new to Latin for homeschooling

[antoniag4]

I have started Prima Latina this year with my 3rd and 2nd graders, who are both advanced readers. I have been going slow--mainly because my time is limited and other subjects often take precedence. They love Latin. I use a lot of Well Trained Mind curricula suggestions. What I'm wondering is should I really try to move the Latin faster? I have no Latin background, so I'm learning as well. Part of my thoughts about moving faster are that I want to start a language and am considering Greek for a number of reasons. So the second question is two-fold: Is Greek a reasonable second (to English) language to learn and how much Latin should they have on-board before starting a second language? For that matter, any opinions on when to start another language. This may all be wishful thinking---when I consider the reality of my schedule, but I am fascinated by [the idea of] Rosetta Stone for learning another language. For that matter, is there any advantage to doing the Latin with Rosetta?

Toni G.

[tanya]

Hello!

There is really no rush in your Latin study. I think you are really better off to take it slowly and let your children digest the vocabulary and grammar forms before moving on. I would recommend that you do an oral recitation review with your children at least once a week to further solidify what they have learned.

At Highlands Latin School, we begin the study of Latin in the 2nd grade. The students then have Greek in the 7th-8th grades. This is in addition to their continued study of Latin. They seem to do well with that, but they have had several years of Latin by the time they begin Greek. I think that the languages are so different that it isn't confusing. And the grammar they have learned in Latin is certainly of benefit when they begin Greek because they are already familiar with conjugating verbs.

I really don't have any experience with Rosetta Stone, but it looks to me like it would be a good study if you were taking a trip abroad and needed to be able to generally converse with the native population. I can't tell how well it teaches grammar or prepares one to actually read the language. I'm sorry I can't be of more help here.

If you have any further questions, I will be glad to help you.

Tanya

[jeremiah213]

It seems that Tanya answered your Latin Velocity question well, so I have a comment about Rosetta Stone. First of all it is a really great program... the intent of it is to mimic immersion language learning without traveling to the land where this language is spoken, and so it can be very effective for modern languages, ones that you will actually have practice speaking.

This strength of Rosetta is (as is typical) also it's greatest weakness. Although you will improve quickly in coversation your knowledge of the inner workings of the language will be a mystery... and much of the mental benefit of taking on another language is lost in trial and error word/picture associations. So...

Learning a Language to speak it? Rosetta Stone is great
Learning a language to understand it? Use a Grammatical Approach.

glen