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WTM Science in the Grammar Stage


dsbrack
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I'm ready to make a change with how we approach science. We've been doing BFSU and I like it but I want more rabbit trails and flexibility. I've reread the WTM approach and I think it's what I want. We can have the structure of a plan with opportunities to follow his interests. I'm just a little nervous of narration being the only output. I could see note booking and lapbooks combining well with this approach.

 

So, tell me how this works in your home. Do you have any free or cheap resources you are using for notebooks or lapbooks to make output more fun? Are your children staying engaged and finding things they want to explore more? Are you actively pursuing memorization in any areas, and if so, what? This approach is so much looser than I am naturally comfortable with so I'm looking for success stories and encouragement as my gut is telling me my son will thrive with a little tweaking.

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We have done different things to try to stick with the WTM science cycle...

 

For the Biology year:

For animals, we start by studying different habitats. The first time through this I used habitats found all over the world (forest, savannah, arctic, desert, ocean) and the second time I did it with my younger ones, I chose habitats found in the United States. We then used construction paper and markers to make these habitats on a large display board. Each day that we did science I picked out a book at the library on an animal. We read the book and answer some questions like, Where does the animal live? What does it eat? What are its defenses? What is something interesting about it? We may or may not put this information on a notebook page. We then printed off a picture of the animal and placed it on the habitat board. Sometimes we would have to add to our board - like a tree for a bird to perch in, or rocks for an octopus to hide in. If we made a notebook page, the animal picture could be glued on there as well.

For plants, we worked on a lapbook and made models from cardboard and construction paper. I think I googled "plant unit study" and got lots of ideas.

For the human body, we worked through My Body by Teacher Created Resources.

 

For Astronomy and Earth Science:

Just books about space during the day - creating notebook pages if there was time. Then stargazing at night using the binoculars and resources recommended in the WTM. This was so much fun! Stargazing as a family has now become a frequent activity.

For earth science I used a Dinah Zike book as a spine and just read and made notebook pages.

 

For Chemistry

When the kids were small, I really bombed this year.  We tried the Atoms and Molecules book, but it was too much writing for my little guy and I didn't know I didn't have to do all that!  When they were older we enjoyed The Elements. When that was finished the older ones did Carbon Chemistry and my younger ones did Atoms and Molecules (only doing some writing) and then random chemistry experiments that I found on the internet.

 

For Physics

This year we started with Physics Experiments for Children.  We got a little bored of that and are finishing by reading a page in the Usborne Internet Linked Enclyclopedia, writing a sentence about what we learned, copying any diagram, doing the "See for yourself" and following the internet links. One two-page spread takes 3 days.

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We follow the schedule, for the most part, adding very low-key note-booking.

 

We spent our entire K year in Zoology. He was in a Wild Kratts craze as deep as his brothers Diego one. It seemed fitting. We checked out books at the library each week, taking turns picking the animal for that week. He created his own animal encyclopedia with a 2 page spread devoted to each animal. He wrote the name of the animal and drew a picture or two, then I wrote 3-5 interesting facts about that animal per his dictation. We organized them by class. We also kept a few labs in the back, found via Pinterest. At the end of the year we made a cover and spiraled it into a book. We didn't pursue any memory work in science.

 

In 1st we are finishing the Life Sciences. We split our human body time between more anatomy type stuff (organs and their functions, senses, ect) and health (germs, sickness, nutrition, ect). Again we work on a two-page spread for each topic we covered, but this time I had pre-chosen all the topics other than a few bunny trails followed. He still titles the page, and draws a few pictures, but now the drawings are a bit more along the lines of diagrams (parts of the eye, route of food along the digestive track, different kinds of joints). I still write at his dictation a narration of the subject. We still have a few labs in the back, mostly found via Pinterest. We memorized the 5 senses, the organs and their function, and a dozen bone names (I let him choose bones or muscles).

 

Now we're gearing up to start Botony and we plan on following the same method of diagramming and dictating narrations, but with longer projects. We are sketching our oak tree every month, for example, to watch the changes. We will plant several things in the garden to study. I plan on memorizing a dozen local flowers, and a dozen local trees...but I'm not sure what else.

 

I can see this method serving us well into Earth Science and Astronomy, with him doing more and more of the writing and the diagrams becoming increasingly intricate. I'll admit, with Chemistry and Physics so much more lab based I'm not sure it will continue to work. At the least we will have to add lab reports.

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I'm also following. My 3 small ones are very into Magic School Bus, Wild Kratts, and other animal based DVDs. My challenge is finding a program that will engage them with information they don't already know!

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Thanks for all the responses!  We have decided to jump into animal study next week since I already had the recommended encyclopedia on my shelf.  I also found these free notebook pages to go along.  My son already had so much fun just picking out the animals he wants to cover.  I'll do plants in the spring when we start our garden.  I'll cover anatomy next year in our co-op so that we can keep moving forward with earth and space science at home. 

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We use Apologia and do our best to follow the principles of TWTM. We are time-strapped, so the value of having the lesson plans laid out is huge. We tend toward the activities that involve classification, memorization and observing. We avoid the "experiments" as they are low value at the grammar stage.

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We did use WTM methods for the elementary years - it was really good for us!

 

First grade we covered human body, plants, animals - those are the plans we used for each topic.

 

Second grade I tried a curriculum for earth science and it was just too much but for space we used a MSB kit and the book recommendations & format in WTM and that was much better.

 

Third grade we used another MSB kit and followed the format/book recommendations in WTM.

 

Fourth grade we did physics same way. 

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We don't use a spine, we get books from the library on the topic and then either I read aloud or he reads, depending on what he wants to do. We are using TWTM sequence, but if DS wants to study atoms in the middle of bio year, then we detour. If he gets dinosaur dig kits or MSB chemistry for birthday or Christmas gifts, he does that when he wants. He narrates from a science book each week and does whatever science activities he wants in addition.

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We are even less structured. They read science topics for 30-45 mins per day about science topics they want to study. Once they are able to write well, I assign a report every 2-3 weeks that focuses on a topic I want them to be more familiar with. It has been a successful approach with my kids.

We did this last year and it was fun. They still learned a lot, enjoyed it a ton, and I didn't get bored from being stuck on one topic for a whole year!

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