Learning Latin with son..but I'm falling behind

[Cedarmom]

My son and I are learning Latin together using Henle. He is doing great. He has memorized all the grammar forms. It is me, the teacher, who is struggling. I tried to use the summer to catch up on memorizing my Latin tenses, but I am struggling mightily. To translate, I have to look up all the verb forms, even the stuff I thought I knew is lost somewhere in the fog. I want to learn Latin for myself, but am about ready to give up. If it was just me, I might take it slower, and give myself more time to memorize subjunctive verbs. But that would slow my son down.

Should I slow down and just let him go ahead? The problem is, we do some of the work out loud together. I am not sure how that would work if I was behind.
Are any of you learning along with your kids? How do you keep up? I hear about students struggling....but what about parents.
Any advice for a discouraged magistra?

Cedarmom

[Crissy]

Cedarmom,
Have you heard of the Dowling Method (http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~wcd/Latin.htm)?
I first learned of this through Drew of The Latin Centered Curriculum, and it was a great help to me. That and making sure I dedicated enough time every day to my own studies.

[Beth in SW WA]

I am not learning Latin along w/ my kiddos. Mental atrophy maybe -- or just laziness on my part. I have the teacher guide and can correct their work, drill them on vocab and ask SOME questions to see how they're doing. They meet w/ a Latin tutor for an hour/wk so she is ultimately the teacher they are accountable to. I decided to take this year to read some Great Books -- so Latin had to fall by the wayside. I'm a great Latin cheerleader :)

[Cedarmom]

Crissy,
Yes, I did the dowling method this summer with the active and passive verbs. But, I still seem to have forgotten the passive(it just falls out my leaky brain) And now we are doing subjunctive, and it is all just swirling. I wish I had done the Dowling BEFORE I started trying to teach my son. My problem is I just can't keep Up!
Cedarmom

[Laura Corin]

Are any of you learning along with your kids? How do you keep up? I hear about students struggling....but what about parents.
Any advice for a discouraged magistra?

Cedarmom

I don't expect to know all the declensions and conjugations as well as does Calvin - my job is to guide him. I reckon I can do this for about another year before handing over to a tutor. I'm fine with that.

Laura

[Nan in Mass]

I'm struggling, too. I don't know anything about Henle, but I suspect you are having the same problems I am - not enough time to study. If I were learning Latin for myself, it wouldn't be a problem because I would use Lingua Latina and just learn the stuff as I read it, but I can't explain the grammar well enough to use LL so we are Ecce Romani. I love ER, but it does require memorizing stuff and it is extremely difficult at the end of a long day to sit down and do it. I've done two things this year which have really helped. First, I started having us chant things - the new vocab, an old vocab, and whatever grammar we are memorizing, before we do anything else in Latin. Chanting all together loudly is a pretty effortless way for me to get the memorizing done. I still don't know it as well as the children, but at least I know some of it. Second, I try to make time each weekend (when I have a little more energy) to read the story we are working on a few times. That cements the chanting better than anything else for me. Recently, I began to make flashcards for the vocab and memorizing them during gymnastic meets. That will probably end when meet season ends and I don't have hours of waiting (and watching) to do every Sunday (why do boys always get the Sundays and girls the Saturdays?), but at least in the meantime I've got some of those rather similar adverbs memorized. I've also, at times, had a child quiz me in the car. This helps my bad-at-memorizing child get started memorizing the vocab, and helps me. And it doesn't take extra time. And if I announce in the morning, during Latin, that we are going to do this, then my children make me do it even though I don't want to by the end of the day.
Hopefully something in these suggestions will help you. I really recommend chanting those endings all together every day.
-Nan

[Cedarmom]

Nan-
Thanks for the ideas. Last year we used the Memoria Press guide and did lots of chanting . Not my ds's favorite-but I think we need to do it.

Laura- I think I may need a tutor next year. Thanks for the reminder my job is to guide my son, I think I'm doing o.k. with that

update- I talked to my son and he is feeling a little overwhemed too, so I think we will slow down. Though I am concerned that we won't be doing it as fast as we should be.

