Well, you are making me feel good! I did think that they ask really good questions and expect a high level of knowledge, but it is nice to have you confirm my impression. These questions have challenged both me and my children and we are no slackards. Interesting that I've gotten both my kids through these exams at the 'excellence' level, but I still don't feel like I totally have it. I just need to review, review, review. And now it is time for the next textbook! What do you recommend?

I was thinking the same thing! My PhD is in Biology, but I am retraining in Geology so am becoming b.r.o.a.d.e.r. So much science to learn!

We LOVED orgo. So much fun! Have you ever looked at the NZ national chemistry exams? They are very high end. There are 3 exams taken in a 3 hour period - equilibrium, thermo, orgo. To get a high grade, students typically take only 2 so they get 1.5 hours per exam. When you look at what is required for full points for any essay questions you will see why! 2020 exam answers are not yet posted. https://www.nzqa.govt.nz/ncea/assessment/search.do?query=Chemistry&view=exams&level=03 very detailed answers are here (called assessment schedules) https://www.nzqa.govt.nz/ncea/assessment/search.do?query=Chemistry&view=reports&level=03

Here is my son's research report on Plastics. The goals was to understand the chemistry behind the different kinds, how they were produced, how they can be improved, how they can be recycled, etc. He did another one on Soap vs Detergent, and my older boy did one on Fracking which was way more complex. Kind of long, but I thought it might give you a feel for what is possible that is not in a standard high school program in the USA. deleted. 🙂

Here is a 'mathy' type question my son had last year on his exam. It requires problem solving like your question did. Unknown W is a straight-chain organic molecule with the molecular formula C4H6OCl2.// Unknown W shows the following properties and reactions. 1) it does not exist as enantiomers. 2) it produces steamy fumes with water. 3) it reacts with excess of ammonia to form product X. Product X turns damp litmus paper blue. // Product X undergoes acidic hydrolysis to produce product Y. Bubbles are released when product Y reacts with sodium carbonate solution. //Draw the structural formulae for the organic molecules W, X, Y.

Well, Geology sits right on top of them all. I can't wait to start. I. just. have. to. Finish. with. homeschooling! 9 months to go.....

You would have loved my son's school for math. He has only 4 required math classes for a math major - univariate calc, multivar calc, diff eq and linear algebra. But all of those you can take a test to place out of, which he did. After that, he took two junior-level classes, and then switched to grad- level classes his freshman year. If he thought he could do the work, they would let him take the class. He took one grad class that had 5 prereqs that he did not have. haha.

I wonder, Not_a_number, if you might need to clarify your goals a bit. If you actually want to be enough of an expert to teach your kids chemistry and physics, you are going to need to have a lot of time to do the work. I don't think there is a shortcut here. But you could also co-learn with your kids, which is what I did. Am I an expert like Regentrude or Dicentra? Definitely NO, but I am good enough to give my kids a firm foundation. You could also have enthusiasm like 8filltheheart to encourage your kids to pursue their passions by using other experts and resources. My goals: I am relearning chemistry and physics in a deeper way in preparation for next year when I start my masters in Environmental Geology. Because this is an applied field (I want to clean up rivers and soil), I need a broad knowledge base. I need Chemistry, Physics, Ecology (this one I have!), Geology, and even some Engineering. I need to learn chemistry but not from its physics foundations in quantum mechanics because if I took that approach, I would not have time for all the other stuff I have to learn. Basically, you need to be clear on your goals and realistic if they are achievable. Going at chemistry by first doing an undergrad degree in physics could be super fun, but it will take some time and motivation. 🙂

