Time spent on foreign language (including Latin) in early high school

[happypamama]

I am qualifying that with "early," meaning ninth and tenth grades because I'm anticipating college or online classes for eleventh and twelfth, at least for modern languages.

 

How much time are you allotting for Latin and modern languages for those first two years of high school? Assume student is not at complete beginner level; I'm planning to designate ninth grade as Spanish 2 and Latin 2, possibly Latin 3. Kiddo memorizes vocabulary and constructions and all easily and quickly, but I'm not sure doubling the time spent will yield double results. I was thinking 30 minutes a day for each of them; I'm not convinced that an hour a day on each is going to double her knowledge and understanding. I think her brain will still need some time overnight to "chew on" what she's learned. I'm looking at the Latin book I plan to use toward the end of this year (Latin Alive 1), and I really don't see a lesson taking more than half an hour, but I also think trying to do two lessons in a day is going to be a lot. Like, she can absorb it quickly, but there's still a limit to what she can absorb in a day?

 

(And regarding Latin, let's just assume it's one of the kiddo's electives and that it fulfills no other graduation/college entrance requirements other than that, because it won't, and I'm thinking it unlikely that it'll be necessary for a college major at this point.)

[Luckymama]

Dd was a beginner in ninth grade, studied only one language, and took an online course. She doesn't fit any of your qualifications :lol:

 

(9th Arabic 1: 3 class hours, maybe 1 hr outside class)

(summer Arabic 2, 4 weeks of immersion)

(current 10th 2nd semester university Arabic: 4 class hours, 4-5 hours outside class)

[RootAnn]

DD#1 is taking an online Spanish 2 class (w/Sr Gamache). She has 2 classes a week with him (1 1/4 hrs each?) plus an hour a day on non-class days. Sometimes, in reality, she has a little less or a lot more, depending on if she's in the early part of a chapter or right before a chapter test. 

 

She's also doing Latin:  MP's 3rd Form Latin. Right now, she only spends 30 minutes a day, but I'm trying to ramp her up to 45 minutes + recitations, flashcards, & review. She'll take longer than a standard school year to get through it, but I found out that speeding through it at the pace the online class went last year translated for her to minimal long-term retention.

 

This is my first kid & my first high schooler, so take it all with a grain of salt.

[chiguirre]

Trinqueta is currently enrolled in Landry Academy's Latin 2 class which uses Latin Alive 2. She spends 1.5 hours/week in class and about 2.5 hours on homework and studying. So she averages about 30 minutes a day although she usually does her Latin in a couple of chunks instead.

 

I would not consider Latin Alive 1 an appropriate text for a Latin 3 credit. It's meant for Latin 1. There's also a Latin Alive 3 and Latin Alive 4 (which CAP uses in its online Latin IV and Latin V classes). Generally speaking, Latin grammar study should be substantially complete by the end of Latin 2. Latin 3 and 4 should focus on reading Caesar, Cicero, Vergil, Catullus, etc. The AP exam covers Caesar and Vergil. Usually, AP Latin courses are numbered as Latin V.

[emzhengjiu]

We dropped Latin to my disappointment, but both my daughters wanted to focus on a modern language only.  My older DD is studying French with Madame S. at the Potter's School and my younger DD is studying Japanese at a local co-op.  Thirty minutes a day seems light, but so much depends on the teen.   As the PP mentioned, Latin Alive is first year Latin. 

[happypamama]

Dd was a beginner in ninth grade, studied only one language, and took an online course. She doesn't fit any of your qualifications :lol:

(9th Arabic 1: 3 class hours, maybe 1 hr outside class)

(summer Arabic 2, 4 weeks of immersion)

(current 10th 2nd semester university Arabic: 4 class hours, 4-5 hours outside class)

 

Okay, that doesn't sound unreasonable -- approximately four hours for ninth grade, including learning an entire new way of writing. DD would love to do the immersion camp (admittedly, so would I), but there's this pesky thing called finances. ;)

 

DD#1 is taking an online Spanish 2 class (w/Sr Gamache). She has 2 classes a week with him (1 1/4 hrs each?) plus an hour a day on non-class days. Sometimes, in reality, she has a little less or a lot more, depending on if she's in the early part of a chapter or right before a chapter test.

 

She's also doing Latin: MP's 3rd Form Latin. Right now, she only spends 30 minutes a day, but I'm trying to ramp her up to 45 minutes + recitations, flashcards, & review. She'll take longer than a standard school year to get through it, but I found out that speeding through it at the pace the online class went last year translated for her to minimal long-term retention.

 

This is my first kid & my first high schooler, so take it all with a grain of salt.

 

You've got about two thousand percent more experience with high schoolers than I do, so thank you! Yes, that's my concern -- faster pace meaning minimal long-term retention. Maybe I should encourage more review and flash card sorts of stuff. She hasn't needed much of that yet, but our pacing has been pretty slow, with sufficient built-in review; it could be that she needs more as it gets harder.

 

Trinqueta is currently enrolled in Landry Academy's Latin 2 class which uses Latin Alive 2. She spends 1.5 hours/week in class and about 2.5 hours on homework and studying. So she averages about 30 minutes a day although she usually does her Latin in a couple of chunks instead.

