Excited about Galore Park Science

[StephanieZ]

Just have to say I am really excited about Galore Park's So You Really Want to Learn Science . . .

 

It appears to be reasonably solid middle school overview of all the major branches of science: biology, health, chemistry, earth science, physics, etc. They break these categories into three larger categories (life, chem, physics). There are two levels (1 & 2) that cover the same broad categories but do NOT repeat info, so ideally one would cover both books sequentially (presumably over 2 years). Each level covers the same 3 categories in the same order, but has varying numbers of chapters in each of the categories, so you have to juggle your schedule if you want multiple children on the same category at the same time (e.g., to do experiments at the same time).

 

I think it is appropriate for most 5th - 8th graders looking for a two +/- year overview of general science topics. (See below how I'm using it for a one year overview for my 8th grader.) It was designed for 5th-7th grade kids in private/prep schools the UK. It could probably be tweaked a bit younger if desired.

 

SYRWTL Science does not include any experiments. (These may be available in the teachers' materials but I haven't seen them. They are pricey. I use just the Text and the Answer Book.) Likewise, I don't have access to the tests, so won't use them.

 

Essentially, there is a text to read and then there are written exercises within each chapter. Reading one chapter and doing the related exercises seems to take from 40 min to 2 hours depending on the chapter. We're doing one a week -- child doing the reading & exercises, and then I check answers and discuss. (There are around 25 chapters in book1, 28 in book 2. The book 2 chapters are also a bit longer.)

 

For labs, we have scheduled 4 week lab periods after each of the three sections in the book to do Just labs. (I am able to schedule both dc at the same time this way. . . (Also, I have used some spare weeks to do one-on-one health/se* ed topics with them.) That way I am sure we'll get plenty of fun, involved, labs done. Additionally, if the dc gets his chapter done early in the week (or gets ahead), we can spend time at the end of the week doing any lab of his choice. My dc like labs, so this may well work, but I *know* we'll get plenty done on our "lab breaks" and I will help choose labs for those periods and plan supplies, etc ahead of time. We'll use some TOPS books, Van Cleave books, our Kosmos Chem 3000 kit, and various other books for experiments.

 

I wanted dd13 to review all major branches of science this coming year (8th) and so I decided to check it out. Dd13 is doing SYRWTL Science 2 while ds11 is doing SYRWTL Science 1.

 

Note on doing it in one year instead of two: I had dd13 quickly read through level 1 (and do exercises orally with me) over a couple weeks before starting level 2. Ds11 is doing level 1. They do one chapter a week, each.

 

So far, the dc seem to LIKE the reading and do well with the exercises. The exercises include some actual thinking/applications and are not simply regurgitation.

 

The content looks very good to me. It's obviously at a basic/general level, but it seems to cover solid concepts at a reasonably challenging level, and they seem to have chosen the most important/fundamental topics to include. I feel like they will be well prepared for the more specialized high school topics to come, and that they will have a basic education on a wide range of general science topics including some that they might not see again in the more specialized high school science courses.

 

At first, I thought that not having lab included/coordinated was a big downside, but the more I get into it, the happier I am not to have the "I don't *have* any red cabbage in the house! I guess we'll have to either skip science today/this week . . . or come back (yeah, right) to this experiment later. . ." issue. I have many nice experiment books. . . And spending a bit of time browsing the experiment books for ones that teach something and can be done with what we have on hand is not only fun, it also puts the kid in control a bit, and is educational in itself as you read through multiple experiments to choose one. Of course, if you don't want to do ANY labs, you could just do that. . . but I am a believer in hands-on science.

 

So, anyway, if you are looking for a logic stage general science program that is easy to implement & secular, the SYRWTL Science might be a nice fit. So far, so good. I will post updates later in the year if anyone is interested.

 

HTH someone!

[Mom-ninja.]

Thanks for your detailed post. Please do keep us posted as to how it goes.

 

I wonder how it compares to Singapore science.

[MariannNOVA]

Your info is extremely helpful -- especially since I STILL haven't decided on science. We will be using GP Latin so I will just saunter over and take a look at their science -- Thanks again.:)

[radiobrain]

Stephanie~

 

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

 

I am planning on doing CPO life science, but for some reason, I am being drawn to GP SYRWTLS. It has nothing to do with this board. :D I am actually serious. I love GP, but kind of forgot about their science stuff until recently. I am not sure how well I will be able to do CPO, so I am thinking that I might go ahead and grab this anyway.

