Hello. Please forgive me if a similar post has been made on this forum... For those using Latin for Children, a Yahoo group has been created devoted to that curriculum (and Song School Latin, also by Classical Academic Press). I invite any of you using LFC to join this group. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/latinforchildren/ Gratia vobiscum (grace be with you), Mark Dawson Liberty Classical Academy Maplewood, MN "Minus enim te amat qui tecum aliquid amat quod non propter te amat." "He loves thee too little who loves along with thee anything else that he does not love for thy sake." Augustine, Confessions, 10.29

You may enjoy seeing the LFC supplements available at headventureland.org. The folks at Classical Academic Press have been continually creating supplements for their various series.

I have not YET read The Latin Centered Curriculum, though I have checked his site out. I need to read it -- sounds very good.

What Latin curricula do we use... Funny you should ask. We are right in the middle of reevaluating what we have used so far (this is the school's fifth year). Like many ACCS schools, the school started off with Martha Wilson Latin Primers, 3rd - 5th. Last year, they added The Latin Road to English Grammar for 6th - 8th. This is my first year at Liberty. For the previous three years, I was at Hope Academy, a wonderful Christian school serving the urban poor in Minneapolis. (www.hopeschool.org) At Hope, we used the Latin Primers in 4th and 5th, then Ecce Romani in 6th-8th -- which I was very pleased with. We (at Liberty) are unanimous in our dissatisfaction with what we are achieving with Latin Primers and Latin Road. Most of our students don't demonstrate a knowledge of Latin that corresponds to how long they've been studying it. What goal do we wish to drive at? We desire a plan that encompasses a unified, cumulative sequence of study, beginning in 3rd and concluding in 8th, that imparts to our students a genuine ability to read Latin. Reading is the goal -- all other benefits are derived best when the student is truly progressing in a substantive knowledge of the Latin language. Toward that end, we are evaluating and considering: Latin for Children, Ecce Romani, and Lingua Latina per se Illustrata. We will probably end up with LfC in 3rd through 4th or 5th (or maybe even keeping Latin Primers), and then use Ecce Romani or perhaps LL beginning 5th or 6th and continuing through 8th. If I was more bold, I would campaign for us attempting Lingua Latina beginning in 3rd. All of these texts require significant supplement in the area of drill on particular forms. That type of supplement is the easiest to produce. To create additional reading -- either individual sentence for translating or passages for reading -- is the most time consuming and difficult to create. LL needs nothing in that area, Ecce needs some, and LfC more, but the publisher has produced readers to accompany the workbooks. We are about to take the Natl. Latin Exam on Friday, and I am anticipating poor results. The Latin Road has not served us well. I suppose if we wished to study English grammar using Latin, then it would be more satisfying. With Ecce, at my old school, my students did quite well on the NLE.

Hello, all. I teach at Liberty Classical Academy, in a suburb of Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN. http://www.libertyclassicalacademy.org/ This chant -- "o/m, s, t, mus, tis, nt" -- I'm glad you are learning the "m". This will help later on. These are the "personal endings", indicating who is performing the verb. In the present tense, this are the only endings (o, not m, in 1st person sing.). The endings you will learn for the imperfect and future tenses will be comprised of an "infix" indicating the tense plus the personal endings: Imperfect: (long a) ba + m = bam ba + mus = bamus ba + s = bas ba + tis = batis ba + t = bat ba + nt = bant Future: bi + o = bo bi + mus = bimus bi + s = bis bi + tis = bitis bi + t = bit bi + nt = bunt There are a few obvious exceptions. It is also good to know the "long vowel rule" (applying only to verbs): When a long vowel is in the last syllable, and the syllable (word) ends in "t", "nt", or "m", the long vowel becomes short. Thus the amo, amas, amat chant, and the bam, bas, bat chant. The macron appearing and disappearing is not random. This rule will help to remember when it stays long, when it goes short.

