UncleEJ Posted February 22, 2013 Share Posted February 22, 2013 Has anyone studied Latin in preparation for teaching their children? I'm thinking of doing this. What programs would you recommend if you have? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melenie Posted February 22, 2013 Share Posted February 22, 2013 I am sure you will get better answers from others who have been at this for longer, but I found Getting Started with Latin to be a nice introduction for me. The lessons are brief and easy enough to do in a short time each day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tranquility7 Posted February 22, 2013 Share Posted February 22, 2013 I second the GSWL recommendation. I did it with DS and learned so much! We have since finished and moved on to I Speak Latin and Lingua Latina. I originally thought we would to LFC next, but both ISL and LL have been great for ME learning more fluency as well as learning how to conduct our Latin time *in* Latin. We go through ISL together (it is scripted) and I add any new vocab words to our flashcards for review. It is conversational, and DS thinks it is really fun to be able to chat in latin :-) For Lingua Latina, we read a few paragraphs at a time, usually just adding one new paragraph (so most of it is review). Then we do the questions at the end and "talk" about what we read. We are going slowly, but it is a wonderful challenge, but we are both learning a lot, AND DS loves it! I am also starting to watch the DVDs for Latin Alive, which I am really enjoying. DS will probably watch them someday, but for now, for me, they are just helping reinforce the concepts and helping me see how a "real" Latin teacher actually does it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sleeplessnights Posted February 22, 2013 Share Posted February 22, 2013 I am studying Latin alongside my son. We've done Prima Latin, Latina Christiana, and this year we are working our way through First Form. There really isn't any reason to be far ahead of your student, unless you want to. Your student will be starting with nothing and so will you! My son always thinks it's funny when he remembers a word faster than me... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Georgiana Daniels Posted February 22, 2013 Share Posted February 22, 2013 Wheelock's is always a good one. I started with that but quickly realized that once I started the Latin programs with my kids, the personal study wasn't really necessary. We learn together, and I'm OK with that :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElizabethB Posted February 22, 2013 Share Posted February 22, 2013 I am also watching the Latin Alive DVDs and working through the program ahead of my daughter. I then teach her from the book, she does not watch the DVDs. I have several years of Spanish, that is helpful. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
happypamama Posted February 22, 2013 Share Posted February 22, 2013 Another recommendation for GSWL. My daughter and I started it together, neither of us having any prior Latin knowledge, and it helped both of us a lot. I like how incremental it is, and how it's very well laid-out. Easy to follow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jayne J Posted February 22, 2013 Share Posted February 22, 2013 I had planned to study ahead of ds as well, and bought the Henle books and the Memoria Press workbooks to go along with it, but stalled out over and over again. Now I work 1–2 weeks ahead of him in the First Form Latin books and am learning so much more. The key for me is to do all the workbook exercises each week, and then I 'review' while working with him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
UncleEJ Posted February 22, 2013 Author Share Posted February 22, 2013 Thank you everyone for the replies! I have some thinking to do. Part of me would love to get ahead of my kids, but on the other hand, realistically, it would probably work out better to just learn with them. I imagine myself getting started but not following through when things get busy. One other question, those of you with kids spaced fairly close, how did you teach Latin? My kids are each two years apart, so my thought was start ODS around third grade and then YDS two years later when he is in third grade. Then again when DD is in third grade. Is this a good way, or would combining be better? I don't want to hold ODS back by waiting for YDS to catch up, but I also don't want to go crazy keeping up with three kids in three different places. I know I have a good while before I really need to worry, but my mind wonders this stuff anyway :-). