Vocabulary Acquisition & VERBA Trials¶
Operation LAPIS takes a research-grounded approach to vocabulary. Rather than leaving acquisition entirely to incidental exposure, the curriculum builds a structured, cumulative vocabulary program on top of the narrative, one that draws from the same high-frequency Latin words students will encounter not just in LAPIS but across their entire Latin-reading lives.
The Problem Worth Solving¶
Comprehensible Input theory requires that learners know roughly 95% of the words in a text before they can read it with genuine understanding. Novice learners have a small acquired vocabulary; almost every compelling Latin text sits above their threshold. Meanwhile, Krashen notes that most vocabulary is acquired incidentally through reading, which means students need vocabulary to read, and they need to read to get vocabulary.
The research offers a way through this. Borawski (2019) found that explicit vocabulary instruction can double retention rates, that novice learners benefit from teacher-structured approaches, and that regular interval testing aids acquisition. Keeline (2023) reinforces this in the specific context of Latin: having the top 1,000--3,000 most frequent Latin words available translates directly to understanding 80% or more of most Latin texts. The takeaway is practical: intentional vocabulary development, anchored to a frequency list, measurably accelerates reading ability.
The LAPIS Approach¶
LAPIS selects five vocabulary words per episode, drawn from the DCC Latin Core Vocabulary List, a frequency-ranked list of roughly 1,000 Latin headwords that together account for a very high percentage of words in Latin literature. Over 28 missions and three episodes each, a student who completes the full operation will have encountered 420 explicitly-taught words, all anchored to high-frequency Latin.
The selection is not arbitrary. Each episode's five words are chosen by cross-referencing the DCC list against the vocabulary that actually appears in that episode's Latin texts. Students acquire the most important words for the texts they are reading, which are simultaneously the most important words for Latin reading in general.
Words are introduced in their student-facing form (3rd singular for verbs, nominative singular for nouns) with a short, clean gloss matched to that form. Verbs use "she/he [verb]s" consistently so students always know exactly what form they are seeing.
The VERBA Browser¶
The VERBA browser at lapis.practomime.com/verba is the student-facing vocabulary tool. It is a static, cumulative word list that grows with the curriculum.
Key features:
- Episode selector. Set the ceiling to any episode; the browser shows all words introduced at or before that point. Useful for matching the list to where a class currently is in the curriculum.
- Full list / Recent 100 toggle. The rolling window shows the 100 most recently introduced words (the active working set for the current assessment cycle). Before the list reaches 100 words, the browser shows all words and notes the actual count.
- A--Z / By episode sort. Alphabetical for quick lookup; by episode to see the words in the order they were introduced.
- Quizlet export. Generates a tab-delimited block in the correct Quizlet import format (term → definition, one per line). Copy and paste directly into Quizlet's import screen.
- POS color coding. Each word is tagged by part of speech with a consistent color system, matching the color coding used in the CODEX KEY-TEXTs.
The Quizlet set feeds directly into Blooket: import the Quizlet set and Blooket auto-generates game-ready practice from it. No separate Blooket build step is needed.
Verba Trials¶
Verba Trials are the assessment side of the system, and they run inside Mission Control: you deploy a trial to a cohort, students take it on their Operative Dossier, it grades itself, and the score lands as an Extra-Operational Award. The structure is simple and cumulative:
- Five words per episode trial, the words introduced in that episode. Students give the English meaning for each Latin form.
- Cumulative trials cover every word introduced so far, capped at the most recent 50 by default (switch the cap to 100, or to every word so far, for a bigger review). Once the list passes the cap, the oldest words cycle off, so a cumulative trial at Episode 14.3 covers Episodes 11.3 to 14.3, not 1.1 to 14.3.
- Three Latinity Points per correct word. The trial creates its own Extra-Operational Award (Verba Trial 3.2, or Verba Trial 3.2 (cumulative 50), where the number is the actual word count, so an early cumulative trial reads cumulative 15) with max LP of three per word (15 for an episode trial, 150 for a cumulative-50), and fills it in as students submit.
