does everyone try to study latin?

[dietmom]

I know Latin is at the heart of a classical education. We are new to this and we are choosing between latin, chinese or spanish. This would be a first language and DS is in 6th grade--WDYT--is Latin essential??

[Laura Corin]

Do you have to choose? I like to do a modern language first, then add in Latin. You could start Mandarin (ask me if you want some tips on this) this year, then begin Latin next year.

 

Laura

[Clover11]

We planned to start Latin, but finally decided we would just study the Latin and Greek roots to give us time to focus on other areas. Here is an interesting article.

[missmoe]

We also focus more on roots than the language.

[Jabberwocky]

I'm torn about this as well. My son heard someone say a while back that if he learned Latin, he could learn other languages really easily. I think he thinks it's a magic catch-all language or something.

 

At any rate, he's really bent on learning it. (Me: not so much. Heh. ;) )

 

I was thinking of learning Spanish as a family this year, but also supplementing with some basic Latin for DS. We'll see... I'm always very ambitious at this time of year. (ask me again in January!)

[swimmermom3]

Perhaps we would be studying Latin if we had started home schooling from the beginning, but we didn't. By the time we started, I had already made the commitment in my mind to the whole family being able to speak Spanish. We have a ways to go, but we are a work in progress. At this point in time, I don't have time for a second language in the schedule.

[dietmom]

thanks for the responses--doing roots would be doable right now--perhaps that would be a good focus--I really just don't want to overwhelm this year--and we're already well on our way--so hoping not to add another subject!

[PeterPan]

Latin is always something you can start later. When people start in early elementary, they're taking several years to do something a high schooler would accomplish in one year. So that's definitely one way to approach it. Two, you have to remember that in doing latin you might find yourself able to coordinate or take a lighter touch with your regular grammar. (Some people even drop it altogether!) Three, nothing says it has to be all or nothing. I think starting with a light touch, something like Prima Latina, is a really good idea. It's inexpensive, won't take much time for a student that age, but will let him learn if he has a facility for languages, whether he likes latin in particular, etc. So there's a lot to be said for trying an intro book like that. You could add it to your schedule at 15 minutes a day and finish the book in a semester I think.

 

The other thing with languages is to pick the one you can do WELL. Poor chinese isn't going to get you very far, as their english will always be better than your chinese. Latin on the other hand you can make a lot of tracks in in literally just one year (Wheelocks) with a very ready student. Spanish, well that's an especially good way to go if you have access to native speakers where he can use it. If he does the Prima Latina first, you'll get a sense of how he learns, how much he likes to study languages, etc. Then you can decide if you want to stick with a book approach or go to something on the computer or more auditory, whether he'd like two languages, etc.

[smillard00]

We study Latin for a lot of reasons. You do get the benefit of studying roots and derivations and it really helps your English vocabulary. (It's a great help when playing Balderdash :lol: ) It is also a really great way to get a handle on grammar. When studying Latin grammar, you can learn a whole lot about English grammar in the process. You have to use a Latin program that emphasizes grammar, though. In my dh's experience, knowing Latin grammar has made learning other languages a lot easier. When he was in seminary, a good 20 years after his high school Latin classes, he had to take Greek and Hebrew. In that first Greek course, the students with a Latin background had a MUCH easier time learning the Greek grammar than the students who had taken a modern language in high school. That spoke volumes to us and solidified our choice to teach Latin to our children. We do hope to add on either Greek or a modern language in addition to our Latin studies but we haven't decided what to do there yet. We're still making sure our Latin foundation is good first. The good thing about making room in our schedule for it is that it fits into our grammar slot and our foreign language slot, since, for us, it fills both needs. So we have plenty of time to fit Latin into our day.

[hollyandab]

We planned to start Latin, but finally decided we would just study the Latin and Greek roots to give us time to focus on other areas. Here is an interesting article.

Awww, man!! Where were you with this article about 2 weeks ago?!! :D I was going back and forth for about 2 months on this decision and finally decided to "do it right" with a Latin course... Oh well, guess it can't hurt! Good article though...

[southcarolinamom]

My son picked Latin for his foreign language in high school. He is going into the science/health field, and Latin is a perfect fit for all of those "science roots."

 

Latin helped ds a lot on his ACT prep. He said Latin had a "logic flow to it" ...:D

[Jenny in Florida]

We played around with Minimus when my kids were little, and they loved it.

 

After that, though, we never could find another program or curriculum that they liked as much or got as much out of doing.

