BJU Life Science vs. Apologia General

[Roxy Roller]

I have Apologia General Science on the shelf for next year(7th Grade). I have seen lots of great reviews about BJU Life Science and I am wondering if someone will please compare the two for me. I have checked the BJU website and I can't seem to find a place to view samples of the text.

 

Thanks

[amtmcm]

BJU Life Science is fabulous!

 

You can see a sample of the first chapter here:

 

http://www.bjupress.com/product/228163?samplePage=

 

I also purchased the DVD that covers all of the labs and it is excellent. It was pricey, but I can use it again with my younger DD.

[Melissa in CA]

I love BJU's Life Science, but the two are quite different. Apologia is far more independent than BJU. I personally would not/could not use BJU's sciences without the online or DVD classes. Mainly because *I* don't particularly like science. I'm more of a history person. If I had to teach science, it would never get taught...or taught very poorly. So, if I did not own all of the BJU jr. high and high school sciences on DVD (from previously having the BJU HomeSat satellite) I would probably be using Apologia. Not because I think it's better, I actually have used both and I like BJU better, but because I'm a very lazy science teacher. The BJU teachers are NEVER lazy and ALWAYS love their subject. :lol::D

[Ann.without.an.e]

I went through a comparison recently. BJU is much more in depth than Apologia, giving you a text almost double the size. For a parent who would rather not have a lot of Science, I would recommend Apologia. If you want a more thorough, testing level of Science...definitely go with BJU.

[PeterPan]

The new homeschool site has samples. Maybe you clicked the subject kits and not the individual components?

[Roxy Roller]

I love BJU's Life Science, but the two are quite different. Apologia is far more independent than BJU. I personally would not/could not use BJU's sciences without the online or DVD classes. Mainly because *I* don't particularly like science. I'm more of a history person. If I had to teach science, it would never get taught...or taught very poorly. So, if I did not own all of the BJU jr. high and high school sciences on DVD (from previously having the BJU HomeSat satellite) I would probably be using Apologia. Not because I think it's better, I actually have used both and I like BJU better, but because I'm a very lazy science teacher. The BJU teachers are NEVER lazy and ALWAYS love their subject. :lol::D

 

I do not love science. I do not formally teach science until my DC are in 6th Grade. Right now my DD11 is using CLE Science 6, which is a light overview of science. I need something that is pretty independent. Is BJU independent if you use the DVDs? How many hours a week would my DD being spending on science if we use the DVDs?

[Roxy Roller]

BJU Life Science is fabulous!

 

You can see a sample of the first chapter here:

 

http://www.bjupress.com/product/228163?samplePage=

 

I also purchased the DVD that covers all of the labs and it is excellent. It was pricey, but I can use it again with my younger DD.

 

Thank you, I do not know why I couldn't find the sample before.

[Down_the_Rabbit_Hole]

We used BJU Life Science for 7th last year and in the past we tried to use Apologia General Science. We found Apologia very dull. The hands on experiments were silly for that age and very predictable. It was however a very child friendly curriculum. My son had no problem doing the few chapters we went through on his own but was bored silly. BJU on the other hand was not dull at all. Jam packed with info on Life Science that had my son informing us about through out the year. The student text/activity book is two large beautiful books. The experiments for each chapter are (in my son's opinion) real science experiments. There is a long list of science materials needed but the teachers manual will give you tips on substituting everyday type of things for the experiments, so this helps in you don't have beakers and graduated cylinders in your supply closet. I have not used the DVDs so I am not sure this will allow a child to do this independently. For us, my son did most of the work by himself. Each day I went over the review questions with him and we did flash cards of the vocabulary. The text explains things very thoroughly. The experiments were done by him with me only giving some help in setting up (I did however stick around because the experiments were interesting to watch).

 

Note: the online sample for BJU does not give a good sample in my opinion. Since they are a Christian publisher, the first Unit (usually 2 chapters) will state their beliefs about God, the Bible and what it means in Science. After this unit, the text dives deep into the subject area...life science, biology, ect, so don't think all you will get in the text is a Bible lesson through out.

Edited December 31, 2010 by Down_the_Rabbit_Hole

[Mom22ns]

 

Note: the online sample for BJU does not give a good sample in my opinion. Since they are a Christian publisher, the first Unit (usually 2 chapters) will state their beliefs about God, the Bible and what it means in Science. After this unit, the text dives deep into the subject area...life science, biology, ect, so don't think all you will get in the text is a Bible lesson through out.

 

:iagree:

 

We did BJU Life Science last year and dd will do it again next year. I skip almost all of the first chapter because there is a lot of religion and very little science in that chapter. The rest of the book is not like that.

[Melissa in CA]

I do not love science. I do not formally teach science until my DC are in 6th Grade. Right now my DD11 is using CLE Science 6, which is a light overview of science. I need something that is pretty independent. Is BJU independent if you use the DVDs? How many hours a week would my DD being spending on science if we use the DVDs?

 

Yes, BJU with DVDs was very independent for us. Plus, if your dd does not like labs, or you don't want the expense of completing all of them at the 7th grade level, they show each lab being completed during class. So she wouldn't miss the experiments and the outcome of them, etc., should you not assign all of them. There were some experiments that my ds has done previously in other science programs. He really did not want to do them again, so we easily skipped them, but my ds still got all the info by watching the class.

 

As for hours in class. Each class is 30 min long. It would take my ds about 45 min a day, sometimes more if labs were involved, sometimes less.

 

He was a lot like another poster mentioned. He learned so much that year and would always be 'teaching' us what he learned in science. He especially liked the anatomy of flowers section (I can't think of the scientific name this morning...need...coffee). He was dissecting every flower he could get his hands on and showing us all it's parts. :lol: