Important Updates
AP Latin Updates and New Resources for 2019-20
To help more students prepare for—and succeed on—the AP Latin Exam, we’ve clarified the course’s focus starting with the 2019-20 school year and are introducing new resources for your classroom. We’ve also moved exam registration to the fall, a best practice that improves students’ chances of earning college credit and placement.
Download the new course and exam description
New AP Resources
This August, we’re introducing AP Classroom, with a suite of new resources designed in collaboration with AP educators that will help give students personalized feedback throughout the year. These include in-depth unit guides, personal progress checks and a dashboard to measure student progress, and a question bank of real AP questions.
Course Overview
AP Latin is equivalent to an upper-intermediate level college course in Latin focusing on the in-depth study of selections from two of the greatest works in Latin literature: Vergil’s Aeneid and Caesar’s Gallic War. Students cultivate their understanding of classics through preparing and translating readings and considering themes in the context of ancient literature as they explore concepts like literary techniques, Roman values, war and empire, leadership, views of non-Romans, history and memory, and human beings and the gods.
Your updated course and exam description (CED) for the 2019-20 school year more clearly outlines all required course content and skills and defines how they will be assessed on the exam.
Course Content
The course framework provides a clear and detailed description of course requirements necessary for student success. The framework specifies what students must know, be able to do, and understand, with a focus on course themes that encompass core principles of the discipline.
The AP Latin framework is organized into eight commonly taught units of study that provide one possible sequence for the course. As always, you’ll have the flexibility to organize the course content as you like.
| Unit |
| Unit 1: Vergil, Aeneid, Book 1 |
| Unit 2: Caesar, Gallic War, Books 1 and 6 |
| Unit 3: Vergil, Aeneid, Book 2 |
| Unit 4: Caesar, Gallic War, Book 4 |
| Unit 5: Vergil, Aeneid, Book 4 |
| Unit 6: Caesar, Gallic War, Book 5, Part I |
| Unit 7: Caesar, Gallic War, Book 5, Part II, Book 6, and Book 7 |
| Unit 8: Vergil, Aeneid, Books 6, 8, and 12 |
Course Skills
The updated AP Latin framework included in the course and exam description outlines distinct skills that students should practice throughout the year—skills that will help them learn to think and act like
classics scholars.
| Skill | Description |
| 1. Reading and Comprehension | Read and comprehend Latin poetry and prose. |
| 2. Translation | Translate Latin texts into English. |
| 3. Contextualization | Relate Latin texts to Roman historical, cultural, and literary contexts. |
| 4. Textual Analysis | Analyze linguistic and literary features of Latin texts. |
| 5. Argumentation | Develop an argument that analyzes Latin poetry and/or prose. |
AP and Higher Education
Higher education professionals play a key role developing AP courses and exams, setting credit and placement policies, and scoring student work. The AP Higher Education site features information on recruitment and admission, advising and placement, and more.
This chart shows recommended scores for granting credit, and how much credit should be awarded, for each AP course. Your students can look up credit and placement policies for colleges and universities on the AP Credit Policy Search.
Meet the current Development Committee for AP Latin.