I don't know how much quantum and thermo you need, but my son's physics major looked like this: Year 1: Fall: Mechanics. Spring: EM. Year 2: Fall: Wave, Relativity. January term: Mechanics 2 (see below*) Spring: Quantum Mechanics 1, Experimental Physics, Year 3: Fall: Quantum Mechanics 2, Statistical Physics 1, elective (Quantum Computing) Spring: Quantum Mechanics 3, Statistical Physics 2 The bold ones cascade, so you have to do them in order. So you need somewhere between 2 and 3 years of content that must be done sequentially to have enough to switch to chemistry. You would also need some statistical physics because it includes all the content on Thermo. Not sure if it is 1 or 2 classes. *I thought that this description for Mechanics 2 was interesting. They are suggesting advanced mechanics is required for quantum mechanics. This is a required 1 month long intensive class (worth a half class) "Mechanics 2: A broad, theoretical treatment of classical mechanics, useful in its own right for treating complex dynamical problems, but essential to understanding the foundations of quantum mechanics and statistical physics. Generalized coordinates, Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formulations, canonical transformations, and Poisson brackets. Applications to continuous media. The relativistic Lagrangian and Maxwell's equations." -------------- Also, I do believe that all these classes are available for free on EdX.

Yes and no. Clearly, the further in you get, the more they converge, but when you first start learning them they are very different styles of learning. When I'm studying organic chemistry, I'm putting all the reactions to memory, and then I'm solving synthesis problems. When I'm studying EM, Im doing math problems. I also agree with Dicentra that there is a LOT you have to take on faith in chemistry especially in the beginning. You can't learn it linearly. What you need to know now, you won't learn til later. Nothing makes sense until you go down a bunny trail only to find you can't understand the bunny trail anyway, so you just have to memorize it. In addition the process/reactions of chemistry do not link to the macro observations like it does in physics. The two subjects require just very different learning styles.

Well, my approach has been to read textbooks, do problems, think about how the problems generalizes, memorize the things that must be put to memory, review regularly, look everywhere I can to use this knowledge in real life, and do this process over many years so I don't forget what I have learned. So basically you need a book, time, and motivation.

Haha. Fine. But you have to practice. A long time ago I read about how subjects are split into four types of learning. Analytical (math, physics), interpretative (english, media studies), synthesis (chemistry and bio), production (music and foreign language). Clearly, there is overlap. I think you will find physics very straight forward to learn because of your background in analytical learning. But chemistry is a very different kind of learning.

Did you read my post on the bottomed of page 1? Because I have as discussing intuition between chem nd physics. I will also say that I developed intuition on organic also. Much easier than in other areas if chem. And I agree with EKS, once you put the content to memory, you just need to do tons of complex problems to develop intuition. I see it kind of like the drill required to be able to speak a foreign language. You may know all the vocab and the grammar, but you can't speak it fluently until you practice a lot.

He wanted to start physics at 12, but hadn't taken calculus. So regentrude recommend Knight's College Physics, which he quite liked. But it is a very fat book, so he got throught it all in about three years. Then it was time to do chem and bio. What was nice is that by going slowly, it sank in. I think the biggest problem kids have with high school survey classes is that they go so fast that you learn it for the test/exam and then don't hit it again because you don't continue on in the same science. You switch to one of the other big three and then learn super fast again. My point was not to suggest algebra based physics is a better path, more to tell you that my kid gets the top grade in all his physics classes (like 97% on his last test when the mean and median were around 63%) even though he did not take calculus based physics in high school. Basically by going slowly he developed the intuition you are looking for. And then because he has the math and problem solving, all his classes are easy.

My older ds is mathy like your daughter and is a physics major at university. At 8 he read The Way Things Work, cover to cover, over the period of 6 months and really internalized the content. 30 minutes every morning laying in my bed while I was making breakfast and getting ready for the day. He didn't zip through it, but made sure that every single idea was clear to him. I think that this kind of work with concepts first can really aid a student in understanding when you throw the math on top. I will also add, that my son is the top student in all his physics classes because of his math and problem solving background. He only took algebra based physics in high school with a very large conceptual component.

I have Chemistry 10th edition by Chang. How does it differ from the textbook you linked to above?

