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What program is recommended for the study of Latin that is compatible with the balance HOD offers. Looking for 7 and 9 yr old boys. Thanks:)

We do Song School Latin 1 and 2 with my younger kids because you can make the lessons extremely short. We've enjoyed it. I don't use the DVD or the TM, just the student book with CD, and we only do a tiny bit each day--maybe 10 minutes? I got the flashcards and we do game with those, and we've watched some of the videos on the company's website as a review for units we've finished. Then we go into Latina Christiana from there, again without the DVD or anything, although you do need the TM for it. I started that with my oldest when we finished SSL, but am repeating SSL with my now 7 and 9 year olds, even though they have done it with their older sister. We also do Spanish, and I don't feel that this adds tons to our day. (Song School Spanish for the younger kids and Spanish For Children A for my oldest, and the three also do Rosetta Stone, and the very youngest (4) watches Little Pim. I know you didn't ask about Spanish but just throwing it in to show that our total language endeavors only add about 20-30 min daily and that's for 2 languages--very compatible with HOD balance)

I appreciate you telling me about spanish because we also will be doing spanish with rosseta stone. So yes I needed to know total time for both. Thank you

I use Classical Academic Press and really like them. I have done Song School Latin level 1 two times now and it is great. With my younger 2 kids, they are doing SS Latin 2 this coming fall. My oldest has moved into Latin For Children Primer A. It takes her about 1 and 1/3 of a year to finish one level. We limit the time. The Latin for Children series include a student workbook, DVDs, an activity book, history reader (she reads in Latin and answers questions in Latin) and a solutions manual. I purchased the clash cards game from them separately and we love that. I also paid for the online headventureland subscription but we don't really care too much for it. I set a time limit to her Latin of 20 min max per day. Her schedule looks like this:

Week 1 - day 1: Chapter DVD and first page of the chapter (vocab page) and play a game of clash card with 4 chapters previously covered (this creates some nice review). DVD takes about 10 min and the clashcards game takes 10-15 min.
Week 1 - day 2: Chant 2xs, 2nd worksheet in the student book is grammar teaching (the teaching is done on the DVD but is great to review on day 2) and then the 3rd worksheet in the student book is a preliminary quiz on the words.
Week 1 - day 3: Chant 2xs, 4th worksheet in the student book and 1 page in the activity book (there are 3 activity pages)
Week 1 - day 4: Chant 2xs, the other 2 chapter pages in the activity book
Week 2 - day 1: have her take the quiz in the student book and then there is a learning lesson on the final page of the chapter in student book.
Week 2 - day 2: She completes one of the translation activity in the history reader

They also have review weeks scheduled every four weeks. Every review weeks takes me about 8 days because there are no DVDs and there are a few more pages. We usually also schedule clash cards to be done 2 times in that time period.

For my younger two, song school latin takes about 10 min per day. This level comes with a student book, teachers manual, flash cards and DVDs can be bought separately as well. There are 32 Chapters in the book. Some of the chapters are review. Their are only DVD segments for weeks where there is new vocabulary. Approximately every 5th weeks is a review week. I keep a similar schedule but it only takes us one week to get through each chapter.

day 1 - sing the song with the new words and study the first page of the chapter.
day 2 - watch the DVD for that chapter and pass out a copy of the activity page from the TM for the prior chapter - the helps to build some review.
day 3 - we complete the 2nd page of the chapter in the student workbook.
day 4 - we complete the 3rd (final) page of the chapter in student workbook.

For weeks that are review, we don't watch a DVD. I spread out the activities over 3 days and then on day 4 we play a card game. I have just completed Song School Latin 1 with my younger kids. Song School Latin 2 wasn't out when my oldest dd finished 1 so this coming year is my first year using it. It looks like it reviews most words covered in 1 and teaches quite a bit of new vocab. Plus, it introduces some of the grammar that will be learned early on in Primer A. I am very excited to start it. My kids love it.

We also do 2 languages. We are learning Greek as well. We took about 10 weeks last year and completed the Greek Code cracker from Classical Academic Press. We are doing Song School Greek now and it is great. I like that CAP makes a point to teach a lot of words (in general for both Greek and Latin) that have roots that lead to English. I find that very interesting and helpful. For me, I love Latin. My youngest begged me for more school work to do last winter and that was the only reason that I added the Greek for her. My other kids got jealous and wanted to do it too so I let them. I settled on Song School Greek because it is interesting, fun and easy to add. We definitely keep this under 10 min a day too. I am not looking to kill myself with workload LOL. If we every get to a point where these two languages start to take over my day I will drop Greek. But for now, every seems happy as clams with it.

You could definitely do Song School with both kids. If you ever felt like splitting them up, moving the oldest to the Primer level would be fine. There is more grammar in the primer levels. You would need to have completed R&S 3 to find it comfortable. My oldest dd is half way finished with R&S 4 and that has been helpful. With the Primer series, I wouldn't go into the level until you get to a point that your child can complete it semi-independent. My dd does most of it on her own and she does a fantastic job. I probably won't let any of my kids go into Primer A until they are ready for that commit.

And finally, even though Classical Academic Press is "classical," they include a lot of activities and games in their program so it doesn't feel so classical to me. Or, I guess it could be the more gentle pace that I have set for the kids that helps too. I don't really know. But my kids really love it. I have been very happy with it too.

Ok thank you