Oxford, Cambridge, Ecce Romani

[Robin in Tx]

Will I ever make up my mind about latin????????????

 

I have spent the entire day searching threads and reviews. I've about decided we'll try the reading approach next year, not the g/t approach, and not the immersion approach (Lingua Latina - was leaning that way but am for some reason backing off now... can't put my finger on it... ).

 

I can't get my hands on Ecce to compare. I saw Cambridge and Oxford used and really liked the stories and graphics. I particularly liked Oxford, but wasn't able to spend much time comparing it to Cambridge. Oxford did seem to have more interesting stories about the culture and mythology.

 

Can someone please make this easy for me and tell me which of the three have the most engaging stories?? Which, if any, stick to a fictionalized story line?

 

Thanks! Sorry I pop in and ask questions and don't ever have time to "give back" these days. Working outside the home part time... I miss everyone!

 

Robin

[GraceinMD]

 

which of the three have the most engaging stories??

 

 

I can't speak to Ecce or Oxford, but we used a bit over a year of Cambridge (yes, we just had to drop Latin last year, but doing so made us both a bit more sane, so I have to see the silver lining!), and the stories were (imo) VERY high interest for boys. I recommended the book to my friend who is a mom of two girls and she came back a month or so later, looking at me like I was crazy!

 

Examples (and somehow they look worse in English than in Latin :)):

- The father goes to buy a slave, doesn't like this one, doesn't like that one, sees the servant girl that the slave-seller has, LIKES that one, buys her, takes her home, and his son LIKES the slave girl and the cook LIKES the slave girl (she's pretty), and the mother (wife) DOES NOT like the slave girl.

 

- Something about the customer getting a shave and (I don't really remember) telling an (?off color) joke and the barber cutting his neck and "the blood flowing down."

 

-The son breaks the nose off a statue when he's horsing around

 

... and so forth. Of course, the whole story is building toward the climax of Vesuvius erupting and destroying Pompeii (and some of the characters we'd come to know) - so there was definitely anticipation because of that.

 

Anyway, not to stereotype, but Cambridge was a good fit (while it lasted) for MY son. It was much more fun for him to be reading right away, rather than memorizing words "in a vacuum" so to speak.

[Kareni]

... Cambridge

 

... and the stories were (imo) VERY high interest for boys. I recommended the book to my friend who is a mom of two girls and she came back a month or so later, looking at me like I was crazy!

 

 

My daughter used all four Cambridge books in out of the home Latin classes for Latin I through III. She loved the stories! And, she is going on to college with the intention of majoring in Latin/the Classics.

 

One of the other series (Oxford?) has a very prolonged series of lessons in which the main characters are stuck in a ditch. When my daughter was visiting a college Latin class on a campus tour, the word for ditch came up during the lecture. Those members of the class who knew the word all had learned Latin previously with that particular curriculum!

 

Regards,

Kareni

[latinteach]

Cambridge, definitely!

[latinteach]

 

One of the other series (Oxford?) has a very prolonged series of lessons in which the main characters are stuck in a ditch. When my daughter was visiting a college Latin class on a campus tour, the word for ditch came up during the lecture. Those members of the class who knew the word all had learned Latin previously with that particular curriculum.

 

Kareni

 

Ecce Romani...but it does have very good grammar and syntax explanations.

Edited July 19, 2009 by latinteach

[Vida Winter]

We're going with Ecce but our term hasn't started yet so I can't say definitively how well it will go. But I do like the looks of it. There is a lot of online support for Ecce -- interactive games, flashcards, etc. That was part of the reason I went with it.

[latinteach]

We're going with Ecce but our term hasn't started yet so I can't say definitively how well it will go. But I do like the looks of it. There is a lot of online support for Ecce -- interactive games, flashcards, etc. That was part of the reason I went with it.

 

Ecce does have good online support:

http://www.tabney.com/pallasathene.html

http://www.tabney.com/ecce1.html

http://www.tabney.com/ecce2.html

http://people.umass.edu/glawall/ecceteach.html (author site)

http://www.dl.ket.org/latin1/vocab/ecce_games/

Also, the publisher has online support materials. If you have the most recent version, you'll see the links in your book.

 

Cambridge also has good support:

http://www.cambridgescp.com/

http://www.vanalstyneisd.org/Latinpg/clc.html

http://www.cambridgelatin.com/

http://www.quia.com/pages/pvilatin1cambridge.html

http://www.quia.com/pages/pvilatin2cambridge.html

http://mygrove.us/learning/clcgames.htm

http://www.magisterhoran.com/CambridgeLatinCourse.html

http://www.quia.com/pages/latina.html

[gardenschooler]

My girl is crazy about Cambridge - the stories are just too funny. I told her she could just do straight Cambridge for awhile if she got through Henle I (we have less than two weeks left!)