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melenie Posted February 23, 2013 Share Posted February 23, 2013 One other question, those of you with kids spaced fairly close, how did you teach Latin? My kids are each two years apart, so my thought was start ODS around third grade and then YDS two years later when he is in third grade. Then again when DD is in third grade. Is this a good way, or would combining be better? I don't want to hold ODS back by waiting for YDS to catch up, but I also don't want to go crazy keeping up with three kids in three different places. I know I have a good while before I really need to worry, but my mind wonders this stuff anyway :-). I think it depends on what curriculum you use. Many of them jump right into grammar and translation, a child under 3rd grade may not have had enough grammar to keep up. If you use something that is more focused on Latin vocabulary you may be able to combine them. My girls are 3 years apart. For my oldest in K-3 we did mostly Latin vocabulary and common used phrases (the youngest always joined in), next year in 4th my oldest will start a more grammar based curriculum. My youngest will join in with the Latin vocabulary and chants, but she will not do the grammar and translation until 3rd or 4th. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sleeplessnights Posted February 23, 2013 Share Posted February 23, 2013 One other question, those of you with kids spaced fairly close, how did you teach Latin? My kids are each two years apart, so my thought was start ODS around third grade and then YDS two years later when he is in third grade. Then again when DD is in third grade. Is this a good way, or would combining be better? I don't want to hold ODS back by waiting for YDS to catch up, but I also don't want to go crazy keeping up with three kids in three different places. I know I have a good while before I really need to worry, but my mind wonders this stuff anyway :-). My oldest did Prima Latina in 2nd, Latina Christiana in 3rd, and now First Form in 4th. My second son is doing Prima in 2nd, and my younger two are not doing Latin yet. I plan on keeping them all on their own individual schedule. I'm afraid if I tried to combine them my older son would be cranking through and my younger one would be struggling to keep up. This way they can both work at their own pace. It working so far, I guess. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
happypamama Posted February 23, 2013 Share Posted February 23, 2013 My older two are three years apart. I originally started GSWL with both of them, since it's all oral, but my older child is very linguistically inclined, plus she was reading fluently, and she very quickly outpaced her brother. They tend to have very different strengths and tend to be somewhat competitive with each other, so I just stopped doing Latin with my son and let DD go at her preferred pace. I'm going to start GSWL with my son next school year, when he's in third grade. We do combine for art, science, history, and readalouds, but it just really doesn't work for everything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StartingOver Posted February 23, 2013 Share Posted February 23, 2013 I am starting with Getting Started with Latin, then will move to Wheelock. I did some Wheelock with the big kids years ago. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mmeblue Posted February 23, 2013 Share Posted February 23, 2013 I am teaching myself using Wheelock. I find it to be very clear, and I feel like I'm learning things (I'm on chapter 7). My children will not start Latin for a while yet, but I wanted to go ahead and begin my own study (I have additional reasons for wanting to learn it, including that I just enjoy languages). One thing I found when I started using Wheelock was this website, which has an email list with groups of people working through Wheelock and other texts as well. I'm going a little faster than their introductory groups go, but I still subscribed to the email list, which has some good conversation on it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldskool Posted February 23, 2013 Share Posted February 23, 2013 I am not sure if they allow it for parents, but a possibility would be to take it Latin online with Lukeion (they use Wheelocks). I think it is the best program out there. We did LFC when the kids were in the elementary years and I was able to learn along with them. But, in the later middle school/high school years it was clear they needed somebody with a full skill set in the language and so I outsourced to Lukeion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
boscopup Posted February 23, 2013 Share Posted February 23, 2013 I am using GSWL alongside my 3rd grader. It's going great. I needed something to hold my hand and go a bit slower, as Latin is completely new to me (I've done Spanish and German, but never any Latin). I'm not sure how I'll incorporate the other kids when the time comes. They're still learning to speak proper English and they aren't ready for the grammar rules in Latin (my 3rd grader had already done through 3rd grade grammar before starting, so he knew what nouns, verbs, direct objects, etc. were). I will probably just do GSWL again with the younger ones as they come up the ranks. My kids are all 2.5 years apart, so they're not going to go the same speed through Latin at the same time. I'm currently planning for my oldest to do Latin Prep in 5th. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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