Building Latin Vocabulary with Picta Dicta (A Homeschool Coffee Break Review)

Over the last several weeks, we've been having a little fun learning some Latin as we worked on a review of a product from Roman Roads Media. The Picta Dicta Vocabulary Builder makes the study of Latin vocabulary into a game, and it's something we could work on in just a few minutes a day.

Roman Roads specializes in classical education products that can be used at home or in a classroom setting. They produce high quality classical Christian curriculum, using video technology and the internet to bring affordable and flexible resources to homeschoolers. Picta Dicta is a self-paced online course that can complement a Latin class or can be done as a stand-alone course. It's a web application that works on iOS, Android, PC, or Mac, so it's very flexible and can be used almost anywhere. The emphasis is on learning Latin vocabulary, and it's done simple but colorful illustrations, audio for pronunciation and sentence context, and several different ways of practicing what is being learned. The Picta Dicta Vocabulary Builder is geared towards middle school, high school, and college students. It includes nouns, verbs, adjectives, and prepositions for more than 1000 Latin words and concepts. There are also Picta Dicta courses specifically geared for elementary and middle school students.

How did we use it?  Kennady and I both downloaded the app and we have a 14 month subscription - I have it on my computer and laptop, and she has it on her phone. We think of it almost like a game, where we can level up as we master the vocabulary. At first I thought she would get the most use out of it, but I think I've been using my subscription more than she's used hers. We've discovered that we both "know" more Latin than we thought we did, because so many of our English words (and French, since she's studying that) have their roots in Latin. And it really is a fun way to expand vocabulary and ability to decode unfamiliar words, even though we're not studying Latin as a stand-alone course.

So what does it look like? Here are a few screen shots and a brief explanation of how we work through a section.

There are 212 chapters altogether - well, each chapter has five "Games" and then reviews for all of them - so there is more than enough material to keep you learning for at least a year. And a subscription is 14 months, by the way.

It's set up like a military campaign - you Train for each Campaign, using games, and then you Go, which is the test of whether you're ready.

Here's the dashboard showing Campaigns and the Train and Go buttons.

First you learn the vocabulary words. Each is accompanied by an illustration. You see the word and hear it pronounced, and usually hear and see it used in a sentence. After learning and practicing, you get to test yourself in the review. In the first review you choose the picture and context that goes with the word.

In the second review you choose the word the goes with the illustration.

In the third review, you have to come up with the word and type it yourself, which tests your memory of the spelling.

The fourth review is where it got tricky. For me, anyway. In this section, you learn the genitive forms of nouns and adjectives and the third and fourth principle parts of verbs. And if you don't know what I'm talking about, then you too may struggle just a bit with this section. The illustrations are the same, so it's not nearly so easy to decode what's needed to fill in the blanks. To be honest, I wound up just guessing at the spellings and getting a lot wrong. The good thing is that the app did show me the correct spelling when I messed up. Still, for the most part, it's pure memorization here, since the illustrations don't give any new clues, and there's not really any explanation. At this point, I see the value of using Picta Dicta along with a full Latin course rather than as a stand-alone.

Hmmm. I need to fill in those blanks.

I guessed and spelled one of the words wrong. This shows the correct answers.

We faced a bit of frustration trying to memorize the genitives and forms in that section of each campaign, and felt like we were just guessing. But other than that, Picta Dicta has been a fun and painless way to learn Latin vocabulary, which I feel is valuable for expanding and understanding English vocabulary.

What we liked best:

• self-paced, and you can review as many times as you need to
• I think the combination of cues - illustrations, words, and audio - makes it fairly easy to learn and memorize the Latin words.

What I need to mention:

•  We floundered through the genitives and forms and felt like there wasn't enough teaching. I had the sense that we were tossed into the review without really knowing what we were reviewing. 

Is it worth high school credit? This has been a standard question I ask on curriculum reviews for a few years. In this case, the answer is definitely yes. Although Picta Dicta seems like a game, it covers a lot of Latin ground, so even as a stand-alone, if a student completed the course I believe it's a solidly earned credit for Latin.

Our bottom line: For students that already have a bit of a foundation in Latin, or are taking a class in Latin, this may be the most fun you'll have reviewing and expanding your Latin vocabulary. I think we may have done better in the form reviews if we'd done the other levels of Picta Dicta too. Still, we learned and we had fun doing it, so I believe we'll continue on these campaigns and see what other vocabulary we can conquer!

Would you like to explore these Roman Roads? Here's what you need to know:

Visit the website:  www.RomanRoadsMedia.com/

Pricing: A 14-month subscription to Picta Dicta | Vocabulary Builder is $79. Additional licenses for family members can be added at a discounted price. See the website for all the details.

Age recommendations: Vocabulary Builder is recommended for junior high students and older.

You can follow Roman Roads Media on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, and YouTube.

Visit the Homeschool Review Crew blog for more information and to read other reviews. Crew members also reviewed Picta Dicta Natural World and Fitting Words Classical Rhetoric, so be sure to check out all the reviews!

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