Stick-in-the-mud learning

Today I am giving an extract from my father's unfinished memoirs. This bit is about his education. He went for a spell to King's College Choir School in Cambridge just before World War II.

Now that school in those days was ruled by a headmaster, one Mr Cedric Fiddian, who was batty and his own way a genius. He had white hair and had been what they called 'shellshocked' in World War I, in the trenches. Fascinated by shellholes, he had constructed two or three open air classrooms around the school. One was his favourite, a round affair scooped out of the earth, where he had desks and chairs arrayed. There he loved to address classes on Latin or other topics. He had a good way of teaching the language. first he would get you to underline each adjective, verb, noun, etc, in some usual text (normally Tennyson). After that he would set you onto Latin verbs, etc, such as 'stick-in-the-mud-o, stick-in-the-mud-are, stick-in-the-mud-avi, stick-in-the-mud-atum'. It was easy to remember, a bit humorous and built up to the next stage.

What a great way of learning! Never mind sticking in the mud, I am sure it stuck in the minds of all those pupils throughout their lives.