You Don’t Have to Be a Scholar to Include Latin in Your Homeschool

We may earn money or products from the companies mentioned in this review or post, but all opinions are our own.

We have included Latin as a part of our curriculum since our first group of kids entered 6th grade. We were so glad to have a chance to review Memoria Press’ Third Form Latin Complete Set and were looking forward to using their DVD to help teach the lessons.

We just discovered that four credits are required to fulfill the Foreign Language requirement for the college my oldest daughter plans to attend. Memoria Press makes it easier to study in the same format for all four years, and with the DVD to assist it was even better. Now my daughter will only study a foreign Language if she wants to in college.

Give Your Children the Gift of a Better Education

We are homeschooling parents of 10. We are busy and we need a curriculum that work from day one. I have a degree in graphic design and am a freelance writer, not a scholar and not a linguist. I was actually so poor a student that I was a high school drop out before getting back on track with the help of homeschooling. So why would a failing student turn around and choose to teach Latin in her homeschool?

Great question, because Latin helps create stronger students.

Latin Aids in Spelling
As a student, I was a terrible speller. No tricks would make letters stick together. As I learned about root words and their origins, I began to unlock my spelling mystery. Knowing why words were spelled in a certain way helped me to learn how to identify similar words and spell them correctly also. I chose to include Latin so my children could master phonics faster and spell with concrete understanding of how words were built.

Latin Unlocks the Meanings of Words
Remember taking the tests as a child where unfamiliar words would be on one side and a ton of definitions would be on the other. Latin helps your child unlock those words because over half of the root words come directly from the Latin language.

Learn Latin and You Can Learn any Other Language Faster
Latin is the root base to all the other languages in the Romance Language family. The structures you learn in Latin will carry over into other languages as well. When your child decides that they want to learn Spanish you will be amazed how fast they pick it up if they have a Latin foundation.

Every Medical and Science Term is Rooted In Latin
Not a few, not half, ALL of them. Should you child take up studies in a science relevant field they will thank you for their Latin mastery. As you begin to study you begin to see how Latin is everywhere.

In the words of Cheryl Lowe from Memoria Press, “Latin is not dead; it’s immortal.”

Memoria Press created this Latin course with home educators in mind

They expect that you don’t have experience with Latin. They created a course that I was able to easily use with my Middle school children and they have continued to use with little assistance through their high school years. Each week we have four brief lessons where we watch the lesson on the DVD or listen to the pronunciation CD and a fish lesson for review. There are review tests and quizzes throughout so you never have to guess if your student is actually getting it. You will see them adding new words to their vocabulary week after week.

We have never been stuck looking for an answer in the text book

The teachers key is an exact replica of the student book. Extensive notes are easy to understand in the accompanying Teachers Guide. Latin drill cards are a great tool to add to your order, but the best purchase you could make by far it the Instructional DVD. The three disks cover ever lesson and includes reviews so your student has plenty of repetition. This is one time that the whole set contained items we used every day. Together they provide every thing you need to learn with out the frustration that some programs leave you with.

Memoria Press is an outstanding leader in educational materials. They are one of my favorite companies to order tools from every year.

What if You Are Just Starting?

We began with Prima Latina with our 5th grade year. They suggest that your student have a basic understanding of grammar terms before you begin so it is a great idea to do a good recap of those before you begin. We followed that with Latin Christiana Complete Set and began with First Form Latin in the 8th grade. Everything you need is right there to jump right in at any time. I suggest that everyone take the first two courses, for all of the reasons I listed above and all the ones you are going to find as you check out the Memoria Press site and read more about them. You can also read Crew Reviews for other Memoria Press Classical Curriculum sets like Nature’s Beautiful Order by clicking the link below.

You can also find them on Facebook @memoriapress, Twitter @MemoriaPress and Pinterest @memoriapress