Quick Latin/WTM question

[Sahamamama]

I'm planning out first grade for next year and "my" copy of WTM is at the library. ;) The Memoria Press website states that WTM recommends Prima Latina, but it doesn't specify when WTM recommends starting. Is it first or second grade? I seem to remember the first edition starting Latin in third grade (with LC or something else), but this was before Prima came out. Now that Prima is available, do we begin in first or second? Thanks!

[Ali in OR]

Not sure this is the real WTM advice, but for many folks, beginning a real Latin grammar program fits at about 3rd grade. So if you want to do Prima or Minimus or Song School Latin or something that is less than a real grammar program, I don't think it will matter too much whether you do first or second grade. I think we did Prima second semester of 1st and part of 2nd, then did Minimus the rest of 2nd before starting LFC A in 3rd.

[Pata]

We are doing Prima in 3rd and it's a great intro. No complaints here!

[Brenda in FL]

WTM recommends it for 3rd grade. Which is perfect - If you start it any earlier then you basically have to do latin orally until the child is mature enough to handle the workbook on his own. (But maybe that's not a problem for some).

[Sahamamama]

Thanks! I was looking at Wordly Wise 3000 (2nd ed), Level 1 for "vocabulary" for next year, but the word lists seemed too simple and random for my oldest student. Then I thought, "Why not just begin with Prima instead?" She would have no trouble absorbing it orally, or even doing some of it as written work (though I think she'll have enough of that). We watched a few of the DVD lessons several months ago, and she still mentions the vocabulary words from that one-time viewing. :glare: No trouble memorizing for this one. So maybe we'll begin.....

 

Or maybe we'll wait for one more year! :lol:

 

Does Song School cover mostly vocabulary? Things like "aqua" means "water," and so on? That's all I'm really looking for at this point, just the idea that in another language ________________ is called _____________. :bigear:

[ourjourneys]

Song School Latin does cover some vocabulary. So, if you are just wanting a very light vocabulary in latin this would work. Also the words are repeated in Latin A just at a harder level with grammar and structure... :)

[Ester Maria]

[QUOTE=Sahamamama;1950222] Does Song School cover mostly vocabulary? Things like "aqua" means "water," and so on? That's all I'm really looking for at this point, just the idea that in another language ________________ is called _____________. :bigear:

Unfortunately, that's what most (all?) of the curricula aimed specifically at this age span are about. Which is a totally wrong concept actually, but at least kids are having fun :D, since you can't really do much else at that age with most kids.

 

You can start in the 1st grade as well, the reason why WTM suggests postponing it a few years is in order to develop a comfortable level of literacy in one's native language first - but if you have early readers, or otherwise linguistically inclined children, it won't harm them to start earlier either.

ETA: No idea why the tag is not working.

[Sahamamama]

Unfortunately, that's what most (all?) of the curricula aimed specifically at this age span are about. Which is a totally wrong concept actually, but at least kids are having fun :D, since you can't really do much else at that age with most kids.

 

You can start in the 1st grade as well, the reason why WTM suggests postponing it a few years is in order to develop a comfortable level of literacy in one's native language first - but if you have early readers, or otherwise linguistically inclined children, it won't harm them to start earlier either.

 

 

Q1: What should we be doing in first grade, if anything? Grammar forms before vocabulary? She could learn terra, terrae, terrae, terram, terra, terrae, terrarum, terris, terras, terris in a day, without having a clue what it means. Should I begin with that?

 

Q2: I do have a verbal, early reader. My oldest (5.5 years old now, 6 next school year) reads at a 4th/5th grade level, writes beautifully, and has a good attitude about learning/work. She memorizes easily. She can define and identify nouns, pronouns, and verbs. She can list all the pronouns, many prepositions, and articles. She understands the basics of subject-verb agreement, singular/plural, and past/present/future tense of verbs. We did most of this grammar orally, with me writing out examples. What do you advise concerning Latin for first grade? Keep in mind that I have not gone far in my Latin (I'm working through Henle I on my own). I have learned the five declensions and adjectives, but nothing beyond that. Should I wait a year or more to teach my student, and spend the time teaching myself, instead?

[Ester Maria]

Q1: What should we be doing in first grade, if anything? Grammar forms before vocabulary? She could learn terra, terrae, terrae, terram, terra, terrae, terrarum, terris, terras, terris in a day, without having a clue what it means. Should I begin with that?

I started with Carmina Burana, specifically Ecce gratum with my kids. :D You have the text here and the music here. I went with them through the text (in small digestible chunks ;)), translating each part to Italian, and then followed that by an explanation that Latin is an older form of Italian, and that how they can see words are very, very similar.

