Novare Chemistry at home? Home Scientist CK01A Kit?

[MamaSprout]

I have a couple of kids who have been working together on labs, and are looking forward to doing "real" chemistry next year. I need something truly do-able at home in less than 2-3 hours every week or two.

 

I'd like it to be more than microchem (but suspect that's what we'll end up doing).

 

I'm very likely going to use the World of Chem book. I have the Lab Manual/ Teacher's Lab materials for it, but something a bit more open and go would be great. We have some glassware and few chemicals from middle school chemistry.

 

I really like Novare's Lab Report Handbook, and REALLY don't like the ASPC book, so I'm really reluctant to purchase another book from them without reviews. However, I read somewhere that this book: https://www.novarescienceandmath.com/product/chemistry-experiments-for-high-school-at-home/ will have a kit available from home science tools, but it must have been an email because I can't find that info now.

 

I'm also eyeing this: http://www.thehomescientist.com/kits/CK01/ck01-main.html

 

I'm not finding very many reviews for either. Does anyone have feedback? We've had a rough time with physics labs this year, so I hope to be more successful with chemistry...

[cintinative]

I might be able to help. We are doing the the "Chemistry Experiments for High School at Home" in our co-op as a Chemistry lab and I am assisting. 

 

The experiments, some of them, take quite a bit more than an hour. Some of them are taking two plus class periods.  One particular lab--she was still running their experiments three hours later. It was a mix of an issue with the alcohol burners, adding too much zinc, and the room temp was a bit cold. She had run it at home without troubles, but when we ran it at co-op there were issues. 

 

We have reworked the steps/instructions in some of the labs. One particular lab we were supposed to add a solid to a test tube with a liquid for the purpose of measuring density. Unfortunately the solid floats, so we reworked the instructions to put the solid in first. That type of thing. Also we substituted toluene for another solvent since we didn't want to have to buy a quart from the hardware store. 

 

I feel like this is pretty close to a "real" lab situation. We bent glass tubes using camping stoves (use good ventilation for this!), we have used alcohol burners and ring stands so the kids have had to use beaker clamps, etc. and understand how to set up the ring stand.  

 

The alcohol burners are not the best. They can burn out without warning, even when there is still liquid remaining. When that happens, the whole experiment has to be put on hold until we can remove the hot burner from under the ring stand and refill it.  Honestly, if you felt there was a safe way to rig up a bunsen burner (there are attachments you can use so you can attach it to a cylinder), I would try that.

 

I don't think we used any pre-made kits (other than the microchem kits, see below). I think our equipment is a mix from different suppliers. I could ask where she got the chemicals. I think some of them she bought at the homeschool convention from another supplier.

 

We did actually use microchem kits for the oxidation-reduction experiments recently.  I asked why and I guess the idea was that we were really only looking at color changes so it was not necessary to buy large quantities of the metals involved (which could be quite expensive). That said, some of the reactions *were* hard to see in the microchem kits.  I am not sure what to suggest there.

 

We have had the students complete two formal lab reports using the guidance you mentioned.  The teacher provided a rubric for the students to follow to ensure they met all that was required. 

 

By the way, we are still in the middle of this class.  I could potentially get you the marked up lab instructions if that helps?

[MamaSprout]

I might be able to help. We are doing the the "Chemistry Experiments for High School at Home" in our co-op as a Chemistry lab and I am assisting. 

 

The experiments, some of them, take quite a bit more than an hour. Some of them are taking two plus class periods.  One particular lab--she was still running their experiments three hours later. It was a mix of an issue with the alcohol burners, adding too much zinc, and the room temp was a bit cold. She had run it at home without troubles, but when we ran it at co-op there were issues. 

 

We have reworked the steps/instructions in some of the labs. One particular lab we were supposed to add a solid to a test tube with a liquid for the purpose of measuring density. Unfortunately the solid floats, so we reworked the instructions to put the solid in first. That type of thing. Also we substituted toluene for another solvent since we didn't want to have to buy a quart from the hardware store. 

 

I feel like this is pretty close to a "real" lab situation. We bent glass tubes using camping stoves (use good ventilation for this!), we have used alcohol burners and ring stands so the kids have had to use beaker clamps, etc. and understand how to set up the ring stand.  

 

The alcohol burners are not the best. They can burn out without warning, even when there is still liquid remaining. When that happens, the whole experiment has to be put on hold until we can remove the hot burner from under the ring stand and refill it.  Honestly, if you felt there was a safe way to rig up a bunsen burner (there are attachments you can use so you can attach it to a cylinder), I would try that.

 

I don't think we used any pre-made kits (other than the microchem kits, see below). I think our equipment is a mix from different suppliers. I could ask where she got the chemicals. I think some of them she bought at the homeschool convention from another supplier.

 

We did actually use microchem kits for the oxidation-reduction experiments recently.  I asked why and I guess the idea was that we were really only looking at color changes so it was not necessary to buy large quantities of the metals involved (which could be quite expensive). That said, some of the reactions *were* hard to see in the microchem kits.  I am not sure what to suggest there.

 

We have had the students complete two formal lab reports using the guidance you mentioned.  The teacher provided a rubric for the students to follow to ensure they met all that was required. 

 

By the way, we are still in the middle of this class.  I could potentially get you the marked up lab instructions if that helps?

 

This is great information! I may be very interested in the marked up lab instructions if that turns out to be a reasonable request.

 

We just made this decision last week to homeschool next year, so we're really just getting started. Thanks.