Thoughts on studying several languages simultaneously? (x-post on curr. board)

[gandpsmommy]

I'm wondering if anyone else has had a young dc study both Latin and a foreign language at the same time, any issues or complications this might have presented, and whether it was ultimately beneficial.

 

DD began studying Latin this year (second grade) using LL BigBook I. She has been very successful in learning using this curr., and we plan to continue with BigBook II next year. I'm also considering starting a formal study of Spanish with her next year.

 

Spanish was my major in college, so I have a pretty good grasp of pronunciation, grammar concepts, vocabulary, etc. I have introduced some vocabulary over the years in mostly an informal or fun way. I have taught her color words, numbers, body parts. We have bought a few cds with songs or stories on them introducing Spanish vocabulary, but we haven't done any formal study of it, and I really haven't taught her as much as one might expect a hsing mom with a Spanish degree would have.

 

I wasn't an education major, and I chose Spanish because I loved grammar and language, not necessarily because I loved the history and culture or that I was enthralled by that specific language. If I had been better-educated, better-informed, I might have chosen something like Classics or English as my major instead, or if I had studied French in high school, I might have gone down that path.

 

I have really enjoyed doing Latin with her this year because, as I stated before, I love language and grammar. And she seems to have a gift for it, too.

 

So, I'm thinking that it might be a good time next year (third grade) to get a Spanish curr. I'm looking for one that actually teaches grammar from part to whole along with immersing the students in the language and introducing vocabulary. I've looked at Spanish For Children and I'm still trying to find other options.

 

I'm just wondering if it might be confusing to dd to begin studying the grammar of another language while she is still getting a foundation in Latin grammar. Since Spanish is a Romance language, in many ways Spanish grammar is similar to Latin. But I'm wondering if studying them simultaneously might make this confusing, whereas maybe studying Latin for a few years and then moving on to Spanish might be more advantageous.

 

Dd has been asking to do Spanish and dh thinks that it would be a good idea. I really would rather use a curr. where I could begin teaching her to read and write it and understand the grammar than just doing more sing-along, picking up of vocab. in a haphazard way, but I also don't want to confuse or overwhelm her.

 

Does anyone have experience with this or thoughts about it? Also, I've thought about just trying to follow the scope & sequence of my high school or college first-year textbooks, but adapt them to her learning speed and age-level, so that I wouldn't have to invest money in another curr. and just see how it works. But this is definitely, *not* my strong point. I really need curr. that is already laid out for me, with how much to do on each day and what to say. Any opinions?

[Pixie]

I never studied latin but I studied 2 languages in school: German and English. I started German in 6th grade and English in 8th (I went to school in France, pretty much everyone studies 2 foreign languages). I studied those 2 until 12th grade (I wanted to add Russian in 10th but it was incompatible with my math/science schedule :-( ). I never had any issue with confusion between the 2 languages at that point. It came later.

All through high school German was my stronger language but it never creeped up in my English, however in college I had one year during which all my classes (math, engineering...) were taught in English instead of French and then came to the US as an exchange student for a year so English became my stornger language and when I went back to German classes after stopping for a couple years I couldn't form a German sentence without English words getting in the way.

I think it would not have happened had I been able to keep taking German all along but in my case as my English got much stronger I wasn't using my German skills at all and lost most of my vocabulary.

[Elisabeth in IL]

In my linguistics class in college, it was said that a child could learn up to 3 languages at the same time and not get them confused. They were speaking about a young child learning them naturally, not with a grammar focused approach. You may want to keep the Latin as grammar focused and have a conversational approach with Spanish adding the grammar a bit later. This is just a thought with no real experience to back it up. I think that kids can do a lot more then we usually ask of them.

[phathui5]

What about something like Rosetta Stone? Or a Spanish class for children at the local community college (ours' has them for homeschoolers)?

[Laura Corin]

I don't think it's a problem so long as there's a little gap between starting one language and beginning the next. Calvin is studying Latin and French (and Mandarin) and there's little confusion. Hobbes began French in January and will start Latin in September; he also studies Mandarin and Greek but again I don't anticipate problems.

 

Best wishes

 

Laura

[swellmomma]

In my linguistics class in college, it was said that a child could learn up to 3 languages at the same time and not get them confused. They were speaking about a young child learning them naturally, not with a grammar focused approach. You may want to keep the Latin as grammar focused and have a conversational approach with Spanish adding the grammar a bit later. This is just a thought with no real experience to back it up. I think that kids can do a lot more then we usually ask of them.

 

This I am glad to hear. We are studying latin and the kids have plans to start Mandarin (they already speak a few words of it) because we have mandarin speaking friends, and ds has asked to study greek as well. I plan to use rosetta stone for the mandarin and greek, with speaking with our friends added for the mandarin. I only want them to be conversational with the mandarin and at this point the greek is just for exposure. I was worried that learning 3 languages would be confusing. I plan if those go well to add French in the mix in a couple years, though that will be like latin with a more focus on grammar, reading and writing.

[skaterbabs]

We've started informal French with DD ( 5 1/2); listening to French tapes in the car, watching DVDs with French as the language selection, etc. Along the first of the year we'll start written French, and add in auditory Spanish. After 6 mos or so of auditory Spanish, we'll add written Spanish. After that we'll continue with both French and Spanish for a while before adding auditory Latin (probably Sing Song Latin.)