 

My daughter tried Oxford Latin and got through a couple of books before giving up. Then, she tried So You Really Want to Learn Latin, which didn't last a year.

 

Meanwhile, my son tried Latin for Children, which went okay for a while. But we ended up abandoning it mid-way through the second level, because he just wasn't retaining anything.

 

They each worked through three levels of Critical Thinking Company's Word Roots software, too.

 

I think it's a worthy endeavor. I'm glad we did as much as we did. But I finally decided that we had given Latin the old college try and that it was time to move on to other things.

[Clover11]

Awww, man!! Where were you with this article about 2 weeks ago?!! :D I was going back and forth for about 2 months on this decision and finally decided to "do it right" with a Latin course... Oh well, guess it can't hurt! Good article though...

 

 

It can't hurt, and there are benefits to learning Latin. I wish we could fit it into our schedule (and budget), but realize that we can "get by" with only learning the roots.

[hollyandab]

It can't hurt, and there are benefits to learning Latin. I wish we could fit it into our schedule (and budget), but realize that we can "get by" with only learning the roots.

Yeah, I think you're right. You can't lose either way. I bought Getting Started with Latin, $20, and Cambridge Latin unit 1 for $13 bucks or so, so I obviously I didn't invest a lot in it! I thought I'd start there before investing in some of the other more expensive programs. We'll see how it goes. What root study did you go with?

[Clover11]

Yeah, I think you're right. You can't lose either way. I bought Getting Started with Latin, $20, and Cambridge Latin unit 1 for $13 bucks or so, so I obviously I didn't invest a lot in it! I thought I'd start there before investing in some of the other more expensive programs. We'll see how it goes. What root study did you go with?

 

I'm curious to hear an update on how it's going for you guys. That is a great price to get started!

 

We chose Science Roots since it goes along with Apologia Biology. Afterwards, we'll do Vocabulary Vine.

[Boxing Hare]

We are just doing Spanish. I took 4 years of Latin in high school, and really wished I had taken a modern language instead. I don't think that Latin helped me on the SAT or ACT. We learned roots in other language arts classes and I think that was helpful. The romance languages all have that common Latin root, so I think as long as you learn one of them it will improve your vocabulary.

 

My dh also took 2 years of Latin in high school, and he feels the same as I do.

[hollyandab]

I'm curious to hear an update on how it's going for you guys. That is a great price to get started!

 

We chose Science Roots since it goes along with Apologia Biology. Afterwards, we'll do Vocabulary Vine.

 

We haven't started yet. I'm hoping next Monday to get rollin', but I have family visiting this week; I'll have to wait and see how I feel Monday morning! After looking over Getting Started with Latin, I think it's a great place for us to start. I never had Latin (or any foreign language--not sure how I got away with that!), so I really wanted something VERY gentle to start with. It looks very do-able. Actually, the more I look at it, the more excited I'm getting! (Although my boys don't seem too excited!:lol:)

 

Holly

[enviromommy]

I realize that this makes us technically not classical home schoolers by some definition. Actually, I would agree that we are not strictly speaking classic home schoolers, but rather rigorous home schoolers with a certain fondness for the classical approach.

 

I would love to add Latin in high school if possible, but for now, there isn't time. My kids have a dual secular / Jewish curriculum, including modern Hebrew, that takes a lot of time. I addition, I speak French and have many friends in France, so I decided it was important to me for the kids to learn that first. With Hebrew and French, there's no way we have time for Latin.

[Lily_Grace]

We lightly study Latin here. Mostly I want him to be familiar with word roots so that he can better decode his own language and those that are Latin-based. We worked our way through three levels of Latin's Not So Tough and now do Word Roots instead.

[mamato3 all-boy boys]

We've tried studying Latin for 3ish years. Started Prima Latina in 3rd - finished abot 1/2 of it. Moved up to LC 1 -- finished about 1/3 of it. Changed to Lively Latin - finished about 1/2 of it. Back to LC 1 - finished about 1/2 of it.

 

I finally had a heart-to-heart with myself and realized that what I really wanted from Latin was the vocabulary benefits -- the roots. So, after a break in our "Latin" studies, we're going to use Vocabulary from Classical Roots in 7th and 8th grade and call it a day.

[Beth in SW WA]

After agonizing/praying about our schedule for next year, I have decided to feed dd's passion for languages via Spanish study along with Greek/Latin roots. I might lean towards a more music and stem'ish focus - rather than classical languages in our homeschool endeavor. That could change.