Cedarmom

[Nan in Mass]

Every once in a while I stop and we rememorize the grammar. My children hate the chanting, too, but it actually works. We tried Latin Primer briefly at the beginning of homeschooling, and I discovered that the stuff we had chanted from that, even sporadically, actually stuck. I also hear the children chanting when they need to know an ending, so I know that is what is working. Fortunely, it is fairly easy to do. I just have to DO it. Mine have the stuff memorized well enough that they can usually translate from Latin to English, but not nearly well enough to go the other way around if it isn't something very simple. I let them use the charts for that.
-Nan

[LisaNY]

Nan-
Thanks for the ideas. Last year we used the Memoria Press guide and did lots of chanting . Not my ds's favorite-but I think we need to do it.

Laura- I think I may need a tutor next year. Thanks for the reminder my job is to guide my son, I think I'm doing o.k. with that

update- I talked to my son and he is feeling a little overwhemed too, so I think we will slow down. Though I am concerned that we won't be doing it as fast as we should be.

Cedarmom

How old is your ds? At what point in Henle are you? At times, you will hit walls in your Latin journey. :) It is important to take those times, and turn them into an opportunity for review, review, review. Slow, steady progress reaps better retention than fast-paced, overwhelming study. It takes *time* to learn a new language - *especially* Latin, IMO, because it is so different from our language. You need to keep on top of language study daily, or you will lose momentum. I would stick to the guide that you started with. I think guides are an excellent way of keeping yourselves on track.

Try to keep yourself on schedule, but allow for your ds to move ahead if he is ready. Have you joined the Henle yahoo group? It is excellent, and full of very helpful people. HenleLatin@yahoogroups.com

[Ms. Riding Hood]

I can totally relate to you on this one. My older ds finished Henle I without me and is now in Henle II. However, is is a diligent self-learner who carefully reviews and corrects his mistakes. If he doesn't understand why something is, he looks it up. Now, ds 13 and I are stuck somewhere around Henle I, lesson 326--in the mire of passive subjunctive. :) I have just decided that we'll go as slow as we have to go, working together. We've worked too long to give up now. All I can tell you is that daily work on it helps a ton, even if you just review quickly over the conjugations or vocabulary. That stuff rusts up so fast that before you know it you're like the Tinman and totally frozen up. :eek:

I am attaching a file that I made of all the conjugations. I find it helps me so much to see them all together in one place, rather than chopped up as Henle has them. I can see patterns that help them stick in my memory. I originally divided them by active/passive, but I think I like this division by indicative/subjunctive better. Take a look. Maybe it will be a little help?

As for grading, personally I could not grade any of my kids Latin work without doing it with them. There are too many variables (IMHO) that I see, ways you can translate other than strictly as the key has it. Without knowing the stuff, I'd be lost.

Hmm. Well I guess I can't load that file? I think it's too big. I'll try again later.

[Cedarmom]

Ms Riding Hood
"I can totally relate to you on this one. My older ds finished Henle I without me and is now in Henle II. However, is is a diligent self-learner who carefully reviews and corrects his mistakes. If he doesn't understand why something is, he looks it up. Now, ds 13 and I are stuck somewhere around Henle I, lesson 326--in the mire of passive subjunctive. :) I have just decided that we'll go as slow as we have to go, working together. We've worked too long to give up now. "

Thanks for the encouragment. Guess what lesson Im stuck on? Lesson 326!
Thanks for your advice and others who said just take it slow and keep on working. Do you remember the movie about the fish ,Nemo and his friend Dory her mantra was "Just keep swimmin',just keep swimmin'" So in the pool of Latin I think my ds and I will "just keep swimmin'"

LisaNY-
Thanks for the encouragement. Yes, I am a member of the Henle Yahoo group. I love their answers. I may post on that site and ask for memory
hints.

I am usually a lurker,but I'm very glad I posted. You guys are all very encouraging. Thanks

Cedarmom