 

I didn't feel like I could tease out all of the grammar from Cambridge in any orderly way, but it will serve as good review after the Henle. And the best part is that now she'll want to study Latin. :)

[latinteach]

I didn't feel like I could tease out all of the grammar from Cambridge in any orderly way, but it will serve as good review after the Henle. And the best part is that now she'll want to study Latin. :)

 

Do you have the Scope and Sequence for Cambridge? This really helps you to follow along with what morphology (forms) and syntax (how the forms work together) is being taught.

 

Third Edition:

http://www.cambridgelatin.org/scope.html

 

Fourth Edition:

http://www.cambridge.org/us/education/latin/images/pdf/scopeandsequence.pdf

[HollyinNNV]

My girl is crazy about Cambridge - the stories are just too funny. I told her she could just do straight Cambridge for awhile if she got through Henle I (we have less than two weeks left!)

 

I didn't feel like I could tease out all of the grammar from Cambridge in any orderly way, but it will serve as good review after the Henle. And the best part is that now she'll want to study Latin. :)

 

When I taught Cambridge I had to continually refer to the appendix and make sure I taught the grammar-made everyone memorize it! Cambridge doesn't explicitly instruct students to memorize anything. However, I taught Cambridge just like I taught LC. Memorize all of the declensions/conjugations etc. I know some Cambridge teachers don't agree with my style-but oh well.

 

And, I also agree that the stories are very funny and high interest for girls and boys!

Holly

[gardenschooler]

Do you have the Scope and Sequence for Cambridge? This really helps you to follow along with what morphology (forms) and syntax (how the forms work together) is being taught.

 

Third Edition:

http://www.cambridgelatin.org/scope.html

 

Fourth Edition:

http://www.cambridge.org/us/education/latin/images/pdf/scopeandsequence.pdf

 

 

Thank you!

[tedearly]

Howdy,

Take the post for whatever it is worth.

I used Oxford, online course out of Univ of NC. Teacher moved form site and I didn't follow up next year reading Caesar. I covered through lesson 47 in Book 3. Minimum 1.5 hrs/day. Best investment of my time. Easily a 3 yr coverage of material in 1 yr. I have MODG Syllabus for Lat 3, and it is a review for what I learned as a point of reference.

 

DS, in high school, used Cambridge. We would study together at times. My online teacher was his high school teacher for Lat 1. Teacher said Cambridge moves slower than Oxford when I was puzzled by DS progress. Additionally, I liked the layout of Oxford. Cambridge caused my eyes to glaze over. However, I had many, many resources to use in addition to Oxford. I quickly outpaced my son, which was fun.

 

HTH.

[Orthodox6]

I'm simple-minded, rather than particularly analytical with my preference. Ecce Romani is published for the middle school market, so I like it for grades 6-8. I like both Cambridge and Oxford for high school, but bought Cambridge after all of the "coin flips".

[Musicmom]

I've never seen Cambridge, so I can't compare the two, but Oxford has worked well for us--compact, contained, easy to implement. The cartoons and stories are both entertaining and interesting as they follow the life of the poet Horace from his childhood (Latin I) through his school years (Latin II) and his adult life (Latin III--which includes a fair amount of his poetry.) Each lesson has reading, vocabulary and questions, and then exercises that teach the necessary grammar. There are also fascinating historical background essays in each lesson. By the end of Latin III, all Latin grammar and constructs have been covered. The lessons do get longer as you go through the series (they start out short and easy at the beginning of Latin I) and Latin III takes more time to get through than either of the earlier two books--but, there's so much more material at that stage of it, and it's getting you ready to read original texts, so it makes sense.

[NancyNellen]

May I ask where you purchased the materials for Ecce Romani? Did you contact the publisher directly? I have the readers, but have not been able to find the supporting materials anywhere. Thanks!

[Vida Winter]

May I ask where you purchased the materials for Ecce Romani? Did you contact the publisher directly? I have the readers, but have not been able to find the supporting materials anywhere. Thanks!

 

I got a set from Pearson. In order to get TM materials you need to register as a homeschooler and swear an oath to not let your student peek at the TM. Just kidding (kind of). You need to send a form in stating something to that effect. Once they have your statement on file they will process your order.

[NancyNellen]

Thanks, Dana!

[Robin in Tx]

Thank you for all the responses. Sorry I'm so late in responding but I've been working summer camps.

