We are stuck, What is there to do?

[Debi Stamey]

My daughter is on lesson 190ish in the Henle. She is stuck. We have reviewed and we have slowed the pace, but there is no going any further. What options do we have? I have racked my brain and can come up with none outside of placing her in a Latin class outside of home, which I don't currently know of any that exist in my area. We could switch to another program. I could let her go back and do LC II and give her a credit for that. There is no way I can catch up with her by the close of this year so as to continue with her. She has worked so hard and is so dissappointed. Originally she wanted to get through all of the Henle books. Now she just wants to get her two credits and be done. Any suggestions. I am giving her two credits for completeing (2) 36weeks worth of work as written in the Mother of Grace and Laura Burquist syllabi. I am going to title her credits Latin IA and Latin IB as she hasn't actually completed the 'normal' Latin I and Latin II credit. She is currently 1/2 credit short of that goal. I was considering letting her do both LC books and giving her that 1/2 credit. She feels awful and wishes we had never tried the Latin language. I have three other children who are currently doing Latin. This experience has definately changed my perspective on the highschool credit situation. Maybe I should slow them down before they get to far in LC.
debi

[Maria]

Debi,

My daughter is on lesson 190ish in the Henle.
There are only 42 lessons in Henle's First Year Latin. Do you mean exercise 190, or page 190?

Thanks,
Maria

[Debi Stamey]

Sorry
She has completed exercise193. That would be lesson 22 in the Henle Latin I Guide for Units III - V, or Lesson 16 from the Henle First Year table of contents.
Debi

[Maria]

Debi,

Thanks.

Since she's already completed most of unit 4 in Henle I, you couldn't really give her a 1/2 credit for LC II at this time because she's already beyond LC material in Henle.

What is she having trouble with? Also, what exactly did she review--vocabulary, grammar forms, or syntax?

Perhaps she could do a few song translations in Lingua Angelica I to get that last 1/2 credit. Or maybe you could get Oerberg's Lingua Latina: Familia Romana (http://www.pullins.com/txt/LinguaLatina.htm#set_1). She may only be able to get through the first few chapters of Lingua Latina; nevertheless, the experience might really help her to get a feel for Latin. Some home schoolers like to supplement Henle with readings from Lingua Latina.

Maria

[Debi Stamey]

She is having trouble keeping all of the 'grammar' straight so she can translate sentences correctly. The answer key doesn't say the same thing as what she has written and it is confusing her. She is jungling four books just to translate one sentence. Perhaps we are grading to harshly and therefore are drawing the conclusion that she doesn't know her Latin well. We have taken a week off every now and again to just review when we felt she was not getting the vocab or the new grammar etc.
Example of a problem:
**Book - Magnum numerum militum et equitum et elephantorum secum habebat.
**key's answer - He had with him a great number of soldiers and calvary and elephants.
**daughters answer - He was having a great number of soldiers and horsemen and elephants with himself.

My daughter says that the problem she is having is: Take "Reading Number Six" on page 176. It took her three days (1hour per day) to translate this exercise. She missed four and got six wrong endings out of the 22 sentences. Is that normal? She is thinking that it is not and that she has missed something that is causing her to go so slow. She is frustrated and ready to quit.

My question, never having studied a language before, is are we giving up to soon. Should I let her review for a few months while I catch up to where she is and then try to finish together. Should we just do some translation and then quit. Should we get another program and jump where we think she is. The sad part is that when we began this jouney in Latin she loved it and wanted to become versed enough in Latin to tutor the language when she went to college.
I have three other children, 8,11,13, with whom I am doing Latin. I am now very concerned that I am not smart enough to get them through a minimum of two Latin credits when they reach high school. I am panicing and thinking I should wait and do LCII until the ninth grade, but that goes against the reason we began Latin in the first place. I really don't want to purchase every Latin curriculum out there if our problem is lack of commitment.
Sorry to ramble. Thanks for your insight.
Debi Stamey

[Maria]

Hi Debi,

Thanks for the extra info. It helps a lot.

Perhaps we are grading to harshly and therefore are drawing the conclusion that she doesn't know her Latin well.
From the conclusions I've made below, I think so.

Example of a problem:
**Book - Magnum numerum militum et equitum et elephantorum secum habebat.
**key's answer - He had with him a great number of soldiers and calvary and elephants.
**daughters answer - He was having a great number of soldiers and horsemen and elephants with himself.
Your daughter's answer is still correct, literally. I mean, it could be a little more idiomatic, but it's still correct.

Take "Reading Number Six" on page 176. It took her three days (1hour per day) to translate this exercise.
That's fine.

She missed four and got six wrong endings out of the 22 sentences. Is that normal?
It depends. It seems to me she's counting some correct answers as incorrect, as I noted above. How old is she? I'm afraid she's not really qualified to correct her own work.

My question, never having studied a language before, is are we giving up to soon.
Yes, I think you are. Learning a language is challenging, especially when you're teaching yourself. I think your daughter actually knows her grammar quite well.

Should I let her review for a few months while I catch up to where she is and then try to finish together.
How far behind are you?

