Does anyone leave Latin until 4th grade or later?

[Linda (Australia)]

With my older ones, we began Latin around 2nd grade, but, now that I have all eight to do lessons with - time is a real problem!

 

We've been using Prima Latina, but always seem to run out of time, and although beginning it in February, are only up to week six! Now, they certainly do 'know' the stuff, we've drilled it quite well. I guess I'm wondering whether to continue along our slow path, slowly but surely, and get to it when we can, or drop it for now, and come back to it in another year or two.

 

It's a constant battle, juggling all these lessons - but somehow, we DO get there!

 

Thanks,

[Laura Corin]

Hobbes hasn't started Latin yet - he'll be beginning in September. I started at age 12 at school and was reading Virgil at 15. Personally, I like to start living languages first, while children are young and pick them up easily.

 

Laura

[AudreyTN]

Yeah, sorta. We've been playing around with Latin, but will seriously begin our studies this year. (4th and 3rd grade)

[dsacco]

I TRIED to do Prima Latina and even I was bored with it.... but last year we did "English from the Roots Up" and it was easy enough for us to "throw" in there.

 

This year - DS is in 7th and starting Henle Latin I and DD in 4th is doing 'Getting Started with Latin'

[fleischdoc]

I started dd with prima in 4th-it was easy, but a gentle intro, and didn't take too much time at that age. Did LC1 in 5th, and now I am thinking of switching to First Forms.

Lisa

[Alphabetika]

We left serious Latin study until (GASP!) 9th grade, and dd learns it online. No ill effects, she loves it, and she grasps it very well (earned an A+ this year, her first year). We did LCI and part of LCII through 7th and 8th grades, but she says she learned more in 2 weeks of her online class (she uses Wheelock's) than she did through all of that LC. She'll be taking Latin 2 next year.

 

So that's my two cents. I know the better late than early approach to Latin isn't WTM-ish, but there you go.;)

[elegantlion]

We started Latin last year (5th) only because before that we weren't using a classical method. For my son I wish we had started in 4th, but before that it probably would have been more frustrating than fun for both of us.

[siloam]

Linda,

 

My oldest started Lively Latin in 5th grade. She does about a page a day, so it is going to also take two years to get through. We will get there, just not quickly.

 

The nice thing is she does it 100% independently and she has the grammar background to really get it.

 

Heather

[Orthodox6]

Hobbes hasn't started Latin yet - he'll be beginning in September. I started at age 12 at school and was reading Virgil at 15. Personally, I like to start living languages first, while children are young and pick them up easily.

 

Laura

 

:iagree: Latin starts here in 6th or 7th grade.

[Tiramisu]

We left serious Latin study until (GASP!) 9th grade, and dd learns it online. No ill effects, she loves it, and she grasps it very well (earned an A+ this year, her first year). We did LCI and part of LCII through 7th and 8th grades, but she says she learned more in 2 weeks of her online class (she uses Wheelock's) than she did through all of that LC. She'll be taking Latin 2 next year.

 

So that's my two cents. I know the better late than early approach to Latin isn't WTM-ish, but there you go.;)

 

Dh is a high school Latin teacher. Your daughter's experience confirms his opinion. After looking at children's Latin curriculum, he wondered if it was worth starting Latin so early since his student's could cover the same material in two weeks in high school.

 

That said, I plan to start with my 4th grader in September but she's not happy about it. She says she doesn't like Latin.:glare:

[Alphabetika]

Yes, dd's Latin teacher feels the same way as your dh, citing the greater maturity and higher-level thinking skills that allow rhetoric stage kids to understand the complexities of Latin better. I have shared that a few times on this board, but only when I sense that someone is really struggling with Latin or looking for support for starting later, not because I'm personally dogmatic about it. Although, I do have to say that I'm amazed at how my dd has learned by being a bit older and learning from an expert with a high-level curriculum, versus trying to muddle through with me and a curriculum that didn't suit her. (I didn't know this at the time, of course, hadn't done any Latin investigation on my own, since it was my dd's idea to learn Latin in the first place. ;))

 

For instance, my younger dd is bent on learning Greek. She wants to take Greek online from the same source as dd1 takes Latin, when she gets to high school level thinking. However, she's so raring to go that we are going to start some Greek this year, and she works on learning the Greek alphabet on her own.

