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The WebBoards proved to be a very valuable adjunct to classroom instruction. The students in my Elementary Latin classes like the fact that they can reach me at all hours of the day and night via the WebBoard: the later the hour, the more likely that if I'm awake, I'm on the Internet.

A side benefit is shown in the illustration at right.

Had Josh asked me the question about Latin verb conjugations via E-mail, only he would have received my answer. But it was a good question, and the answer was of interest to the whole class.

In this way, all of the Latin students who logged into the WebBoard were able to benefit from this exchange... whenever they chose to log in.

From: cicero (jjh117f@mail.smsu.edu)
Date: Sunday, December 13, 1998 12:08 PM

On 12/13/98 10:36:27 AM, Joshua wrote:
>Can anyone define the nuances
>of telling the different
>conjugations apart?

Knowing the second principal part is the trick.

amo, amare, amavi, amatus = 1st
habeo, habere, habui, habitus = 2nd
ago, agere, egi, actus = 3rd
audio, audire, audivi, auditus =4th

The students very quickly became comfortable with discussing their personal lives on the WebBoards... sometimes, a little too comfortable for my comfort. The most popular topics included dorm food, intolerable roommates, homesickness (or the lack thereof), and of course, the opposite sex.

In the example at right, one of the WebBoard regulars is venting about a relationship broken up when her boyfriend took a job out of state.

The responses to this post were uniformly supportive, as is usual when one of the regulars posts about a personal problem.

One noteworthy fact is that the men who responded tried to offer some insight into "how guys think," while the other women tended to commiserate.

From: (name changed)

Okay, I just need to vent, and this seemed like the place to do it...

Recently, the guy that I have been seeing for a little under 3 weeks just took a job out of state. So, Sunday, he decided that we should merely be friends before anything more gets started and he has to leave.

Well, my problem w/ this is that (and I know this sounds dumb, but) he is so right for me! I haven't found ANYONE like him ever and now he wants to just leave me behind and not look back... I can't help but think that something could happen in these next two months and maybe we would work out over time, eventually...

I don't really know what I am expecting you all to say, but I just needed to let out a little frustration...

Also, ladies, is it just me or do we as women tend to fall more quickly for the men than they do for us?