 

Then we listened to lots of music of those later Latin forms and read texts the music was made on, trying to find similar words in Italian. I made sure to translate each part, and then tried to demonstrate why Latin, as language, is differently formed - some things we say in Italian with "little words" such as DI, in Latin are said by changing the word a bit. So we would say "Piango le ferite di Fortuna", but back then in the oooold days, they would say "FortunaE plango vulnera" (yeah, I actually listened to that morbid stuff with small kids :lol:), and vulnera is the older way to say "le ferite", which we see even today: we can say ferito, but we also say vulnerato. So FortunaE when it's "DI Fortuna".

 

So, here's a scheme: "plain" Fortuna is Fortuna, when something is "di Fortuna", it's FortunaE, when something is "A Fortuna", it's also FortunaE, and when we see it (acc.), it's "FortunAM". And that's how I, sugarcoating stuff, got to declensions. And then made up all sorts of stuff to practice words learned in contexts - "Faber fortunae suae" for example, or going through those songs we had listened to and sang and trying to find the words, see what they mean, etc.

 

Basically all of K-1 was guessing stuff from texts - but I had advantage of having Italian speakers. I remember I'd often open some random text, esp. poetry (I love Ovid), and we'd try to figure it out. I used bilingual versions too.

 

But little by little, yes, I started teaching them the structure of the language right away: first declension, then second, then first two conjugations. Then I pulled out a bunch of Latin books and find easy practice sentences, but I'd still go much beyond that, trying to make them associate Latin with Italian, on other texts.

 

2nd-3rd grade, pretty much the same, only adding a bit more; the rest of declensions, the rest of present tense and present participle, at some point I drew the whole of verbal scheme along with the Italian one to show them how "it's all the same, really" (without subjunctives and multiple infinitives at that point though, though I said those exist too), and when it got more formal, I did all of nominal inflections (numbers and adjectives with nouns) together.

And plenty of stories about Rome, we read Aeneid :D, I taught them the scansion of the beginning and my favorite parts :D, but kept on translating to Italian. It was all gentle and not really studying.

 

Still, by the time I introduced them to a school friend of mine that's now a medievalist, whose Latin is scarily brilliant, they both had some basics. She showed them then some documents and old book scans which made them think Latin is very cool :D, read bits of old monuments with them ("DM means Diebus Manibus and Romans used it for..."), and taught them basically instead of me about the history of the Latin language. By that time they were 8-9, 9-10 years old and she was really impressed, even though they didn't know subjunctives of pluperfect and such "exotic" stuff.

 

From about 4th grade - end of 3rd really - I turned Latin into a more structured grammatical study. They started it all anew, but this time totally consciously of what they're actually doing and why: ALL of morphology (first nominal then verbal), periodization of literature, translation exercises on bunch of texts. Took about 2-3 years to get to syntax, and I covered basics metrics even before complex syntax.

 

So earlier stages have to be "child friendly" and filled with vocabulary, but it's not correct that you should refrain yourself from building the fundaments of morphology at the same time, and music is really great to reinforce all of that - I also recommend medieval Latin stuff where Latin is syntactically easier. Maybe I just had it easier because of native language though, and the fact that *I* was making the program and could thus mix stuff as I felt was the best.

 

You can actually do a lot with kids (albeit not much "meaty" stuff), it just takes knowing them and knowing what you're teaching. I realized that the early exposure to some pretty hardcore stuff texts-wise later payed off, even if those were bilingual texts and even if I was translating to them or playing the guessing with them.

Q2: I do have a verbal, early reader. My oldest (5.5 years old now, 6 next school year) reads at a 4th/5th grade level, writes beautifully, and has a good attitude about learning/work. She memorizes easily. She can define and identify nouns, pronouns, and verbs. She can list all the pronouns, many prepositions, and articles. She understands the basics of subject-verb agreement, singular/plural, and past/present/future tense of verbs. We did most of this grammar orally, with me writing out examples. What do you advise concerning Latin for first grade? Keep in mind that I have not gone far in my Latin (I'm working through Henle I on my own). I have learned the five declensions and adjectives, but nothing beyond that. Should I wait a year or more to teach my student, and spend the time teaching myself, instead?

You know, despite all I wrote in the passages above, I really don't consider early Latin a must. I started it in 5th, Giuditta started it in K, she's now entering 8th and knows maybe what I knew in late 9th, and by the time she graduates, she'll be maybe a year, year and a half ahead of me totally even though she started it 5 years before I started it as a student. The difference really isn't that huge, as you can see, since, again, you can't do much "concrete" stuff with the littles, but just play around.

