This presentation focuses on methods and materials used in teaching intermediate Ottoman Turkish at a higher education institution in the United States. The presentation will explore the challenges and opportunities of working with learners from diverse linguistic and educational backgrounds. Students with a basic knowledge of the Perso-Arabic alphabet and modern Turkish language are often placed in an intermediate Ottoman Turkish classroom. A classroom of learners from diverse linguistic and educational backgrounds presents an opportunity to teach the Ottoman language with more advanced texts and collaborative learning activities. Such a group of learners joining together in an intermediate-level class also presents challenges that require learners to fill in their knowledge gaps in Persian, Arabic, and Turkish. This filling in the knowledge gaps resembles reading a text in medias res or in the middle of the plot. In literary texts that begin in medias res, the plot is exposed with flashbacks to previous events. This method of using learners’ prior experience helps students learn the unique characteristics of Ottoman Turkish vocabulary, grammar, and orthography using a comparative approach. The presenter will explain this teaching methodology with examples from classroom activities used in an intermediate-level Ottoman Turkish class. The presenter will also discuss appropriate primary resources for intermediate to advanced Ottoman. It is hoped that this presentation will contribute to the discussions on creating a curriculum for teaching the Ottoman Turkish language.