Thanks for the kind words. I've been quite busy over the past 2 years relearning all my physics and chemistry knowledge from 20+ years ago because I'm going to be retraining in environmental geology starting next year when my youngest goes off to uni. Because of this, I am personally aware of how science learning works and how it differs between subjects. I pay attention to what my brain does so that I can explain *how* to learn better to the students I tutor. So I was thinking a bit more on Not_a_number's goal of developing intuition in physics and chemistry, and I'm thinking that you can't develop intuition in chemistry like you can in physics. In physics, you as a human on earth have experienced the forces you are now studying in physics; but in chemistry, you have only experienced the macro world, and that macro world has very little to do with the chemical world, which is why historically chemistry was SO much later to develop as a scientific field than physics. So when I look around me now, I see forces everywhere. My mechanics and wave knowledge are now used everyday to appreciate the world around me. My EM knowledge is more focused on what I see in my house, or what I read about in the news concerning the grid. Some world stuff, like in earth science, but mostly technology for me. My modern physics knowledge is mostly just textbook with few opportunities to use it in real life, but I do use it to help me in chemistry and to help me understand my older boy when he is talking. 🙂 But for chemistry, I am not exactly developing intuition. I think that is the wrong word. I sometimes can say if I mix these two chemical together I will get xxx. Or if I want to clean xxx, I should use xxx chemical. But I don't actually experience a whole lot of chemistry in my everyday life. It is more of a hidden science I think. I use it to understand how industrial processes work - so how the aluminum smelter works and why it uses one third of ALL of NZ's power. I can use chemistry to understand why searching for a better battery is so difficult and so important. I even did a massive project on Fracking, where my older boy and myself read the chemical engineering literature to explain why you add each chemical to the well. But these things are not *intuition*. I wonder if intuition is about things you can see and experience, and we don't see and experience chemistry, only the macro scale outcome of the reactions.

Not_a_Number, I'm a bit confused as to what you are looking for. It seems like more than a textbook?

I should also mention that this can be a very slow process for some kids. Just in case it wasn't clear, achieving 90% accuracy meant that he was still misspelling 1 in 10 words at the age of 14.5. But this was a massive improvement. He is now at 1 in 20 words which is easy to spell check.

Good memory! Yes, my son knew all the rules and could sound words out. We had tried 7 different programs and worked diligently from the age of 7 to 12, 20 minutes every day. But he still could not spell. Nothing was automated. In the end, he just needed to write words in the context of sentences over and over and over. So we switched to dictation where I corrected him word for word. This took 30 minutes per day for 2.5 years to get to 90% accuracy. Now at 17, he is around 95% accuracy and he is still working to improve.

Well, I don't like Chem labs much as they don't help me with understanding the content. They can, however, help me remember the content because I have seen something occur which helps me put it to memory. But you can do this with youtube videos. The problem with chemistry (that is not as true with physics) is that it is really NOT linear as you learn it. There is a lot of stuff you have to accept on faith early on that then you will understand the reasons behind many courses later. It is also a synthesis subject, so you just have to memorize a butt ton of content, to then be able to synthesize into a whole and answer complex questions. I find it way more interesting than physics, but it is a completely different type of learning.

My experience is similar but also different from yours. I took a year-long, Calculus-based Physics at Duke with the Engineers who were taking an Engineering class that worked synergistically with physics (a class I was not taking because I was a Biology major). In contrast to the other students, I had never taken high school physics, so I was really dumped in the deep end. But I did the work, studied for hours upon hours, and got one of the top grades in the class. But even with all this struggle and time and an A in the class, I did not actually learn the content. I have come to believe that it was just moving too fast for it to sink in, given that I would not be working with the content moving forward like the Engineers did. I hated the class, but needed the mark, so I made it happen. But then nothing stuck. This time through I am focused on *learning* the content, going on rabbit trails to answer my questions because I actually have the time. Connecting disparate subfields to build a more creative and rich understanding. I am now starting to see physics everywhere I look, and am starting to ask the right questions. But this takes time and motivation. It is the journey you need, not the outcome. Thinking like a scientist is all about wandering in the dark, asking questions, and looking for answers. So by linking my textbook learning to life around me and issues/problems facing the world, I am building intuition. Slow and steady.

Excellent. Then ask Regentrude. Given that you have the capability and the motivation to *learn* the content, rather than just tick the box, you will develop the intuition you desire if you put in the work.

Well then, your solution is easy. Go get which ever textbook Regentrude recommends and work your way through it with the focus of caring to actually learn the content. I don't think there are any shortcuts here. And yes, I am also deeply grateful that we had the resources to give my son what he needed.

From my point of view, you did have trouble to with physics because in the end you didn't understand it. Why not? That is the question you need to ask yourself, and only then will you find the best path forward to meet your goals.