 

I wanted my kids to grow up with Latin, knowing that at the beginning it'll be more Italian than Latin there :D, but early start is totally unnecessary in any other case. In fact the more I think about it, the more I'm convinced that 5th grade is the IDEAL start - if you start it in 1st, it's too young to profit from taking it so many years ahead, but if you start in 8th-9th (8th is what they do in Italy, though I was taught from 5th, and sometimes it turns out fine, but sometimes there's lots of chaos and stress because of too little time, and sometimes it's just bad), you either have to be quick and efficient, either the whole thing will be quite "incomplete" (assuming, of course, one aims high with Latin). About 5th grade really seems to be an ideal start - it allows you enough time (cca. 3 years) to absorb morphosyntax, but also enough time (cca. 5 years) for working on proficiency and texts, going through the canonical readings, etc.

 

If I were you, I'd probably work on my own Latin instead of sweating the small stuff with a 6-7 y.o. that, on the long run, won't get that much out of early Latin, but for you with an adult brain, a few years are all you need to gain confidence and knowledge needed.

 

I usually don't recommend early Latin, unless you want your kids to literally grow up with Latin. Starting it a few years later is not a problem at all, and the better the instructor, the less she has to rely on a fixed framework of ONE curriculum and the more freedom she has in choices, mixing, informal learning, etc.

 

So I don't know, I guess you know the best what your concrete priorities are, and why are you doing Latin in the first place. :)

Edited August 14, 2010 by Ester Maria
inexcusable mistakes, lol, that was typed quickly, so if there are more parts with weird expressions, sorry

[Sahamamama]

Again, Ester Maria, I thank you. Much advice to ponder and implement.

 

As to why I am doing Latin in the first place....

 

Years ago, when I was in high school, I went on a trip with classmates to NYC to visit the Cloisters. As I stood in one of the chapels, surrounded by Latin inscriptions that I did not understand, I felt shut off from the past, excluded from my own Western history. I was an honors student who studied Latin and Greek roots for fun, so I was able to "decode" some of the Latin around me... but I could sense in that place a great richness, a vault of deeply ancient treasures, to which I did not hold the key.

 

After that experience, I tried to teach myself Latin with an old textbook I found in the public library... it was a fog I could not penetrate. What are declensions? What is ablative? I had never heard of such things. But I remained caught in the web. Time after time, I kept coming back to Latin... only to be overwhelmed by its monolithic immensity. How can one learn this language without a teacher to guide the way?

 

Unlike so many things, Latin doesn't go away. Latin is eternal. :D When I am discouraged and feeling that it is impossible for me, with the many demands on my time and energy, to ever learn Latin well enough for this effort to be rewarded, I remind myself that being connected to Latin -- even in such a small way as I am -- is its own reward. I can close my grammar and go to sleep, knowing that Latin will be there in the morning.

 

Thank you for your response to my questions. You have helped to clarify my goals. For the next several years, instead of "teaching Latin" to little children, I will do my best to teach Latin to myself. Wish me luck! ;)

[Brenda in FL]

Again, Ester Maria, I thank you. Much advice to ponder and implement.

 

As to why I am doing Latin in the first place....

 

Years ago, when I was in high school, I went on a trip with classmates to NYC to visit the Cloisters. As I stood in one of the chapels, surrounded by Latin inscriptions that I did not understand, I felt shut off from the past, excluded from my own Western history. I was an honors student who studied Latin and Greek roots for fun, so I was able to "decode" some of the Latin around me... but I could sense in that place a great richness, a vault of deeply ancient treasures, to which I did not hold the key.

 

After that experience, I tried to teach myself Latin with an old textbook I found in the public library... it was a fog I could not penetrate. What are declensions? What is ablative? I had never heard of such things. But I remained caught in the web. Time after time, I kept coming back to Latin... only to be overwhelmed by its monolithic immensity. How can one learn this language without a teacher to guide the way?

 

Unlike so many things, Latin doesn't go away. Latin is eternal. :D When I am discouraged and feeling that it is impossible for me, with the many demands on my time and energy, to ever learn Latin well enough for this effort to be rewarded, I remind myself that being connected to Latin -- even in such a small way as I am -- is its own reward. I can close my grammar and go to sleep, knowing that Latin will be there in the morning.

 

Thank you for your response to my questions. You have helped to clarify my goals. For the next several years, instead of "teaching Latin" to little children, I will do my best to teach Latin to myself. Wish me luck! ;)

 

This is beautiful and inspiring - just what I needed to hear as I try to get Latin jump-started again in our home school in the next couple of weeks.

[Sahamamama]

This is beautiful and inspiring - just what I needed to hear as I try to get Latin jump-started again in our home school in the next couple of weeks.

 

 

:hurray: You can do it! Rah! Rah!