 

Based on all said here, I guess I would choose either Cambridge or Ecce, probably Cambridge. But I don't like cumbersome teacher manuals and I don't want to have to stay on top of whether or not we're learning the grammar, so here I am again... blowing in the wind and thinking about using something like Cambridge or Lingua Latina (yet again!) simply as a reading course and combine it with a traditional grammar based program. But do I really want to schedule two programs when I have trouble enough doing one???? We tried Henle but it didn't work for us. Just isn't organized (visually?) as I like and although I thought the christian content would be a plus, I ended up tiring of it... perhaps it didn't feel as approachable as I needed it to be, and picking it up every day felt more and more like a chore. The problem with Wheelocks (imo) is that I don't like using college texts with younger kids (14), for a variety of reasons - content, lack of sufficient exercises/review, etc. The reason I want the reading element is I believe we will be more consistent in our latin studies if we were to enjoy some sort of anticipation in the story line. I think the story will make a big difference to us. I wonder if adding the story will make Henle more palatable, or if switching to Wheelocks (or something else? what else is there?) would still be in order.

 

Too bad Latin in the New Millennium is so EXPENSIVE!!!!!!!!! No way can I spend that kind of money.

 

Thanks again to all... you've given me a lot to think about. The ability to make a decision is my weakness. You should see me in a cafeteria line. It's all I can do to keep from hyperventilating when faced with all those choices and a line of customers pressing behind me!

 

Robin

[latinteach]

Based on all said here, I guess I would choose either Cambridge or Ecce, probably Cambridge. But I don't like cumbersome teacher manuals and I don't want to have to stay on top of whether or not we're learning the grammar, so here I am again... blowing in the wind and thinking about using something like Cambridge or Lingua Latina (yet again!) simply as a reading course and combine it with a traditional grammar based program. But do I really want to schedule two programs when I have trouble enough doing one????

 

Cambridge teaches grammar, but presents it in a different way than Henle. It presents the morphology (the forms) functionally. The Scope and Sequence really make the presentation clear. You don't really need to do two programs, though people who want a very traditional presentation of grammar do mix programs and use Cambridge as a reader. But Cambridge is a wonderful core text. What can be challenging is that it's easy to gloss over the grammar sections. You do need to pay attention to the Scope and Sequence and make sure that you're mastering the sentence patterns and the forms taught. Each chapter teaches what you need to know to move on. There IS an independent study guide you can order from http://www.cambridgelatin.com as well as sets of comprehension activity masters and worksheets.

 

The problem with Wheelocks (imo) is that I don't like using college texts with younger kids (14), for a variety of reasons - content, lack of sufficient exercises/review, etc.

 

The content is very good, but written more toward a collegiate level.

 

There is a workbook that goes along with it and there are tons of online exercises and reviews here: http://www.wheelockslatin.com/wheelockslinks.htm (Scroll down to the Quia games.) The content is much different, though, than Cambridge/Oxford/Ecce. Wheelock's content is adapted from original authors, so it's more appealing to a college level audience. Cambridge borrows some ideas from original authors, but writes them into a clever storyline that is appealing to middle and high school level students.

 

The reason I want the reading element is I believe we will be more consistent in our latin studies if we were to enjoy some sort of anticipation in the story line. I think the story will make a big difference to us.

 

You will get that with Cambridge. What's fun about Cambridge is the cast of characters and the predicaments they get into. Quintus is pretty much the main character. He's the son of Caecilius, a banker. The family is based on a real family that lived in Pompeii. The story revolves around the family, but has a lot of other people in it too, who are their friends and neighbors and servants. Some of the situations are drawn from ancient Roman authors. For example, in the chapter that describes all the Pompeiians going to the gladiatorial show, there's mention of a another town and their gladiators, and the rivalry that goes on between the towns. (This parallels the modern world and our football and soccer teams.) That story is taken from a letter written by Pliny, but it's reworked to appeal to younger readers. The situations that happen with the cook and other servants are drawn from ancient plays, but again, they are reworked to fit into the parameters of a secondary level textbook.

 

Too bad Latin in the New Millennium is so EXPENSIVE!!!!!!!!! No way can I spend that kind of money.

 

It is expensive, but the added value comes from the online Teacher's Forum. Also, the books are pretty huge and amazing.

 

Thanks again to all... you've given me a lot to think about. The ability to make a decision is my weakness. You should see me in a cafeteria line. It's all I can do to keep from hyperventilating when faced with all those choices and a line of customers pressing behind me!

 

The problem is that there are a lot of wonderful Latin programs out there, with different methodologies. It's hard to choose just one. You have to go with what fits your family's learning style best.