Why These Texts?
- First Latin Course by Scott & Jones (1908)
- Meiklejohn's Grammar (1891)
The PNEU used these books for many years, and I am so happy to help bring them back into use! I believe they fit so well within a comprehensive Charlotte Mason program of study and bring immense value and enrichment to language study throughout the middle and high school years. Both texts help students make discoveries for themselves by noticing patterns, asking questions, and making careful observations. As Meiklejohn states, "What the learner has once observed for himself he can never forget." Both texts also use engaging exercises and offer a variety of work. These books do not define terms, set up charts to be memorized, or require lots of drill work, but rather provide interesting exercises that bring the student to knowledge and understanding on his own. These aspects really set the books apart from other, more modern curricula.
Language is relational! Scott & Jones and Meiklejohn both do an excellent job of helping the student see the relationships of words and the roles they play within sentences, and in this way bring forth not only assimilation of knowledge, but a genuine enthusiasm, appreciation, and enjoyment of language study that will lay a foundation for life. Another foundation that is laid with the approach of these books, and one that Charlotte Mason espoused again and again throughout her volumes, is that of habit and attention. These texts, with good guidance, help the student build habits of attention and steadiness in language study, just as picture study, narration, dictation, copy work, and nature observation do, and with such interest and pleasure. It is no wonder these texts were on the programs for so many years!
“Of the teaching of Latin grammar, I think I cannot do better than mention a book for beginners that really answers. Children of eight and nine take to this First Latin Course (Scott and Jones) very kindly, and it is a great thing to begin a study with pleasure. It is an open question, however, whether it is desirable to begin Latin at so early an age.” - Home Education (1905), p.295
(I recommend beginning in Form 2A, 5th or 6th grade.)
“I am more than delighted with Scott and Jones’s Latin Course. It is one of the most craftsmanlike books that I have ever handled. My raw youngsters now using it may be said to LIKE their Latin lessons.” - From a book advertisement in 1907, written by “The Headmaster of an important Grammar School.”