Once we received our box of goodies I took a few days and previewed the DVDs, checked out the CD and went through the teacher's manual. For Kaden I knew I would need to start small and take our time. What I was first impressed with was that the lessons were already in manageable chunks. Lessons start out with Practical Latin, being just a few words....nothing overwhelming. Then the main Grammar lesson, followed by Vocabulary....Kaden's favorite so far is learning the numbers. :) Afterwords is the Latin Prayers, Derivatives followed by the lessons exercises. The exercises have review questions, writing practice, listening to the CD to practice pronunciation and more. I like that there are different activities and that each exercise is short.
I have been taking German classes, so Kaden was confused at first how this was going to work. But, once I explained to him the benefits of learning Latin he was intrigued and ready to give it a try. My intentions was just to expose him to Latin and see where it goes from there. I was pleasantly surprised how well he did.
We started first doing one whole Lesson for the whole week then reviewing the following week before introducing the next Lesson. Is that necessary, no....but that's what you do with a Special needs kiddo, you tweak things to work for you. After the end of the 2nd week though I realized that because there are so many reinforcements, like the different activities along with the DVD and CD that we were able to get through the next few Lessons at a pace of one per week.
I divided it up to where he was getting the Practical Latin and Grammar lesson on Mondays. I usually write up on the board a reference to what we learned and I try and keep it up all week. Tuesday is all about Vocabulary and we get to take out the flash cards. We also would break out the CD and listen to the corresponding Prayer. We may or may not have listened to it all, even though we are not even half way through with the lessons. We were excited to hear everything. :) 
Most of the time I found he was still able to be focused, so we orally would go through the Derivatives. In a "neurotypical" world I would have him write these out, but his handwriting is a huge struggle, getting him to write out the Vocabulary words is all I can do for now. Thursday is our big day, we work through the exercises. What I noticed is the repetition, he knows what to expect and the sections are bite size. We start with 5 review questions and then 5 questions for the current lesson you are finishing. Translation of the current words along with practice time speaking with the CD and with me. And then comes the dreaded writing part, but that's ok he needs the practice. My favorite part is the Fun Practice section at the end. Kaden was asked to come up with a poem or song to help him remember the vowel sounds. He assigned each of them a color....don't ask me how he does it, but he remembers them. (A- yellow, E-red, I- green, O-orange U-blue) Another fun activity was finding invisible verbs in a current book your reading. Kaden was super stoked to even learn about invisible verbs. He is just grasping all the major components in the Grammar department. And this curriculum works nicely with what he's using for that. I was worried it may confuse him, but if anything it has reinforced what he is learning.
If you asked me if this would be something a child with Special Needs could do, I would say yes for sure with a few tweaks here and there. But, the short sections make it a possibility for every child that struggles with sitting still or staying focused for 20 minutes. I think obviously if you have a typical child within the ages range of 7-11 this is perfect. But, for Kaden who has Autism and is 11 this pushes his ability. He wouldn't have been able to do this a year ago. But, a year ago having the flash cards and CD would have been great. Even doing a Latin word of the day. Remembering that it's all about exposing our kiddos, they don't have to master every single thing we put in front of them. The words and phrases are so practical that are taught. And all of the examples and visuals with the DVDs make this an excellent way to involve even the most struggling students, not to mention that as the teacher you don't have to know any Latin at all to introduce it to your children. I am so thankful I have this program for Kaden...once again I LOVE Memoria Press for their simple workbook formats that appeal to sensory sensitive kiddos, easy to follow teacher's manuals and sturdy useful extras like the CD, DVDs and flash cards. We will definitely be getting the next level, Latina Christiana once Kaden finishes Prima Latina. Make sure to head over and Connect with Memoria Press on Social Media.
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