 

Older dc took Latin. Not sure if that was the best use of time/energy. High school level Latin in middle school was a daunting affair. I wish I had exposed ds to more music, math & computer programming instead. Dd preferred more Spanish. I chose Latin for them and I regret my decision.

 

Hindsight is 20/20....

Edited August 11, 2011 by Beth in SW WA
Typo

[amsunshine]

Although I wish we had more time in the day to study Latin -- I finally had to admit to myself that it wasn't going to happen. As far as languages go, I teach my girls both French and piano (I consider piano a language of sorts). They are also studying Spanish via a charter school class, and I help them with that, as well. This is about all we have time for, on top of the rest of our studies. I decided that I wanted to focus on teaching a few languages really well, as opposed to doing more while not doing any of them particularly well.

 

We've done Song School Latin, which dds thoroughly enjoyed, as well as the first level of WordRoots software, and will continue to study Latin roots using various things in the future. If dds decide they really want to study Latin in earnest later, that's certainly an option I will keep open for them.

[TC5]

We do, but it's not the focus of our education. My oldest and I have been studying Latin for two years. This year, when we return to the United States in a few months, we plan to do 3 days of Latin and 3 of Spanish. I don't think he needs to rush through high-school Latin already, so we'll slow down and take advantage of our current experiences in Costa Rica to try to pick up Spanish and keep learning it. (My son's Latin is definitely helping him here.) I've been debating about whether my second son should start Latin this year (3rd grade). I don't think he's ready for LivelyLatin, and I don't really want to pay for another program, so he'll probably just focus on Spanish for now.

 

We study Latin for many reasons, but I still enjoyed the article linked by a PP. Just one comment about something in the article:

 

"Further, Latin only helps with the Romance languages, it won't help with the myriad other prevalent, spoken languages in world (Chinese, Russian, Arabic)."

 

This may be true, but I met a lady on an airplane recently who homeschooled her 4 children. Her son, who had studied Latin, later learned other non-Romance languages and said Latin definitely helped with that. It taught him how to learn a language, apparently. Still, probably learning any language would help you to learn another. Because I don't know any languages very well besides English, I chose to start with Latin. I hope learning how to learn a language while they are young will help them learn another later. (Of course, now we are unexpectedly in Costa Rica with the opportunity to learn how to learn a language in a very different way. :))

[Clover11]

We study Latin for many reasons, but I still enjoyed the article linked by a PP. Just one comment about something in the article:

 

"Further, Latin only helps with the Romance languages, it won't help with the myriad other prevalent, spoken languages in world (Chinese, Russian, Arabic)."

 

This may be true, but I met a lady on an airplane recently who homeschooled her 4 children. Her son, who had studied Latin, later learned other non-Romance languages and said Latin definitely helped with that. It taught him how to learn a language, apparently. Still, probably learning any language would help you to learn another. Because I don't know any languages very well besides English, I chose to start with Latin. I hope learning how to learn a language while they are young will help them learn another later. (Of course, now we are unexpectedly in Costa Rica with the opportunity to learn how to learn a language in a very different way. :))

 

Good point. I especially liked the statement in bold. :)

[Classical Katharine]

I too would like to refer to the article a PP linked to. There the author of the article said

 

"Latin only helps with the Romance languages, it won't help with the myriad other prevalent, spoken languages in world (Chinese, Russian, Arabic)."

 

 

I would have to respectfully disagree with that author. Latin is a helpful foundation for any inflected language, and that includes Greek and Russian, with their inflected noun systems. Neither of those is a Romance language, but they share with Latin a noun system in which the noun endings change to convey the grammatical function of the noun. Sure, you could start with Greek or Russian and skip Latin, but Latin gives you the word roots on which a great deal of English depends, PLUS an introduction to an inflected language in your own alphabet. It's easier to tackle an inflected language with a foreign alphabet when you've already had some exposure to an inflected language in your own alphabet!

 

 

The article author also says

 

 

"Some say that you'll understand the English language and its grammar better by learning the Latin language. But wait, English can't easily (or intelligently) have Latin grammar forced on it . . . You don't need to learn the Latin language to understand English grammar in depth."

 

 

My husband found that English grammar only came to life for him when compared and contrasted to the grammar of another language. What grammar is becomes clear in a unique way when you study more than one grammar.

 

 

Roots studies can be valuable, and not everyone has to study Latin, but I wanted to add another point of view on those couple of points so that perhaps someone doesn't skip Latin thinking it's of less value than it is.