tammyw Posted June 11, 2013 Share Posted June 11, 2013 We did RSO Chemistry with our daughter for grade 3/4 (we took our time) and will do RSO Biology Level 2 with her for this year (grade 5). Initially I was going to have DH do the RSO Chemistry with my son who just turned 7 (grade 2 level), but my husband thinks we should wait another year at least. Should we do another "curriculum" for science or just focus on living science books with experiments thrown in every week, etc. Thoughts? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted June 11, 2013 Share Posted June 11, 2013 I'll vote for living books and lots of fun experiments :) My kids enjoyed NOVA Hunting the Elements. Link to teacher resource page http://www.pbs.org/w...collection.html We also printed out the cards for the elements and my boys just form the periodic table on our living room floor http://www.ellenjmchenry.com/homeschool-freedownloads/chemistry-games/documents/QuickSix_12_11_000.pdf Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted June 12, 2013 Share Posted June 12, 2013 Living books and experiments, clearly! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tammyw Posted June 12, 2013 Author Share Posted June 12, 2013 Living books and experiments, clearly! Yours are going into 3rd grade this year, right? Can I just ask what you did last year? (and not just for science either, lol!) I have a feeling I'd love most of what you did :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Five More Minutes Posted June 12, 2013 Share Posted June 12, 2013 I vote living books and experiments! BFSU is also a minimal-to-zero writing program if you'd like more structure. Some people find it to be a lot of prep; I don't find it to be that much more than any other science program I've used. I use it as much to guide our reading as anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted June 12, 2013 Share Posted June 12, 2013 Yours are going into 3rd grade this year, right? Can I just ask what you did last year? (and not just for science either, lol!) I have a feeling I'd love most of what you did :) My kids are finishing third, but they're youngish for grade (Sept birthday - they just meet our cut off). This year we did biology for science. Last year, it was chemistry and earth science (without astronomy, which we had covered previously). We always just do living books and experiments. I keep science journals. This year, we've read lots of good books since there are sooooo many for biology. We grew things, we have done a couple of cool bug experiments, we've done some fun dissections, we have spent a lot of time at the zoo and doing nature observations, the microscope has had a workout looking at various things... Once a week or so, the kids pick a book from the pile, read it and do a narration. That's the most formal science we do. I used to blog a lot about our science stuff, but I've fallen away from it. I've been playing around with making a science guide based on all the materials we've used over the last few years. It's what I wish I had - a guide to the best books, videos, and experiment possibilities for each topic for K-4th science. I do plan our science because when I started, I felt like I wanted to go through and expose my kids to a comprehensive set of stuff. Now, three years on, I feel like it would have been fine to just read and do everything hodgepodge. On the other hand, I like that soon we really will have covered a huge amount of science. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amyrobynne Posted June 12, 2013 Share Posted June 12, 2013 BFSU is also a minimal-to-zero writing program if you'd like more structure. Some people find it to be a lot of prep; I don't find it to be that much more than any other science program I've used. I use it as much to guide our reading as anything. :iagree: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tammyw Posted June 12, 2013 Author Share Posted June 12, 2013 :iagree: Funny, we have one of the BFSU books and they scare me. Is there anything that would make it less daunting? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Five More Minutes Posted June 12, 2013 Share Posted June 12, 2013 Funny, we have one of the BFSU books and they scare me. Is there anything that would make it less daunting? Highlighters, sticky notes and sticky tabs! :001_smile: In all seriousness, that's what it has taken for me. The books are not formatted for ease of use, that's for sure. But I find that taking about half-an-hour a week and highlighting parts of lessons that I want to use, plus gathering any supplies that I may need, makes it less daunting. Plus a made-messy-by-me book just feels friendlier. The other thing I do is just use the flow chart to guide me in getting books out of the library, renting documentaries, or folding other units in (like TOPS ... I love TOPS units right now!). I don't always do the BFSU lesson for a topic (although invariably if I skip it I find myself going back ... the discussion questions, background, and demonstrations really are invaluable). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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