Maria

[Debi Stamey]

I began Henle with her and we stayed together until about exercise 55 or 60, but that was last year. She was going so much faster than me that I just let her keep going as I was actually slowing her down. I have started my other children in LCI and am doing those lessons with them daily.
As for the grading, I was doing the same thing she is doing. Because I am not doing the work in advance, I don't know how "correct" or "incorrect" an answer really is. In fact, giving her a grade has been extremely difficult. Do you count off 1 pt. or 2pt. for a wrong ending or for a wrong voc. Then how do you make that apply to a lesson that has 5 sentences and a lesson that has 25 sentences. Any suggestions there would be greatly appreciated as well.
We have been discussing the situation here at the house and think we could change her review and go back to Mom leading that, I have tossed around the idea of me jumping back into the Henle book (but I just don't know where I would fit it in)To be completely honest, we have not (in my opinion) been successful at making Latin the center of our curriculum. We have managed to make it a class, but I think we have a ways to go before it is the subject it is meant to be. Not having ever done this before, we just don't know how.
Your advise would help so much. I am committed to jumping back into Henle if that is what is necessary so give me your best suggestion. I would probably have to start at the beginning and that would take some time.
Thanks,
Debi Stamey

[Maria]

Debi,

In fact, giving her a grade has been extremely difficult. Do you count off 1 pt. or 2pt. for a wrong ending or for a wrong voc. Then how do you make that apply to a lesson that has 5 sentences and a lesson that has 25 sentences. Any suggestions there would be greatly appreciated as well.
An experienced Latin teacher I know gives a point for each word in the excercise. You could subtract or add a few points for style, etc.

Your advise would help so much. I am committed to jumping back into Henle if that is what is necessary so give me your best suggestion. I would probably have to start at the beginning and that would take some time.
If your daughter can type out her work and email it to me on a regular basis, I would be willing to correct it through email (I wouldn't give a score since I don't think I'm qualified, but I could give a suggestion). I haven't had the opportunity to teach Latin, but I have taught myself Latin using Henle's First Year Latin and Second Year Latin. Also, I'm not sure how long I'd be able to do it...probably at least a few months.

Other than this, the only route I can recommend is your catching up in Henle so that you can work through it with your daughter.

Maria

[magistra6]

Dear Debi,
Teaching oneself Latin is very challenging and your daughter should not be discouraged but proud of the progress she's made! I've taught Latin for a few years and found that very few students can keep up with the pace of the MODG syllabus. One thing I've done is to give credit is by counting 120 hours of work as a high school credit. The goal is to learn and enjoy Latin rather than complete a certain number of pages by a set date.

Maria's suggestions of working with Lingua Angelica or Lingua Latina are good because they'll be enjoyable and a relief while still giving your daughter a chance to use Latin. Also, sometimes students get so bogged down with analyzing each word and ending, they forget that language is communication. These resourses will help. Also review the tips on reading Latin on page 48-49.

In using the answer key, don't worry about word order. While subject-direct object-verb is usual, other arrangements are fine. Be sure to remember the alternate meanings of words so that if the key gives a different one, you know you're OK. (In your example; cavalry=horsemen, with him=with himself, and your daughter's "was having" is actually more accurate for the imperfect, than the key's "had"!)

As for grading, I give a point for each word and a point for each ending. (Your example would be 16 points) Total the number of points for the exercise and give a percentage grade according to points earned.

Don't give up doing Latina Christiana with your younger children. Even if you're not doing as much Latin or going as fast as you like, they're gaining so much. I'll chime in with Maria and offer to help if I can to answer questions or help you over any rough spots.

Pax et bonum,
Julia

[hcparker]

Dear Debi,

I've been reading some of the posts here over the last few days, and I didn't really have any intention of posting, but I felt compelled to jump in here, and so I joined this site just to respond to your post. I'm not a home schooling parent (in fact, I'm not a parent at all). I teach Latin and Greek at one of the state universities in North Carolina. I'm interested in the classical approach to home schooling, and I'm particularly interested in how students learn Latin and Greek in a home school setting. I don't want to come across as a know-it-all, but I would like to make a few comments, which I hope will be reassuring to you and your daughter.

First of all, your daughter has done well to make it as far as she has on her own. I know that she's frustrated now, and I fully understand her frustration. Learning Latin well isn't easy. It takes a long time, and most students get frustrated from time to time, and sometimes they get very frustrated. It's very common for students to sail along, as your daughter probably did for awhile, and then get to a rough section where everything seems hard. Then after a few weeks or even months of slow going the same students will take off again. For good students, Latin is sometimes the first experience they have with a subject in school that they find difficult, and that just adds to their frustrations.

Let me give just one piece of advice to your daughter (and this repeats to some extent what others have said, but it's worth making sure that your daughter understands this). When you translate from Latin to English, you're not trying to come up with a certain exact set of English words that conveys the meaning of the Latin sentence. What you're trying to do is to express the Latin author's thought in an English sentence, and there may be many ways to do this. The answer key to Henle will give you one way of doing it, but that doesn't mean that it's the only right way. For example, take a simple Latin sentence like "Filiam fratris mei voco." If this sentence were in Henle, the answer key would probably say, "I call my brother's daughter." But the following sentences would also be correct:

1) I am calling my brother's daughter.

2) I do call my brother's daughter.

3) I call the daughter of my brother.

4) I am calling the daughter of my brother.

5) I do call the daughter of my brother.

So your daughter's translation of "Magnum numerum militum et equitum et elephantorum secum habebat" is perfectly correct. I would certainly accept what she wrote—"He was having a great number of soldiers and horsemen and elephants with himself"—on a test and give full credit for it. She has followed the grammar and vocabulary of the sentence, and has come up with a correct meaning for it. Give her lots of encouragement (as I'm sure you're already doing) and don't let her get stressed out because her translations aren't exactly the same as the ones in the answer key. As the sentences in Henle get more complex, she will come up with the answer key's exact wording less and less of the time. But that's OK. If what she writes down means the same thing as the sentence in the answer key, then she's probably translated it correctly even if she uses somewhat different wording.

Best of luck to both of you!!!

Hugh Parker