Are you able to fluently speak classical Latin or Greek? If so, how did you learn?

Answer 1

Yes. Most American Latin classes (HS and college) teach traditional method Latin with limited out loud usage. The teacher may ask a student how to say "we were walking" in Latin, but does not greet the class and tell them what page to turn to IN LATIN. My French & German teachers in MS and HS used French for everything in class, but not my Latin teacher. As a result it took a lot of practice and repetition on my part to learn to say regular everyday conversational sentences and questions in Latin. I knew the rules, but had little experience applying them. In the US there are now a bunch of college programs using Latin as a modern language (U-KY, Univ. of St Thomas, U-Mass Boston, others). This helps students learn faster, because everyone learns better using their ears and eyes and mouth (and hand to write), instead of just one or two. Imagine trying to learn Japanese or Chinese but not learning to write. For those who had Latin and want to learn to speak it, one can look for Living Latin groups that were meeting weekly at cafes and restaurants. Now they are probably online during the covid crisis. The survival and revival of using spoken Latin in teaching owes a great deal to Reginald Foster, former Papal Secretary for Latin Letters, who taught for many years at Univ. Gregoriana in Rome, until the admin misbehaved very horribly.