I know..I know Latin is a dead language, why study it. Many feel the same about Greek. But you know what it's important and I'm going to tell you why. The English language is made up mostly from Latin and Greek roots. English is also heavily influenced by French, which in turn has Latin roots at it's core. So by understanding roots, you can master words. There will be no word big or small that you can't breakdown or atleast get close to its meaning. So we don't study it because we think Euro-centric language and culture are the superior to others. But it is important to understand history and where things come from. Most words we use for government, administration, the law and other things that govern our lives come from French and these roots.
For example, we did a lesson on the word pandemic . The Busy Bees weren't exactly sure what it meant. They have heard the word thrown around alot lately. So I said, " Lets look it up!" I asked them the difference between a pandemic and epidemic. So the older kids got to work. We broke things down on our board. Then, we thought about other words that had these roots. From there they were able to break down the words and use context from what they already knew to help define...thus understand the words. And just like that, we had an English, Foreign language and vocabulary lessons.
In the weeks to come, I will share our favorite resources, ideas and lesson plans to those who join. I will show you all the things you can do without having to do all the leg work. So I hope you join us for so much more.