tmstranger
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Posts posted by tmstranger
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Are you just looking for more hands-on projects that really work and explain scientific concepts? If so, your kids might enjoy receiving Tinkercrate. The projects are all high quality and the included magazine is fairly good at explaining the hows and whys of things.
The best part: It isn't school - it is mail. All school stops when our Tinkercrate arrives. The kids dive in and work together to build their project, and then they explore you-tube to learn more about the topic. We have even expanded on some of these crates to learn how to do some pretty cool things. They are now involved in 3-D printing hand prosthetics for children in need thanks to a simple activity in a Tinkercrate box. Science with real-world impact, without hassle.
My 9yo gets the Tinkercrates. He enjoys them, but my 13yo is not interested.
What I mean are the projects like, "students will create a synthetic material that will fulfill a societal need," or, "students construct an argument relating to the impact of x on the body." These are the things that are on my county's website for science curriculum. Sure, my kid might know science stuff, but can he apply to real world stuff? And these projects came from 6th grade, so I wonder how involved they were...my kid was in that system through the end of 4th grade, so did his peers learn so much in the last year of ES that they can apply these concepts that way? That's where I get hung up and insecure. :(
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She said to me, "When am I ever going to need to say clarinet in Spanish?".
LOL!
Thanks for your feedback. I read somewhere else that it is difficult to teach it unless you speak Spanish, so I thought the online would be better than ordering the books alone. Maybe not!
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Some things are more final than others.
Set:
MUS Algebra 1
Spelling You See
OM Environmental Science (I read through part of the syllabus and I really like it. I think this is what DD wanted.)
Have you purchased OM Environmental Science yet? I looked at it online, but really wanted a better look at it. It looks like it was recently changed, so I wasn't sure if you had the current version. Does it look like it has experiments or long-term projects? Daily reading and answering questions? I've never used their science before, and I just feel like I can't get a good grasp on it from the sample.
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Anyone have experience with the online Spanish classes with BJU?
What are your thoughts?
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LfC is difficult to teach without the chanting cds. (if you don't know Latin yourself!)
LC is easy, peasy to teach. No dvds or anything are needed.
I haven't used GSWL, but I have used the Spanish version, and that was great. It was an inexpensive intro to Spanish, so I would think GSWL would be just as wonderful. But LC is easy to teach if you want to go that route.
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Apologia has an Astronomy book. I haven't used it, but I think it's elementary level, not middle school. I imagine you could use it as a spine and add additional reading or something to bulk it up some.
Sorry, I haven't seen anything else, so hopefully someone else will have some good resources for you.
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The Golden Goblet
The Bronze Bow
Otto of the Silver Hand
Madeleine Takes Command
The Chestry Oak
The Fables of Aesop
A Single Shard
The King's Fifth
The Switherby Pilgrims: Tale of the Australian Bush
Children of the Storm
How old are your children? I've read a few of those books and we enjoyed them, but my kids are currently 9 and 13.
The Golden Goblet was really good. Kids were 7 and 11 at the time and the 7yo didn't love it. It is difficult in the beginning, but in the end, my older son really liked it.
The Bronze Bow we did as a read aloud. It was good. Both kid enjoyed it (same ages as above).
A Single Shard...loved, loved, loved. I think that was 8 and 12 years old for my kids and they both (and me!) loved it.
The King's Fifth was this year. Younger kiddo didn't love it. Older kid took a while to gain interest, but ended up enjoying it.
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Thanks ladies.
I know it's normal to second guess myself. I'm not a teacher, and I don't claim to be creative in any way with my kids' education. I just try to pick curriculum for them that I hope will help them to succeed in whatever they choose to do. Then, I look at the county website and the middle school project pages, and I get overwhelmed. In retrospect, I imagine they put that stuff there to look good for parents and others in the community. I do wish I could find a way to incorporate more "real life" application to our science, though. I have no idea how to do that...and my kids would hate it...so we will just keep doing our best and hope it's enough!
I know you all are so good at talking me off a cliff, though! Thanks.
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When I started homeschooling, I had plenty of doubts about teaching all of these subjects to my kids, but I do ok for most things. The curriculum choices available to us are really wonderful...BUT...then there is science.
I literally agonize over this each year. Do we cover Earth Science or Chemistry or Physics, etc.???
There is about a 75% chance that my child will go back to public school for high school. I have been searching the local county website to see their science sequence for middle school and high school. They are phasing in the NGSS, so things have been changing year to year.
I feel like I do fine giving my son a good knowledge base of science. He knows about different science topics, but we don't really do a lot of "projects" that really involved. He does a project every week with his curriculum, but they are more "demonstration" than project.
Sometimes, I just worry that I don't do enough...
Does anyone else ever feel like they are failing in this area? I want him to succeed when he returns to ps, but I fear that they will be so far ahead with their project experience.
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SOTW vol. 4 covers that time period. That is what I plan to use.
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I think I know what I'm going to do...at least for now!
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Have you tried the yahoo group for LTOW?
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Everything reviews. You'll be fine entering at grade level.
I have heard that if your child is above 5th grade, to start at 5th grade and move up from there, but honestly, my son is doing grade 6 this year, and there is plenty of review.
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I finally received a response from Mosdos.
They simply stated that they apologize for the delay, but they've been having some problems with the website. They expect to have it up and running again next week.
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Did you actually use BYL 7? Would it be worth it if all I'd be interested in is the Geography portion? I've been creating my own world geog/cultures study for next year and would MUCH rather find a secular, already-made one!