- Retakes are one click. The low-stakes structure means class averages tend to be high and a retake is a support mechanism, not a pressure valve.
The rolling window matters. Students who know they will eventually stop seeing a word have a different relationship to it than students who fear it might appear on a final exam two years from now. Cycling words off the active list rewards genuine retention and prevents the list from becoming unmanageable.
What the student sees¶
The trial appears as a gold Verba Trial active banner at the top of the dossier with a Begin button. The take page lists the words in a different random order for every student, each with a box for the English. Answers save the moment the student moves on, so nothing is lost to a dropped connection.
Any one common meaning is enough: for magnus, great, large or big all count; for dat, she gives, gives or to give. Capitalisation, stray punctuation, an article in front of a noun, and I don't versus I dont are all forgiven. Spelling is not forgiven automatically; that is your call on the review page.
On Submit, the student sees their score and nothing more. Until you close the trial they cannot revisit or change their answers, so a student who finished early cannot feed answers to one who has not started. Once the trial is closed, they can open it again from the dossier and see every word, their answer, and the meaning.
A browser cannot truly lock a student in, so the trial does the next best thing: it asks for full screen when they start, and every time the tab loses focus it warns the student and records it. You see the count of tab-aways and total seconds away beside each score. Treat it as a flag to ask about, not proof.
Running Trials in Mission Control¶
The full workflow per episode:
- Students study using the VERBA section of the relevant CODEX page as they work through the episode, and practice in Blooket if you have built a set from the VERBA browser's Quizlet export.
- Deploy. Open the cohort's Operatives view, click Deploy · Verba Trials, pick the episode and scope, choose Deploy to (the whole cohort or a single section), and click Deploy. The trial is live on the targeted dossiers immediately, and you land on its review page. A section trial is invisible to the other sections, its review page lists only that section, and its name carries the section (Verba Trial 3.2 · B). You can run the same episode again later; the app only refuses an identical trial to the same group while the first is still open.
- Review. As students submit, the review page fills in by section: status, score, tab-aways, attempt number. Click Answers on a row to see every word. Mark any word ✓ or ✗ to override the automatic grade, or Auto to hand it back; a near miss badge flags an answer one letter (or one swapped pair) away from an accepted one, ready for a one-click ✓ if you accept the spelling. Scores and LP update instantly.
- Teach the grader. When you mark a wrong answer ✓, tick accept in future first and that answer joins the accepted list for that word in every later trial, for every Agent. Re-grade re-runs the automatic marks on an older trial against the current list; your overrides stay put. A collapsible Words the cohort missed most table shows which words the class as a whole has not acquired yet.
- Retakes and absentees. Reissue on a student's row puts the trial back on their dossier in a fresh shuffle; their current score stands until they submit the retake, and the new score then replaces it. Issue does the same for someone who never took it, including after the trial is closed, so an absent student can sit it the next day.
- Close. When everyone has taken it, click Close trial. Anyone still mid-trial is submitted as they stand (marked auto); anyone who never started keeps a blank, not a zero. Students can now see which words they missed. A closed trial cannot be reopened, since that would leak the answers; deploy the episode again instead.
Export CSV on the review page gives one row per operative with a column per word. Delete trial (in the Danger zone) removes the trial, every answer, and the award with all its LP, so export first. The award itself cannot be hand-edited on the manage or bulk-award pages; override marks on the trial page instead. See Latinity Points & Grading for how Extra-Operational Awards feed the LP total.
A suggested rhythm: deploy the episode trial the day the episode finishes, leave it open across the week's meetings so absentees catch it, skim the near-miss badges, close it Friday. Once a module or so, run a cumulative-50 trial as the review.
The VERBA browser, the CODEX VERBA sections, and the Verba Trials are all built from the same underlying word list, so practice and assessment stay synchronized automatically.