All,
I have been forced into the 21st century by my children who provided me w/ a 1st generation iPod to which, in my ever increasing desire to learn Latin vocabulary, I downloaded the appropriate Latinum podcasts. So now my question is, “How should one use them?”
Are they intended for Repetition? Memorization? Recitation?
I am interested in finding out how I can gain the most from these podcasts.
Thanks,
dlb
.
Hi DLB,
Laura Gibbs kindly pointed out your post to me. Latinum has a huge variety of resources on it - and depending on your ability level, you will want to listen to different things.
Have a read of this, I outline various ways you can use Latinum here:
http://latinum.weebly.com/
Thanks to both Laura and Evan. I will pursue this further looking forward to increasing my understanding of the language.
When I first encountered Latinum, I was overwhelmed by the volume of information on the site. It was very difficult to sort out where to begin, particularly at the rate that new material has been added to the site. (I will never understand how Mr. Millner has managed to put all this together, including videos)
The way that I approached it was to download the books and take a look at them. Most of the material is audio from printed sources, so it’s easy enough (links are provided) to pull down Adler or Comenius’ Orbis Pictus and have a look. From there I picked a book and started with it. Some I had printed at a print on demand service, some I use in electronic format.
For the audio, I chose to purchase from the Latinum store. This was simpler for me as it gave me a physical back up and collected all the material in one place. The cost is low and I’ve not had any problems. The only challenge has been that there is so much material I have to decide what to sync to my iPod.
The blog that metrodorus posted looks like a good collection of entry points. I’ll be looking at that again, myself.
I think what Evan is doing is tremendous. It’s been an inspiration to me for all the years I’ve been doing Latin online (we both started working on our various projects at about the same time). One thing that Latinum shows and that you can also see at my Bestiaria projects (http://bestlatin.blogspot.com): De multis parvis, grandis acervus erit. By doing SOMETHING every day, you end up with a big heap of stuff… and if you put your work online to share with others, you end up with thousands of blog posts and/or podcasts in just a few years. Of course, the same principle holds for students - if you can learn just a little vocabulary or read just a few paragraphs of Latin every day, you will be amazed at what you have accomplished by year’s end. 
After almost 3 years of self-study I am coming to the point where I must agree wholeheartedly with your assessment. And I will add that I am impressed with most of the good Latin sites which I have visited & have come to gain an appreciation for the amount of work that people like you and others have put into their sites.
I first listened to the Latinum vocabulary this past Saturday while driving. It took me about 1-2 minutes to realize how the podcast was structured and another minute or two for my mind to get up to speed. As I continued I began to wonder how to best use this material. I couldn’t repete it - there were no time gaps; I couldn’t memorize it - it was too fast and copious; I couldn’t recite what I heard for the same reasons. Now, after Evan’s post I have a better understanding of his approach. As a side note, during church today, as I was following along in Romans (I use the Vulgate), I could hear Evan’s voice from the podcast when I read certain words. So, there is merit to his methodology and I believe that I will approach the material from the standpoint of daily listening (and hoping that something will stick!)
Thanks,
dlb
.