I have read lots of stuff for grade school science, but what is out there for high school science. I have an 8th grade boy who is not academically minded; he is a willing student though. Apologia and Abeka would be too much for him. He would have great difficulty understanding it. What have you all tried or heard of? Also has anyone taken their child through high school and not taught the usual sciences as in biology, chemistry, and physics? If so, what did you teach for science and were you pleased with the end result? I do want him prepared for college if he chooses to go that route. I look forward to hearing what you all have to say. Hope this is not a repeated post. I did try to search past posts, but did not have any luck finding any.
Science My high schoolers do online classes with Apologia. Look into Rainbow Science and Spectrum Chemistry. We haven't used them.
You could look at Rod & Staff (samples at www.rodandstaffbooks.com -- R&S doesn't have a website, but this is a bookstore that sells their stuff and others). He could start ninth grade doing their 7th grade stuff, then their 8th in tenth, 9th in 11th, and 10th in 12th. Each year is a general mixture of science topics, so he'll get health, life science, earth science, and physical science, with a bit of chemistry too by time he's done. They're not terribly expensive, and they don't have tons of books for each course (student text, TM, quiz book, TM, test book, TM, student activity book, TM..... like some have) -- The R&S TM has the answers in the TM for the textbook questions, any worksheets that might be extra practice, and the tests. So all you really need is the student book and the TM, and a test book if you don't want to type out your own tests from the TM.
Switched on Schoolhouse or LifePacs are another option. My son is back to doing an older Abeka Earth Science which is 9th grade stuff and honestly it's pretty straight forward and not a ton of "stuff". We are doing about 1 chapter per week (we are using it through Seton which does their own lesson plan). Now they use Abeka or Apologia for Biology in 10th grade and I'm not sure which route we will go - it will be up to him I think - but I want to take a look at the Abeka one before I go that way (though I have no problem with the Earth Science right now)
Thanks for your suggestions . I will look at Rainbow Science, Spectrum Chemistry, Rod and Staff, Switched on Schoolhouse, and LifePacs. Also, thanks for the web site. We did do some LifePacs this year. He seemed to like it though we did not do any of the tests or activities.
Thinkwell has good science products, check the homeschoolbuyers co-op for discounts. www.hippocampus.org has free courses. The virtual homeschool group has some courses online. APCollege central has lab requirements for various subjects for AP level. They are good to look through and figure out which ones you might like to use.
we did Apologia Science for Biology and SOS Science for the other two years. They have sceince projects to do and everything, SOS = switched on school house. BJU also has science books, ds18 used them and SPectrum in his private school science. They were both really interesting!
Biology, physics and chemistry are prereq's for most 4-year universities. Just to warn you. He will need to take them to meet entrance requirements. Basic sciences don't even count. (like a "General Science" or "Earth Science" course). Now (8th grade) is the time to plan his high school curriculum. You have to plan all four years in order to meet college entrance requirements. Any college website can tell you their entrance requirements. I would suggest you check the ones for your state universities. They tend to set the ways. Private schools are somewhat more strict and often have more advanced requirements, but they are also often willing to work around one or two requirements with a good SAT score and good grades. So check your state university's college catalogue to look up the entrance requirements. Honestly, I taught one all the way through and two part way through high school. At the time my first went through, the schools were not cooperative with home schools in any way, so there were not a lot of options to meet college entrance requirements. I used Bob Jones, which was a little less advanced than ABEKA. I did use ABEKA for chemistry because at that time they had a video chemistry which was far preferrable. So I guess my suggestion would be the following: If you can at all enroll your child in the ps or private school for just these courses, it honestly is preferrable, mainly biology and chemistry, and mostly because of the labs. I just never found a way to do adequate labs at home, mostly due to the cost. I spent literally hundreds of dollars (like 500) on my oldest's biology labs and really felt like she did not get enough. So while it pains me to recommend anything from a ps, I would recommend using them for these two classes. The one recommendation I would have is to thoroughly research the school you use. You are not limited to the local school. Since you will be transporting them, anyway, you can go to pretty much any school you may want for a small fee. The only alternative I could recommend is possibly something like Switched on Schoolhouse where there is an extensive video lab. But honestly, it is nothing like the real thing. Let's face it, it's pretty hard to know how to dissect a frog unless you get your hands dirty and smell the formaldehyde! And for both chemistry and biology, while these things are available, they are hard to teach when you haven't been involved in them for, say, 15 years P), and to purchase all of the equipment (dissection kit, frog, bunsen burner, vials, test tubes, petri dishes, agar-agar, chemicals, glass rods, and on and on), is absolutely prohibitively expensive to my thinking. Might as well get something out of the school taxes we pay. lol.
If you're looking for a Christian science perspective the following site has a list of Apologetic resources ... go to the Answers in Genesis website and click on Education. There's tons of study guides and links to other apologetic websites ... I'm a bit of a newb to homeschooling ... but I hope this helps.
Check out ACE science. My dd is not a science person, but their Biology has become her favorite subject this year.
Thanks for all the great ideas. I sure do have my work cut out in researching the different curriculum and web sites. Thanks again.
I am lucky in that there is a homeschool co-op in our area. We are able to do our labs through them. Rachael did a Biology lab last year, and is doing chemistry this year.
Thats where our science is mainly done too, SOS is on the side for when we dont do the other, cause its alternate weeks
There is just so much out there. Sending your child out is a great thing, if feesible. Otherwise, there is also BJU science, Real Science For Kids, Paradigm, many programs online, Teach12, etc.....
Co-ops are a great place to do science. Unfortunately there is not any close co-ops. The only co-op which is quite far is too expensive. We taught our daughter the high school sciences. Truth be told, it was my husband that taught her the sciences and math for high school. Now she is majoring in biochem. Guess she learned enough at home. But my son, at least at this stage in his life, would just get very frustrated using the same books my daughter used, Apologia science books. Apologia is a great curriculum for those who can handle it.
So what are you going to use in place of Apologia? It was (is!) good for my oldest, but I'm not sure it will work for my middle one.
We're still deciding on what to use for high school science. I have an 8th grader this year, for whom I have used ACE last year and this. I figured she needed a break, because she was doing some other harder courses, and doing the ACE doesn't require a whole lot of thought or studying for her to do well (her words, not mine!). But for next year, I've given her a choice between Apologia General Science, or Abeka ninth grade physical science, or Lifepacs, (I've used all of these with other kids through the years) or just what would she like. She - for now at least - has expressed a choice for Lifepacs. But I'm thinking I may switch up on her and have her do CLE, which are very similar to lifepacs but less expensive per workbook.
