Talk to me about GEMS science

[A home for their hearts]

I've seen it mentioned on here and am curious about it. It looks like fun and something my dc would enjoy. I'm really wanting to add some fun into our day and think this might work for us. For those who have used it, what did you buy and how did it work?

[Kfamily]

:bigear:

 

I'd love to hear more about this too...hope you get some feedback.

[HappyGrace]

:lurk5:

[tangomoon]

I used the Oobleck: What Do Scientists Do? GEMS guide with a class of 4th graders several years ago. It was a huge hit (albeit messy!), and tied the scientific process into a fun hands-on activity, with lots of emphasis on making observations and predictions.

 

With that same class, I also used some of the Stories in Stone rock and mineral study. Many good hands-on activities in this one as well.

 

This was several years before homeschooling was on my radar, so I don't recall if any of the activities would be difficult to adapt for small group/individual situations.

[Guest]

I'm usually the one exclaiming about how wonderful GEMS is. I've used just over half of all the units with my daughter or with a group of co-op kids. They are not hard to adapt for single kids or small groups; you just adjust the amount of materials you have to gather at the beginning, and when there are "group discussions" it's just you and however many children you have there. Some activities will be a lot quicker with one or two kids because you avoid the inevitable waits while materials are handed out and kids made to come to order; others will take longer because the kids get so excited and involved, and you don't have to cut them off at a bell.

 

Some of the units are more fun to do in groups: Bubble-ology is one; Mystery Festival is another; and Plate Tectonics is so rich in material that it works well to have a few kids to parcel out some of the work. We held science parties for some of these since I have only one child, and some I saved for the co-op. The rest I did with my daughter at home.

 

They are all, without exception, wonderful fun and engaging to kids. They all require some work gathering materials from the drug store or grocery store, the hardware store, and around the house. I put off doing some of the units for over a year because I couldn't face this; but when I finally made the effort it was so very worthwhile. Once you have the materials, the projects are truly engaging, exciting, and set up so that the kids can run most of them with very little, or even no, help. When I had the co-op kids they would come in, immediately plunge into work, and all I did was sit there commenting on what they did (wow, how neat! How did that work? Can you repeat those results?) and being an appreciative audience. They even cleaned up! (GEMS is messy science. That's part of why it is so truly engaging and educational.) We always ran over time and they never wanted to stop.

 

There are varying degrees of writing required for the different age groups. Each unit lists non-fiction and fiction books for a span of ages, and you choose how little or how much to add to the unit. There are built-in assessments or extra, written options for assessment.

 

GEMS is divided into scientific categories: chemistry, space science, physics, biology, environmental science, etc. so you can choose units to fit in with what you're working on. You can use them with or without a spine, because of the literature connections that come with each unit give you plenty of reading material. Within the different categories some units seem to naturally go together: for sixth grade, for instance, the co-op used Stories in Stone, River Cutters, Ocean Currents, Convection, and Plate Tectonics. Those took us all year at three hours a week. Units can be stretched or condensed to fit your schedule.

 

I'd suggest to anyone who wants to try these to start collecting things like empty yogurt containers, plastic spoons, eye droppers, straws, string, tape, and pieces of cardboard, because these get used a lot. Start keeping a big box to put things in, and then when you order a guide you'll already have a head start on some of the things you'll use.

 

I hope I haven't put anyone off talking about the collecting phase, because as all the teachers in the guides say, and as I found myself, it is so worth it to put in that time when you see how easily it goes after that, and how involved the kids get. The people at the Lawrence Hall of Science who put these things together do an incredible job.

[Allearia]

I'm hoping to do a lot of these especially as my library has dozens of them! For now I am inspired by Karen Anne's description and hopefully will get collecting items, and maybe even do a small co-op class. Thanks Karen so much for getting me excited about it - I am a bit put off by all the work getting things together but maybe if I start with a small one I will not be overwhelmed.

[A home for their hearts]

Thanks for all the replies. This really looks like a fun science curriculum! There are so many to choose from that I don't know which one to get! What would you recommend for my kiddos? I have a dd10, ds9, and ds6 who I would like to combine together. I also have a dd2, and a baby coming on Wednesday! I'm not planning on starting this for a couple of months once things settle down. Thanks!

[PeterPan]

Stacy, you might look at their list and find the free ones. There are a couple you can download for free, and that would give you a way to try them without any expense. *I* wouldn't have gotten something like that done with a new baby and that many littles, but that's just me. If your oldest can handle implementing it, gathering everything, and following the directions (which you can tell by looking at the free ones you print), then you'll know you're on the right track. If those don't look like reality, then I would look at WonderScience http://portal.acs.org/portal/acs/corg/content?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=PP_SUPERARTICLE&node_id=552&use_sec=false&sec_url_var=region1&__uuid=01e5c8dc-dd56-44b3-b4c5-8426613307c4 or some of the other books at that link. Little more scaled down, but still the same idea, good for your ages of kids.

[Guest]

Some great units for summer or the beginnings of fall when it's still warm enough to do science outdoors: Bubble-ology; Dry Ice Investigations (your kids will probably be just a bit too young for the final activity where they isolate one variable and do experiments, but the rest is really fun, and pretty much all you have to buy is a hunk of dry ice); and Oobleck. All are messy, great fun, and don't require too much material-hunting.

 

If you have access to a microscope, Microscopic Investigations (I think that's the title) is another fun and easy one.

[cschnee]

We too have done a lot of the GEMS units. Right now we are working on Microscopic Explorations and Algebraic Reasoning: Professor Arbegla Introduces Variable and Functions (grades 3-5). I think our favourites so far have been Secret Formulas (grades 1-3), Mystery Festival (The one about the bear for grades 1-3), Chemical Reactions, Crime Scene Chemistry (chromatography), Vitamin C testing (free on the web site, order the indophenol from Home school Science Tools.) We found Bubble-ology difficult to do with only the two of us because one has to compare many bubble diameters and we kept feeling dizzy from all the bubble blowing through a straw.

 

Some require lots of data, so it's better if there are more people involved (such as Bubble-ology.)

 

Cindy

[PeterPan]

Cindy, any more tips on the indophenol? I thought I would do that vit. C one on the spur of the moment, and I totally got stopped in my tracks, lol. Did you buy a powder and dilute, or did the already have it made into a solution?

[cschnee]

I bought the powder and made some of the solution and had tons of it. I still have some of the power left too! Make sure you try the solution before you use it in the experiments. Like the GEM Guide suggests, you don't want to have to add too many drops of juice before the solution turns clear. BYW, it is totally cool how the indophenol solution (very bright blue!) turns clear when vit C is added to it.

[PeterPan]

Well cool, that doesn't sound too hard. Thanks! :)

[Faithseed]

I don't see any free ones on the GEMS site to trial :confused:

 

Did anyone else see it/them?