Cycle 3 Latin/English John 1

Putting this here to prove to my future self I’m not crazy when (if) it changes again.

You know you’ve been in Classical Conversations a long time when they’ve switched the memory work on you multiple times, and you feel gaslit by an otherwise charming and lovely curriculum. lol

It’s not CC’s fault… well it is, but it’s understandable. They occasionally update their curriculum and it’s not their fault I was in my 20s and had two kids when I started CC and I’m now in my 40s with four kids (and the kid who started CC as a 5-year old is now an adult). There were some good old days back there when I was a Foundations tutor and pregnant with my third and would have to run for the nearest trashcan while a kind mom took over my class for a minute. Now I’m just a cranky old Challenge director giving highschoolers the stink eye when they eat snacks through a heart-rending discussion about the Scarlet Letter.

All that to say, Andria and I could NOT figure out the Cycle 3 Latin this year. We wrote an entire workbook to make Latin accessible for ready-to-quit families, but couldn’t figure out the English translation for Foundations. Thankfully the Vulgate never changes, so at least we got that part right.

We printed these sheets, laminated them, and we sing them every morning of Cottage School so the kids have them down pretty good by now although the English is so different from the regular translations we’re used to, that we’re still messing that part up. I think the idea was to pick a translation that more matched the Latin, but if you’re a Challenge director, you will find yourself explaining that half the words are wrong from what they’ll be told in Challenge A, but whatcha gonna do. This is why people have dedicated their whole lives to translating Scripture.

…also we included some tracing sheets for fun.

Free Multiplication Flashcards (That go up to the 15’s)

Multiplication flashcards for you! And multiplication flashcards for you! 

Because what everyone needs in their life is MORE flashcards…obviously. 

No, but seriously, these aren’t your standard Target dollar bin flashcards. These go up to 15×15’s which is like the Moby Dick of the flashcard world. You can find up to the 10’s and sometimes the 12’s, but the 13’s, 14’s and 15’s are pretty much impossible to find anywhere (and for good reason, those 13’s and 14’s are pure evil). The only reason I allow such a thing in my house is because CC does them in Foundations, and requires them for Memory Master.  Yes, my older children tell me that it is way easier to do algebra and upper-level math if you see those higher patterns easily. And yes I’ve noticed that the kids with their times tables memorized get through their math faster and with fewer tears. And yes, my 9-year-old uses them to count sheep, chase away werewolves, and ward off bad dreams at night, but you can never convince me that 13×14=182 is anything less than nauseating.  

Classical Conversations bookstore sells a beautiful set of laminated math flashcards that go all the way up to the appropriate 15s, but there are two problems with them.  One they are double-sided, with equations and answers on both sides. A genius solution if you don’t want to carry a mountain of flashcards everywhere, but a real problem when you’re trying to sort out which ones your student knows, and which ones they still need help with. Also, smart kids with photographic memory tendencies, have a habit of remembering the answers for the other side. The other problem is that like all flashcards, they are prone to being chewed on by pets (or baby siblings), used as a bookmark, or lost in the depths of mom’s purse because she naively and optimistically packed them to the dentist. I am embarrassed to admit how many sets I have bought over the years. 

So I finally caved and made my own, mostly so I could print replacement cards whenever I lost one.  

In case you are like me, here you go. My gift to you. Single-sided commutative law flashcards that go up to the 15’s. Now you too can drown in an absolute sea of multiplication flashcards. 

You can download them for free here.  

Or if you feel like supporting my Etsy shop, you can buy them for 99 cents here.  

Also (because once I got going, I couldn’t stop), I made a matching game out of them for all you matching game lovers out there. You can download that here (or it’s also included as a freebie in the Etsy set).

May your printer smile upon you (and I strongly recommend printing in black-and-white with “save toner” selected. Hope this helps!