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Okay so I am NOT a Science person!  However, I don't want my children to be held back by that.  I would love a Science curriculum or what have you that I can use next year with my will be 1st grader (age wise). He is an advanced reader and enjoys Science.  I want it to be secular.

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I just discovered Pandia Press' REAL Science materials and that's what my advanced 1st grader will be using next year for science. They have a Life Science level 1 and then you can move on to level Earth & Space and so on. It kinda follows TWTM recommendation as far as sequence. It is totally secular and includes reading and labwork which I like. And it goes in depth with the subjects in an age appropriate way, covering living/nonliving, cells, and the classification of animals in the elementary life science text. The makers of the curriculum should be done with their level 2, or middle grades, set of curriculums by the time our kids need them.

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As someone who has a kid who is crazy about science, and is probably less comfortable with science than any other subject area (the result of having two parents who are professionals in different areas, growing up in college labs and going to conferences, and attending a math/science focused high school when all I wanted to do was find a practice room and spend hours with my piano, saxophone, and clarinet), I empathize. I can't say I feel that I've really found a good science curriculum yet, but somehow, it's worked.

 

Since you're in my area, I'm going to put a plug in for the Mad Science homeschool classes. The instructor is extremely good with asynchronous GT kids and DD has LOVED the classes she's done there, and they've been flexible with age, so I doubt they'd have a problem with your DS doing the 2nd-5th grade class. It's set up with the intention that kids can repeat it and get more the 2nd time around, but DD did it at the 4th-5th grade level at 6-8, and it was right for her.

 

In the same years, I probably bought almost every elementary secular science curriculum on the market. Mostly, DD read them, ripped through them, and wanted more. More depth, more structure, more information. It was kind of like living with Johnny 5 from Short Circuit. Things that we used that seemed to work

ALL levels of Evan Moor Daily Science (I recommend paying for a year of Teacher File box and using it on an Ipad to avoid printing). She could pick a topic and go at it at grades 1-6, all at the same time

The textbooks and problem solving books for Singapore Science (I HATED Singapore Science, but she really liked it)

Ellen McHenry Units

Mr Q units (again, iPad!)

The free Thunderbolt Kids Science from South Africa

Lots and lots and lots of trade books (Basher Books, the Elements, How things work, etc)

Scientific American

Animal Planet, Discovery, Discovery Kids, Nature....mostly the older stuff on Netflix before the DIscovery Networks started being more fictional than factual.

 

What didn't work well was anything involving science projects that were more demonstration than anything else or science kits. Either she didn't have the motor skills for them, or they were too easy and boring. She preferred to read science books, watch science documentaries, and to go explore the world and try things out. She also started recording and keeping notebooks about her explorations quite early, mostly drawings with a little writing, and eventually started trying to figure out a lot of calculations to go with them. Science was largely the reason why she jumped ahead in math so drastically-she discovered she needed it. Some of these became more involved science projects. It's gradually (well, maybe not so gradually, realizing that I'm talking about a less than 4 year time period) started to look more and more like professional work in the field as she's learned more. 

 

I'm not sure what I'm saying-only that if I haven't messed it up too badly, you won't either. :)

 

 

 

 

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I'm using BFSU, which works well. The book for it is really a TM that teaches me the science (which is good, I need it) and tells me how to teach it. It also has a book list for each topic. I get the books from the library and DD can read them independently.

 

Other than that, we also use Snap Circuits, The Private Eye, and Lego Education kits for some variety.

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For first grade? A library card. If you have access to a good library, anyhow. My dd ripped through science like dmmetler's did at that age. There's no way I could have afforded or stored everything she read or watched.

 

We did all of BFSU''s first book (2nd one didn't work out after it, not sure why) first grade-ish. She watched every Bill Nye, Rock n Learn Science video, loved They Might Be Giants, read every Read and Find Out Science book we could find.

 

At some point we discovered NOVA's making stuff series and Science Friday's video pod casts. She read several upper elementary school text books. And did a lot of nature study.

 

And then she sort of branched out to other things. Which was a good thing, because she was through most elementary science around third grade, and it has been frustrating to find science that she hadn't already covered without more math. Her math is finally catching up.

 

We did do some Ellen McHenry, but she was probably 2nd 3rd grade-ish. Then Sonlight science (bought used and made secular) at about double pace. The TOPS units were fun.

 

Have fun- and good luck!

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We have really liked all of the read and find out books, which were already mentioned, but also check out the Gail gibbons books. Those are fantastic too. I had good luck going through my library's biography section for picture books of great names in science and technology. The science biographies are really nice to give science the proper feel of a living, changing being. It is constantly being added to and refined, with much toil, frustration, and elation in its wake.

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BFSU is great.  It takes *a little* planning, but very little once you find your groove with it.  I love that it fosters thinking skills instead of just spoon feeding facts.  Science, after all, is a way of thinking.  Scientific facts are simply the history of science, and science-oriented kids need to realize that there is a lot still to be learned.  Ellen McHenry is a great option because she doesn't oversimplify complex topics but teaches them in a very kid-friendly manner.  There are also lots of great picture-heavy science encyclopedias available.  They were ds's favorite books at that age.

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  • 2 weeks later...

If you're doing life science, get the lyrical life science CDs or Mp3s. There are books to go with them, but they're middle school level and kind of tedious and boring, but the songs have a lot of great topics and information. There are three, one more on classification, one on plant and animal groups, and one in anatomy and physiology.

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Guest aliana04

I just discovered Pandia Press' REAL Science materials and that's what my advanced 1st grader will be using next year for science. They have a Life Science level 1 and then you can move on to level Earth & Space and so on. It kinda follows TWTM recommendation as far as sequence. It is totally secular and includes reading and labwork which I like. And it goes in depth with the subjects in an age appropriate way, covering living/nonliving, cells, and the classification of animals in the elementary life science text. The makers of the curriculum should be done with their level 2, or middle grades, set of curriculums by the time our kids need them.

 

We used RSO Life for the first part of this school year, and to be honest, I wasn't impressed. It wasn't terrible, but DD and I both felt it was a bit babyish for her. It didn't go into enough depth for each topic, and it seemed to be very insistent on having a hands on demonstration/experiment with each lesson, even when it didn't make sense to have one. It does include a supplemental reading list, which I would definitely recommend using if you opt to use RSO.

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My kids are really sciencey and we are using R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey by Pandia Press next year. I checked out a lot of different stuff and when I tried out the (generous) sample download I thought this will be the winner. I bought a couple of them and am very happy. I'll be adding some themed read alouds to go with most of the units. The labs are all really good. Easy to get the supplies together and they actually *teach* stuff in an interesting way.

 

I should mention I'm using it for both my kids, an advanced Grade 1 kid and an advanced Grade 4 kid. It's not too boring for my Grade 4 kid but he finds *anything* science related very interesting even if it's something he's learned before. Even so, flipping through the Life Science I don't think it will be redundant. He'll be doing other science too though, this is just a little supplement for him.

 

We're also going through the "Let's Read and Find Out Science" book series, and the "One Small Square" book series by Donald Silver which complement the Life Science unit nicely. We also watch Bill Nye and Nova, etc. but I don't count that as schoolwork as they do it in their free time.

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