My 7th grader is using BYL7 this year. The curriculum itself is not a lot of $$. I bought it on sale, too.
We love the spine books and the map drills. DS will sit and read Hungry Planet or Material World on his own, and that is really not his thing, but he enjoys it.
We are using BYL for the geography and culture info and not for the science and language arts stuff. We have been reading the read aloud and literature suggestions, but we are finding that it is just too much on our schedule. Overall, we've enjoyed the year, though.
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I have not used their primary or junior series, but I just started using WriteShop 1 with my oldest son. We've tried a few different things in the past couple of years, but this is the first one that HE'S actually liked and responded to. In literally 3 weeks, I've seen his attitude about writing improve.
It is teacher intensive and that could be the difference for us. He needs some hand holding and this really provides that. He also likes the assignments and has worked hard. This level is not all arts & craftsy, but there are prewriting activities that tie in nicely with the assignments.
I plan to use level E with my younger child for next year since I've been so happy with this.
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Those are all excellent!
Haha! That's the problem! I've heard they are all excellent!
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We're doing SOTW 3 and we read aloud daily. I usually alternate between historical fiction, classics, and other good modern literature that I think they'd like.
Generally, I look at lists such as Sonlight, BYL, etc. to find good books. We are at the time period right after the American Revolution and I have my books narrowed down to these three:
Stowaway
Fever 1793
The Ghost at the Tokaido Inn
We have plenty of time to read more books, but I know I won't get all 3 of these in. I have to drop one...maybe two because I still have a long list of other beyond this! I need more hours in the day!!
Do you have a favorite here? If you could only read one of these, which one would you choose? My library has all 3, so that's not an issue.
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look at Novare Science. They are a religious publisher with solid high school materials. We are considering a class that uses those books for Chem and we are an atheist family. Textbooks are rigorous and very well done. I wouldn't touch Apologia.
I think there are no two perspectives on science. There is science and then there is religion. Teach science in a science class and religion in a religion class. I really don't understand this problem.
http://www.novarescienceandmath.com/extras/faq/#seven
This is from Novare Q&A
8. How will your biology books handle evolution?
Our mission is to provide premier science instruction methods and materials for Christian students grade 7-12th, to the glory of God. Excellence in Christian education cannot exist where passions and alarms have colored the study before it has even begun. A good education involves bringing students into the ongoing conversation of ideas, insisting on their mature engagement with them.
For this reason, Novare’s future biology texts (Life Science for middle school, and General Biology and Microbiology for high school) will include a complete presentation of evolutionary theory in a manner appropriate to the grade level of each text. Our texts will not cast aspersions or malign the intelligence or character of evolutionary theorists. Neither will they advocate in favor of the acceptance or rejection of evolution. They will present the current state of the scientific consensus as best it can be done at each level.
I have been leaning heavily towards their physical science text for my son for next year (8th grade). Overall, I've been impressed with what I've seen, and I emailed them with some questions and they were very responsive.
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Thanks for the responses. Honestly, I have struggled with how to teach science for the whole 3 years we've been homeschooling.
I'm a Christian and my kids are Christians. My hubby is not. So, we try to teach all viewpoints, but I certainly wouldn't want to ever put my kids at a disadvantage when it comes to college admissions, and that is why I asked. (You can see from my signature that I use a lot of religious curriculum, but hubby is ok with that...science is a different animal)
I appreciate you sharing your experiences.
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Does anyone know when in March Beast 5D will be available?
Their website says March 2017
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I just started Write Shop 1 with my 7th grader. He is certainly a reluctant writer, but so far, he's loved this. The assignments are interesting to him and the prewriting activities make sense.
I plan to use their junior level E with my 5th grader next year. It does require teacher time, but it's been well worth it so far for the older kiddo!
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I don't want to get in trouble, so this isn't a question about religion itself, but I have a question about science at the high school level.
I just read something on facebook that I've seen many times before and I wonder about it's validity. The poster was commenting that using neutral or religious science curricula in the high school years will not count as appropriate science in the eyes of college admissions. She was stating that purely secular was the only acceptable "college-bound" science path.
Is this true? Do you have experience with this?
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hmmmm....still a little too early for me, and we've been having all sorts of discussions about lack of effort, continuation of Latin, etc., etc., lately, but...
Grammar/Lit/Writing: Oak Meadow English 8; I also own Write Shop and WWS2, so we may add in those if necessary...I don't know how much I'll like OM's writing instruction
History: Oak Meadow Civics and SOTW 4
Science: Not 100%, but leaning towards Novare Physical Science
Latin: IF he continues, he will be finishing up Second Form Latin, starting 3rd form, and supplementing with Cambridge or other reading
Spanish: Most likely continuing with his tutorial and doing Spanish 2
Math: Probably Saxon Algebra 2 (95% sure on this)
Logic: Still figuring this out...maybe Art of Argument
Health: ??? I'm thinking of having him read some nutrition books and we'll go from there...state requirement
Music/Art: ??? no idea. Maybe Artistic Pursuits for Art
Astronomy for 8th graders...what are my options?
in Logic Stage & Middle Grade Challenges
Posted
I found samples on ChristianBook. Not sure why they didn't have them on the Memoria Press site.
https://www.christianbook.com/exploring-the-world-of-astronomy/john-tiner/9780890517871/pd/517871?event=ESRCP