 

Okay, reasonable goal. I haven't looked at Latin Alive 2 to see how much of a step up it is from what we've done so far.

 

I would not consider Latin Alive 1 an appropriate text for a Latin 3 credit. It's meant for Latin 1. There's also a Latin Alive 3 and Latin Alive 4 (which CAP uses in its online Latin IV and Latin V classes). Generally speaking, Latin grammar study should be substantially complete by the end of Latin 2. Latin 3 and 4 should focus on reading Caesar, Cicero, Vergil, Catullus, etc. The AP exam covers Caesar and Vergil. Usually, AP Latin courses are numbered as Latin V.

This is super helpful to read -- thanks! I thought labeling next year as Latin 3 was pushing it, but I really hadn't given it much thought yet. (Can you tell? LOL! I've been asking a lot of questions about high school lately.). She's been through GSWL, levels 3-5 of Latin's Not So Tough, and will finish level 6 this year. I'm hoping we will finish 6 quickly and move on to Latin Alive 1, with the intent of starting it this year and finishing both 1 and 2 next year (ninth). From the little I've looked at LA 1, it looks like much of it will be review for her. I gave her the 2015 NLE exams for Intro and Level 1 yesterday, and she scored 95% and 78% on them, respectively, so if all continues as it has been, I think I can justify ninth grade being Latin 2. (I'd actually be fine with moving right to LA 1, but she wants to finish 6 first.)

[Loesje22000]

30 minutes per language per day,here.

But not every language has the same amount of days.

3 days minimum, 6 days maximum

If you want to count the high school foreign language as a full credit, I would want to have at least an hour a day of work, including direct instruction, memorization, and translation exercises.  If you don't want to go "faster" through your text (and I'm not that familiar with Latin Alive), I'd recommend adding in a reader to supplement, like Lingua Latina, or one of the old, public-domain latin readers you can download for free.  The only downside is that Lingua Latina (or any given reader, really) isn't going to be keyed to your text, and may introduce grammatical concepts and forms that the text hasn't taught yet.  In particular, LL starts the passive voice and deponents much earlier than most texts.  (Personally, I like this, as most real Latin text are filled with deponent verbs).

 

Also, I would consider what your goals are.  From her NLE scores, it sound like she's covered most of a typical Latin I sequence in the last four(?) years.  However, Latin 2 is harder than 1, and Latin 3 is generally much harder than 2, for that is when you leap to mostly translation of real Latin, which can be a difficult change for many students. Starting with a reader early can help smooth this Latin 3 transition. If your goal is to get to Latin 4 or AP Latin in the next three or four years, she'll need to pick up the pace quite a bit from GSWL and LNST, in order to more closely cover one year of HS Latin material in one year of schooling.

 

Good luck!  A remember -- even if she doesn't study Latin in college or ever again, students rarely regret learning the language.

[happypamama]

If you want to count the high school foreign language as a full credit, I would want to have at least an hour a day of work, including direct instruction, memorization, and translation exercises. If you don't want to go "faster" through your text (and I'm not that familiar with Latin Alive), I'd recommend adding in a reader to supplement, like Lingua Latina, or one of the old, public-domain latin readers you can download for free. The only downside is that Lingua Latina (or any given reader, really) isn't going to be keyed to your text, and may introduce grammatical concepts and forms that the text hasn't taught yet. In particular, LL starts the passive voice and deponents much earlier than most texts. (Personally, I like this, as most real Latin text are filled with deponent verbs).

Oooh, a reader! She'd probably really like that, and you're right, it would add more time and, more importantly, more depth, without adding speed. Good idea!

[Luckymama]

Okay, that doesn't sound unreasonable -- approximately four hours for ninth grade, including learning an entire new way of writing. DD would love to do the immersion camp (admittedly, so would I), but there's this pesky thing called finances. ;)

A few comments--

 

Dd's Arabic 1 class was way too easy for her (it covered the usual level 1 topics---she just "got it" very quickly). I had expected her to spend 5-6 hours a week, including class time. An hour a day per language, just like for any other subject, is a good target time for a high school credit.

 

Scholarships, baby! Some languages at Concordia have more scholarship money than others. Dd had to write an essay as part of the application. (And now she's moved on to writing multiple essays for state department-sponsored immersion experiences :))

[happypamama]

I did not know Concordia had scholarships! Will have to look into that -- thanks! (If we had millions, DD and I would love to do the Spanish one, but DS1 and I would love to do the Italian one. And pretty much every one they have, haha.)

 

This has been a super useful thread. I really appreciate all the wisdom. I think the biggest takeaways I'm getting are: one, more review and vocab practice in our day, and two, she needs to decide if Latin is going to be one of her electives or not. I'm looking at what she's doing now and seeing where I can pare down small subjects to make more room for the four cores, a modern language, and a couple of electives (one of which will almost certainly be music, maybe with art included).

[Penguin]

DS has Danish 2 and Latin 2 this year (9th). Our umbrella school requires 180 hours for a credit - pretty much an hour per day.

 

We outsource Latin, but I design the Danish class. We live where the studied language is the local language, so it is easy to mix creative assignments with bookwork. But even if we didn't live in an immersion environment, I would try for some fun, active hours so it doesn't get tedious.