 

Every family is different and has different preferences. I just share my experience to say that my dd started at 14 and didn't miss a thing, IMHO. I can't imagine how her current experience would have been very different if she'd started Latin when she was a very young kid. I suppose she would have started high-school level Latin earlier, but to what purpose? I want her to get high school credit for it, and I don't see how I could have given that if she'd started higher level when she was in 5th or 6th grade, even if she was able to grasp it. As it is, she uses a college-level text, does very well and is deeply satisfied with her level of learning. Latin study is very exciting to her, because she has the mental tools to really figure it out and make sense of the "logic puzzle" that Latin seems to be sometimes. This is certainly not something I can take credit for. I honestly think it's the timing, and having an excellent teacher (Amy Barr at Lukeion.org).

[Linda (Australia)]

Thanks, everyone! I feel somewhat better - we'll just do what we can, and not stress over what we simply don't have time to do.

 

I'm really in the the 'let's ditch the books, and have some fun!' mode at the moment - no doubt I'll get over it once we've done a heap of 'fun' activities, and we then have to clean up the mess!

[Tammy]

I agree....and it seems in the early starters....all they are really learning is 'vocabulary'....I think highschoolers have a better 'understanding' of Latin.....and don't get bored as easy sitting around learning 'vocabulary' LOL.

[claire up north]

We're holding off till at least 7th grade, maybe longer. In the younger years, they'll work on Spanish.

[mcconnellboys]

I waited until logic stage with my older son in order that he could work on it more independently.

[FishMama]

Though I read TWTM when my oldest was two (he's now 12), when 3rd grade hit, I had three more K and under. We've since added two more to the crowd. Until now it's been way too overwhelming to work Latin into our school day. So, I'm coming from a "how do I make up for lost time" perspective.

 

I was thinking of doing Minimus Latin with my 7th, 4th, and 2nd graders for this year. I know it may be too low for my oldest, but don't think I can work two curriculums into the program. Then I was thinking of working in Spanish when he hits 8th or 9th. (I was a French Lit major, but we live in San Diego for heaven's sake, Spanish is more practical.)

 

Does this sound right? Any thoughts are appreciated.

[Wendy in ME]

We start in 4th grade here. I want to get into English grammar and spelling before starting another language.

[Ester Maria]

I personally started at 10 and I never considered that a "late start". I wrote once about my experiences here. I had 8 years of Latin in my school, and during the last 2-3 years of that period many of my classmates outperformed classical philology majors which would come to our school to do their teacher practice - that's how good the instruction was.

The premises were that we entered our study of Latin (and two years later Greek) with the solid foundations in our language and with having at least started previously a modern foreign one, if not already bilingual. It worked wonders.

Also, the differences between those who started at 10, 12 and 14 (we participated in two surveys regarding that) were basically statistically insignificant by the time we were 18, while the differences in modern foreign languages depending on the time we started them were significant, particularly accent-wise. Another argument in favor of postponing Latin and introducing a modern language first.

 

I, however, started playing with my daughters with Latin right away, but I postponed a serious study till about 3rd/4th grade. True, by the time they entered the serious study period, they were already rather well-versed in Latin, but they didn't feel it as a burden. In the earlier years, instead, I insisted on the literacy in their native languages and in Hebrew (but even for Hebrew I postponed the actual grammatical study until 4th-5th grade and insisted they acquire it naturally first).

 

I've seen good results both with starting early and waiting, though.

One of the reasons why I personally chose to wait is the fact that Italian is our first language, so Latin is, at least lexically, easier for them in the start and a few years of informal work before formal couldn't hurt.

[sagira]

We will start at least in 5th. Ds will be learning Spanish prior to this. I also feel that learning Latin will aid him in English grammar and vocabulary, and he can remember more with the SATs and such.

Edited August 2, 2009 by sagira

[prairiegirl]

I started my oldest with latin when she was in Gr. 2 but it just didn't click with her, so I held off. I recently discovered that she is dyslexic so that may be why we had so much problem with Latin. I am going to try again when she is in Gr. 6. I am still planning on doing declensions and conjugations with her as part of our Morning Time but I won't have her do a formal program.

 

I am thinking that I won't start my other two until they are older as well.

[phathui5]

Since your older children have already taken Latin, could you assign one or two of the older ones to work on it with the littler ones once or twice a week?

[sweetbaby]

We played around with it here last year, 4th and 5th grades but will seriously dive into it this year for 5th and 6th grades. I don't make learning a foreign language into a big deal until 5th to 7th grades anyway.

[Jlynn]

I started Latin for Children with my son in 3rd grade, but will wait till 4th grade to use it with my daughter. I don't see any problems with waiting one more year, except that I've hear that Prima Latina might be too easy for a 4th grader.