Getting Started with Latin: Beginning Latin for Homeschoolers and Self-Taught Students of Any Age,   ISBN:9780979505102

Customer Rating: 

Great job Mr Linney

English is not my first language so I can feel how it looked like to start learning a new language, MOTIVATION

And the way to motivate me?

Telling me something interesting. I don't want to start with apple or tree. Well, Getting started with Latin started with nauta, stella, maybe some of the most beautiful words in the world to me.

Don't let me guess like Rosetta Stone, that's not my way of learning, why just show me the word or grammar in endless repetition rather than just let me know the answer? I can handle these things right now since I'm not a child anymore.(I say this because I still remember how I was frustrated by some simple English grammar rules when I was a child, now I can remember the first and second declension in a much natural way, so ,just tell me)

Not too basic for too long. Well, this is so great about this book, I finished it in 2.5 week with daily effort(I mean understand every word in every sentence in this book), that's really a balance between the time you spent and the content you learnt.

There's much more. One great feature in this book is the Latin Expression, which introduces many interesting Latin usage in modern world, the author does not explain a lot on that except the meaning and historic background. How can I say this is part of a motivation. Because some of them can not be explained using what you have learnt in this book. And I'm just happy to continue my Latin study in order to, say, find the Latin background behind them.

Another thing I need to mention is the free audio commentary from My Linney, which is a very helpful companion to the book, or say, it is a essential part for the learning, it's just like somebody is really teaching you something and Mr Linney explained a lots of details that you might be at first confused when reading the book

All in all, Getting started with Latin is a very good introductory book for Latin. I never think that I can get any fluency in Latin after finishing this book, but I think Mr Linney just succeeded in bringing the beauty of Latin to me, say, with the words and the Grammar(I can really feel the beauty of the Latin Grammar now, when I was learning Spanish, since the grammar is not very different from English, so many times I just get bored)

I highly recommend this book to anyone want to study Latin as a complete beginner.(even you say you are a serious learner and want a more formal and academic book. it just takes you 2 weeks, and it will boost your enthusiasm, that's the two week definitely worth taking)

Customer Rating: 

First: IGNORE the bad reviews of this book. The reviewers did not understand what this book is supposed to do and that is to introduce the TOTALLY oblivious to Latin so they can test themselves on whether or not they want to go further.
Second: All the FIVE stars speak for themselves. This IS the book that has allowed me to pursue Latin further and start to read Caesar and Cicero.

I am homeschooling Latin now, thanks to Linney.

Customer Rating: 

I thought long and hard about writing a negative review for a book that has garnered nearly universal praise. But just because something 'feels good' doesn't mean it's good for you or will do much to help you.

Working through Linney's book 'feels good' because you don't have to put forth much effort. Unfortunately, when you're finished, you will also not have much reward.

The book consists of a limited vocabulary of Latin words, presented one per page, and interspersed with short expositions about grammar and Latin expressions. The pages have lots of white space because so little information is given on them. Some pages are mostly white space: Lesson Two, for instance, on page 2, consists entirely of three sentences telling me that there is no 'the' in Latin. Am I supposed to draw in crayons on the rest of that page?

The next page consists of one new Latin word - 'sum' - with its definition, two sentences of 'instruction', and two translation exercises, one of which asks that I translate 'sum'. Hmmmm.

You can't learn Latin by taking these baby steps. Many people dislike Latin because it's hard, really hard to learn. Authors who peddle books promising to make it easy do a disservice to their prospective readers when their 'method' consists of filling entire pages with single words and incomplete lessons. Sure, that's easy, and virtually anyone can work through Linney's book, but they will not have learned Latin, nor will they have gotten a particularly effective introduction to the language. Linney takes over 200 pages to present material that in any other book could have been presented in 40 pages.

The other problem with Linney's approach to teaching Latin is that it's disjointed. Nothing seems to come together because it's given in 'chunk' form instead of organized cohesively and then dissected individually. Worse, there's no big wrap-up at the end to pull together everything from the book and make sense of it as an organic whole. Instead, the last lesson presents a new word (for 'many'), and there the book ends.

I'm a big fan of making languages accessible to people who were taught poorly in school and have, as a result, avoided them since then. I'm also a big fan of doing it right. Linney's book does make a tiny subset of Latin accessible to anyone who can read at a basic level. But he doesn't teach it right, and that means when the reader is done with Linney's book and then - confidently - opens a real Latin book to further his education he will be in for a most rude awakening.

Customer Rating: 

My wife and I have begun using this Getting Started book, teaching each other, as it were. We're both instructional designers -- I'm a tutor as well -- and our hats are off to the author! I've written instructional, home-study books (SAT, AP Bio, etc.), so I know a bit about what's involved. He's done a fantastic job.

We're about a third of the way through GS, and we are just thrilled with it. Can't wait to finish and start the online course: lectures based upon another Latin textbook.

It's always been a goal of mine to learn another language. Many false starts -- Hebrew in Hebrew school (didn't even start, really!); Spanish in high school; German in college and grad school; French and Russian in grad school. Many beginnings, some progress, no real mastery. So, for my 40th birthday to myself, I decided to remove a reason to berate myself by learning Latin, which my wife was also interested to learn. (She took six years of Italian in high school and college.)

We're both very interested in Roman art, literature, culture. I've spent five weeks in Italy over the past decade; my wife's family is from just north of Caserta. I've read a ton of Roman literature in translation; my two ultimate goals are to read the Aeneid and Tacitus in Latin. Some day in the not-too-distant future -- with the author's help-at-a-distance!

Customer Rating: 

I have a Ph.D. in English and am currently homeschooling my 7-yr-old son. I looked at several texts for teaching him Latin. I prefer this one b/c it is a simple yet systematic approach to learning the language. The sequence progresses clearly, logically, and manageably. The audio downloads provide clear, effective support for the lessons (they just repeat the lessons, but sometimes my son likes to listen to Linney rather than me!). One doesn't need any Latin background to use this book. I highly recommend it as a starter.

I also got Bell's _Minimus_ book, but I don't recommend it--not as the main text, anyway. It's not a systematic approach but more of a "Latin for speaking/cultural knowledge" approach. But who needs to speak Latin? It's more useful to know the forms of "to be" (Linney) than to learn to have a conversation involving, "Who are you?" "I am the mother" (Bell). I will use this book (since I bought it) after my son has a stronger grasp of the language structure. It's a fun accompaniment, but not the main text--certainly not essential.

For parents wanting to learn alongside their kids, I recommend Wheelock's Latin grammar, which is quite comprehensive but written (originally) for GIs entering college on the GI bill and having no background (or use for) classical languages. It's much denser and more comprehensive than Linney, but it is clear and accessible. Only the self-tutorial exercises have an answer key (as far as I can find), but it's a great intro to the language and even to Roman literary history. I recommend it as well.