Yes -- declensions are groups of nouns which take the same sets of endings -- that's it. As hard as it is for us to imagine, a child growing up in a Latin-speaking household 2000 years ago would use all of these forms correctly without having to learn the chants, etc. (Assuming their parents spoke correct Latin.) We get a slight glimpse of this when we consider how naturally we use our personal pronouns ("he/him", "she/her", etc.). I have no experience with Henle, though I do use his grammar. Seems well liked by many. Oerberg's Lingua Latina... The initial thrill of this book has still not worn off for me. I have had it only a few weeks. I love it so far. Regarding text recommendations... I think one should ask what the end goal is. If it is to attain some level of real reading ability, then the text should at least attempt that (and the authors should themselves be at an advanced level). This would rule out the Martha Wilson Primers and The Latin Road to English Grammar, and perhaps a few others. The most commonly weak characteristic in Latin texts/workbooks is a lack of sufficient drill work on isolated forms. When a new form is introduced, the student should drill both on producing it and on identifying it, first in isolation, then relative isolation, then in a larger context. For example, when I wanted my 4th graders to learn to quickly and (eventually) instantaneously identify which word in a sentence was nominative and which was accusative, we began by declining nouns (which they could already do fairly well). Then, I gave them a list of about 40 nouns -- all either nom. sing. or acc. sing. (only masc. and fem.). The next, a similar drill -- just identify which ones are nom., which acc. Then again, including plural forms. The effect: A few students got it almost immediately, most were becoming quite adept after the second "long" drill, and even the slowest, most challenged student was doing it with ease by the end of the third day. And being 4th graders, they were not bored by this but found it a joy. Only one text I have seen has a lengthy amount of drill work. Learn to Read Latin, by Russell and Keller (a college text). It also has very thorough descriptions and explanations of the grammar, and much else to commend it. It is weak, however, it giving the students reading exercises that they can truly read (not decipher). The age of my kiddos... I have none, but I teach about 30, 4th through 11th grade. And I have a dog and a foster dog. (http://www.flickr.com/photos/markrandalldawson/)

When we talk of "declensions", we are primarily talking about nouns. (Adjectives also decline, using one set of noun endings or another.) Any given noun is in one of five declensions. Nouns don't jump from one to another (a few odd exceptions, domus, filia, dea, which take endings from more than one declension). In English, most nouns have two forms -- singular and plural. In Latin, most nouns have ten forms -- five sing. and five pl. Adjectives and pronouns also decline. Prepositions, conjunctions, adverbs do not change (a few exceptions). Verbs will conjugate more fully than in English. Every noun has a gender. It's best to think of each word as having one gender and never changing, but there are a few words that can appear as masculine or feminine (e.g. civis). Lastly, it IS good to learn "terra, terrae, f." -- nom. sing., gen. sing., and gender. Good habit. Gotta go.

Another good option is Vocabulary from Classical Roots, which introduces both Latin and Greek roots.

First, you should have your student memorize the ending chant (bo, bis, bit, ...) AND a chant of a given verb in that conjugation (laudabo, etc.). Next, make six flashcards -- one for each form of a given verb (laudabo, laudabis, laudabit, etc. -- except with macrons) with the translation on the back of each. You should practice both producing the various forms AND identifying the various forms. Practicing conjugating is easy. For identifying, it would be great to have a worksheet that has the various forms shuffled together for a handful of familiar verbs. How about this -- make three cards that have 1st, 2nd, 3rd person, two that have singular, plural, and then a card for each tense. Randomly select a person, number, and tense, then produce the form for a given verb.

Hello. That book, English Grammar for Students of Latin, really is helpful. You may also benefit from a more adult-learner book, such as Wheelock's (readily available and inexpensive) or Learn to Read Latin (by Keller and Russell, greatly superior to Wheelock's, more money). You need some additional resources beyond Lively Latin, if that book tells you that a given declension has a gender. You were right -- each word has a gender, not the declension. The words comprising the first declension are so predominantly feminine, those in the second so predominantly masculine and neuter, that we could speak of those declensions as corresponding to those genders. There are exceptions in each of those declensions, not to mention the third declension (most nouns) which includes all three genders. Gender is a characteristic of the words, not the declensions. Think of a declension as a group of nouns which follow the same pattern in their morphology. I believe your mother's comments are a little misleading, as well. In our modern age, we are offended at the thought of a masculine word being applied to a feminine person or animal, and vice versa. The Romans were not troubled by this; they did not necessarily use a feminine form of an otherwise masculine word for animals, or even people, who were feminine. And again, vice versa. These details are neither here nor there at your present level of study, but perhaps worth having in the back of one's mind. Mark