have the 2009 first edition, please do not worry. It is valid for the course.]

Cambridge Latin Grammar, edited by R Griffin, Cambridge University Press, 1992, ISBN 978-0-521-38588-6

 

At AS level, each session for each component requires about 4 hours study and preparation time and there are 20 sessions per module. The total study time for the each component is therefore about 80 hours.

The total study time for a whole AS course (two components) is about 160 hours.

We advise students preparing for an AS course in one academic year to study for about 8 hours per week for 20 weeks and allow for revision time.

AS (Advanced Subsidiary) is a UK public examination and students should ensure that they have access to an examination centre which offers this exam before they enrol on the course.

School students are advised to approach their school's Exams Officer and ask that their school enters them for the examination.

Mature or homeschool students may either approach local schools or contact us for assistance finding an examination centre. We may be able to help you by providing you with a list of some schools in your area that offer Latin; you would then need to contact these schools.

If you cannot find a school that is willing to enter you for your exams then a company like Tutors and Exams may be an option. Tutors and Exams provides examination and assessment facilities primarily aimed at private and home educated candidates. They currently have five examination centres located around the country: Bolton, Coventry, Doncaster, St Neots Cambridgeshire and Wimbledon. Please note that there is a charge for their services, although CSCP Distance Learners are eligible for the reduced "Partner" rate.

In all cases, firm arrangements should be made in the Autumn Term before the exam. While CSCP takes responsibility for tutoring students for the exams, we are not ourselves an examination centre and are unable to enter students for exams.

The overall code for the AS Latin qualification is H043.

Please note, you will need to sit both papers, language and literature in one year.  You may sit the AS language and literature papers with no change to the syllabus until Summer 2023; should you wish to achieve a full A Level qualification you may then sit the final (A Level) language and literature papers with no change to the syllabus in Summer 2023 or 2024.

Language (01)                                1 hour 30 minutes

80 marks                                         50% of total AS Level

Learners build their knowledge of vocabulary and linguistic structures through reading and studying prose texts in Latin to become familiar with the vocabulary in the Defined Vocabulary List and prescribed syntax and accidence. Assessment is by unseen (sight reading) translation (55 marks) and comprehension questions (25 marks) on content. CSCP is not planning on teaching the prose composition option.

Literature (02)                                2 hours

80 marks                                         50% of total AS Level

Learners study in depth one prose set text (i.e., Cicero) and one verse set text (i.e., Virgil). Learners should have an awareness of the immediate literary context from which the set texts have been taken. It is expected that they will develop this through wider reading in English. Assessment is by comprehension questions on content and style on a passage of the text (25 marks), translation of five lines (5 marks) and a mini-essay (10 marks).

Fixed End Date or Fixed Number of Weeks?: 
Fixed number of weeks
Fixed weeks duration: 
40