Second Form Latin (A Homeschool Crew Review)

Disclaimer: I received a FREE copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way.

Early on in the kids education, I decided I wanted to start them on a foreign language early on.  I know that in my own schooling, foreign language wasn't introduced til high school and as such, my knowledge of Spanish can only be described as "muy mal" and I wanted the kids to begin their studies much earlier.  After trial and error, Ashleigh discovered she really enjoyed learning Latin and for the last few years, Latin has been her language of choice.  Thru the years, we have found that Memoria Press offered the most comprehensive coursework for learning Latin starting with early grades.  Using their materials, Ashleigh has made her way thru Prima Latina, Latina Christiana, and First Form Latin. 

We were extremely grateful when we were given the opportunity to review the Second Form Latin Complete Set, the next step in Ashleigh's Latin Studies.

Being upfront and honest here.  Ashleigh surpassed my knowledge of Latin when she finished with Latina Christiana.  Because of this, I am extremely thankful that the Memoria Press Complete Latin sets contain everything needed for her to independently study, because at this point in the game, I'm not a whole lot of help for her. 

The Second Form Latin Complete Set contains everything needed to teach the course.  The set contains 8 components:

Student Text -  This 120 page,  9x7.6inch softbound book that contains lessons for all 31 lessons as well as a student reference.  The smaller size allows for easily bringing lessons on the road without being bulky.

Student Workbook - Spiral bound soft cover book where students will find between 4-6 pages to complete for each lesson.  The book contains 211 pages. 

Quizzes and Tests Book - This book contains weekly quizzes and unit tests to gauge students progress and understanding of the material.

Teacher Key (Workbook Quizzes, & Tests) -  This 119 page, spiral bound book that contains the solutions for each page in the student workbook as well as the quizzes and unit tests.  Answers are colored to making a quick task in checking your student's work.

Pronunciation CD - containing 2 audio CDs, this reference allows students (and teachers) to listen to the vocabulary, declensions, conjugations and Latin sayings pronounced properly.  (This is NOT an audio of the actual lessons).

Flashcards -  These 238 double sided flash cards contain the Latin material on one side with the English translation on the other.   The lesson number is included on each card  - this is something I personally appreciate as I pull each set of cards when we start the corresponding lesson and add them to the pile that Ashleigh uses to review with.

Teachers Manual - Containing scripted lessons,  teachers notes, insets for each page of the student text and workbook (with the answers in color for easy reference), schedules, and informative background information, this manual provides all the parent needs to successfully teach the Second Form Latin curriculum.

Instructional DVDs - Taught by Glen Moore, this three disc set contains 8.5 hours  of instruction.  Each video lesson spends roughly twenty minutes going over unit review (which Moore refers to as "Latin Parties") and presenting new material using diagrams and illustrations.

Unboxing Video from when we first received 2nd Form Latin

In the course of 26 lessons and completion of this curriculum, students will have mastered six indicative action and three indicative passive tenses of all four verb conjucations, five noun declensions, three declensions of adjectives, personal pronouns, prepositions and an addition 180 vocabulary words to be added to the 185 vocabulary words the student learned in First Form Latin, bringing their total to 365 vocabulary words.

How We Used It

For this review period, we followed the sample lesson plan found in the Teaching Guide.  This recommends using the program 4 day a week, which worked well for us, however, we did decide to switch to 5 days a week to allow for her to have an extra review day each week.

For our typical week, we would start on Monday with Ashleigh watching the video lessons located on the DVD with Mr Moore. Video lessons are on average less than 20 minutes in length.  Over the course of the video lesson, she recites previously learned material such as first and second declension of nouns and adjectives, vocabulary words and phrases before being introduced to new material for the week, such as the weeks Latin sayings, new vocabulary and grammar rules. 

All the material being taught on the video is also explained in the student text.  Ashleigh simply puts her textbook in front of her and follows along with Mr Moore as he goes over the lesson.

Following the lesson, Ashleigh beings working in her workbook.  Each lesson has four worksheets sections that she works on over the course of the four days, so one worksheet each day.   These worksheets review previously learned material both in First Form Latin as well as the 2nd Form course.  These worksheets include word study, grammar, vocabulary, declensions, forms, diagramming sentences and more. Ashleigh typically works on one page each day in addition to listening to the audio cd and reviewing flash cards.  So on days 2-4, she begins with doing her recitation, followed by a section of her workbook.   The teachers guide makes it easy for me to guide her through the recitations and review by giving me a list of what to ask her to recite while the notes in the teachers guide that correspond with her text book makes it much easier for me to have an idea of the concepts she's working on so that I can help her when necessary.

If one is using the four day schedule suggested in the teachers guide, then on the fourth day, the student does form/oral drills and pretests.  The form/oral drills are found at the end of the lessons in the student text (9 are found in the appendix of the text).  The lesson quizzes can be found in the Quizzes and Tests booklet.  If the student does well on the lesson quizzes, they can then move on to the next lesson.  If they do not do well on the quiz, they are asked to review the material and retake the quiz to pass before moving on.

 

Five Unit tests are also found in the Quizzes and Test booklet.  These cover the collective material learned in each unit.  For example, Unit 1 covers Nouns and Adjectives, Unit 2 is Personal and Possessive Pronouns and Prepositions.  Ashleigh has not yet taken a Unit Test as of yet since she's currently on Lesson 6.  Next week will be a review week of all the material for the first 6 lessons and she will take the unit test that Friday.

Overall, we are very happy with this course.  It is a bit more challenging than First Form was and Mr Moore moves at a faster pace than in the first course, but that is to be expected.  Second Form marks the halfway point for her foreign language lessons, and while we are only a portion of the ways into the course, I can see how much she's grown just in these few weeks.

Memoria Press offers a wide variety of classical education curriculum in addition to their Latin language program.  Be sure to visit their website to find more information.  You can also find Memoria Press on the following social media sites:

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Members of the Crew have had the opportunity to review their choice of 6 different levels of Latin study with their students.   Be sure to click the banner below and read their reviews today.