Jump to content

Menu

The Big Book of Lively Latin


LauraBeth475
 Share

Recommended Posts

I used it with my older two and just started it again with my youngest this summer. My understanding is that books one and two cover the material of a first year high school class. I print out a chapter at a time and we do one (occasionally two) double-sided pages a day. Our schedule varied between 4 and 5 days a week, but I think we spent three school years working through it. We would usually listen to her pronounce the vocabulary, but other than that we rarely made use of anything online. 

The one thing we do differently is I use Anki for flashcards because the paper ones quickly got out of control. Anki is wholly independent.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, SusanC said:

I used it with my older two and just started it again with my youngest this summer. My understanding is that books one and two cover the material of a first year high school class. I print out a chapter at a time and we do one (occasionally two) double-sided pages a day. Our schedule varied between 4 and 5 days a week, but I think we spent three school years working through it. We would usually listen to her pronounce the vocabulary, but other than that we rarely made use of anything online. 

The one thing we do differently is I use Anki for flashcards because the paper ones quickly got out of control. Anki is wholly independent.

Thanks!

Did your kids continue with Latin after Lively Latin?  If so, what did you use?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have one in the middle of book 2 and one in the middle of book 1. We like it. I do find it very open-and-go.

We tend to do it 3-4 days per week, and book 1 takes about 2 years for us. I think book 2 will end up taking 2.5-3 years at our pace. At first we watched the video lessons, but at some point both girls decided they'd prefer to just read the lessons rather than watching them. We do use the pronunciation audio files the first 2-3 times we hit a new vocab list. And I use the answer keys to check DD#1's work, because I have not kept up with learning it alongside her.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I used Big Book 1 it this past year with three kids who were in 3rd, 5th and 6th grades.  All three kids had previously finished Song School Latin 2.  My older kid worked through Latin for Children A when he was in 3rd grade at a traditional school.  I decided to keep them together in BB1 in order to make it easier on myself.  My goal for Latin prior to high school is to make steady forward progress; but we won't be setting any speed records.  They'll get more serious about Latin in high school.

So far, we are about 2/3 of the way through BB1.  Most of it has been review for my kids.  But, looking ahead in the book, I can see more challenging material on the horizon.  I knew it was going to be a review going into it.  I wanted a Latin course that was not going to be a huge burden because we have other priorities. 

The program is open and go, other than having to print the pages from the CD.  We tackle it 4 times per week.  We watch the video lessons and listen to the vocabulary pronunciation when there is a new list.  When we started, we read all of the Latin history lessons that are included in the book.  Toward the end of the year, we started to skip some of the history lessons.  Some of them were tedious - lots of names of people and they all blended together after a while.  We use Quizlet for flashcards; and we use the tests that come with the book.

Overall, I'm pleased with the program.  There are occasional errors in the worksheets and answer key.  But they are minor and we know enough Latin to get past them. 

I think the author and/or SWB in TWTM made recommendations on the next courses of study after completing the Big Books.  I'll see what looks best for each kid when the time comes.

  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

DS started BBoLL 1 half way through 5th grade after doing “Gettibg Started with Latin” He finished part way 6th, and took the NLE Intro and got top marks in 6th.  He did part of BBoLL 2 in the rest of 6th and first part of 7th, but we stopped in favor of doing Barbarian Diagrammarian with Lukeion (in preparation for Lukeion Latin 1 in 8th).

He really likes BBoLL - there were a variety of activities which were not long /overwhelming to approach, he loved the histories and military strategies, the pages were in color and included images, and he could do it 90% independently.  

Also, there was immediate application of the learning (similar to GSWL) in translation and other activities. This was key for us. The grammar first approach like Memoria Press uses doesn’t work for him - he does have an incredible long term memory but needs context and application (not straight up memorization). The same was true for learning math facts - he actually had to use them in problems, Flashcards/songs/drills were counterproductive.

He did three sides of a page (or a complete history if it was a history lesson) along with Quizlet review of vocabulary each day.  I also added some reading in Cambridge Latin in 6th grade in preparation for the NLE.  I put everything on his checklist and he could do things himself.  There are pronunciation files and video lessons on the website that you have access to with your purchase but DS thought they were a bit slow and got what he needed from the lesson pages.

The BB1 takes about a year and a half, unless you do it really intensely.  There’s a thread here somewhere in which a boardie put her schedule breakdown of BB1 that many people have found helpful.

In answer to your question, yes there are Word Power activities for English derivatives in each chapter (often more than one).  

  • Like 1
  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...