 

so thanks for taking the time to give me a better idea of what I may be in for!

[Jen+4dc]

We'll use some TOPS books, Van Cleave books, our Kosmos Chem 3000 kit, and various other books for experiments.

Care to post your schedule??

 

I wanted dd13 to review all major branches of science this coming year (8th) and so I decided to check it out. Dd13 is doing SYRWTL Science 2 while ds11 is doing SYRWTL Science 1.

 

Note on doing it in one year instead of two: I had dd13 quickly read through level 1 (and do exercises orally with me) over a couple weeks before starting level 2. Ds11 is doing level 1. They do one chapter a week, each.

Is you dd13 science minded?

 

So far, the dc seem to LIKE the reading and do well with the exercises. The exercises include some actual thinking/applications and are not simply regurgitation.

 

The content looks very good to me. It's obviously at a basic/general level, but it seems to cover solid concepts at a reasonably challenging level, and they seem to have chosen the most important/fundamental topics to include. I feel like they will be well prepared for the more specialized high school topics to come, and that they will have a basic education on a wide range of general science topics including some that they might not see again in the more specialized high school science courses.

 

At first, I thought that not having lab included/coordinated was a big downside, but the more I get into it, the happier I am not to have the "I don't *have* any red cabbage in the house! I guess we'll have to either skip science today/this week . . . or come back (yeah, right) to this experiment later. . ." issue. This is the bane of my science existence!

I have many nice experiment books. . . And spending a bit of time browsing the experiment books for ones that teach something and can be done with what we have on hand is not only fun, it also puts the kid in control a bit, and is educational in itself as you read through multiple experiments to choose one. Of course, if you don't want to do ANY labs, you could just do that. . . but I am a believer in hands-on science.

So are you letting the kids choose?

 

So, anyway, if you are looking for a logic stage general science program that is easy to implement & secular, the SYRWTL Science might be a nice fit. So far, so good. I will post updates later in the year if anyone is interested.

 

HTH someone!

 

It feels like an endless search sometimes. This looks promising, thanks!

[Country Girl]

Thanks for the great information on this program. I'd love to hear more as you use the program throughout the year.

 

I am also curious about your plan for incorporating labs.... can you describe the schedule you plan to use a bit more?

 

Thanks!

Edited July 21, 2010 by Country Girl

[keptwoman]

Your info is extremely helpful -- especially since I STILL haven't decided on science. We will be using GP Latin so I will just saunter over and take a look at their science -- Thanks again.:)

:iagree:

[StephanieZ]

Care to post your schedule??

 

Aha, what schedule, lol? Now that you mention it, maybe I should write things down as the year progresses. :) Then I could post it for you. My plan is to not have much of a plan on a week-to-week basis but I do plan to have a plan for the three 4-week-experiment blocks. . . but said plan is not yet made. I plan to have a plan at least by the day before said experiment blocks begin. LOL.

Is you dd13 science minded?

Hmm, well, she is quite bright in science and in general. Lately she seems facebook minded, lol.

My plan was for her to read over the science level 1 over 6 weeks -- about 4 chapters a week/a chapter a day. That would have been relaxed and easy. However, she procrasinated a LOT and so actually read over it in about 8 days to get it done by my deadline. We did 3 chapters a day. It probably took her a couple hours most days. It really wasn't hard. It isn't too long. I had her bring me the books to go over the exercises orally when she hit the end of a chapter. I think if you took about an hour a day, you could cover 1 chapter a day pretty darn easily. (Note that chapter length varies a LOT.)

This is the bane of my science existence!

Tell me about it.

So are you letting the kids choose?

Yes, on a week-to-week basis, completely. I am not requiring experiments outside the 4 week exp't blocks (although you certainly could easily do so. . . I just am streamlining my experiment stuff into those 4 week blocks when we'll do multiple exp'ts each week for a while), so if they have time and motivation to choose, I will go along with whatever they want to do.

For our 4-week experiment blocks, we'll all 3 collaborate to choose/plan/organize. They like experiments enough that they'll go along with pretty much whatever I want to do if I am organized enough to make a plan. I do plan to have them write a couple lab reports those weeks, so that'll be something different. I think we'll do one lab report each week on one lab, plus several other just-do-it labs.

[Jen+4dc]

Thanks Stephanie!

[Matryoshka]

I am planning on doing CPO life science, but for some reason, I am being drawn to GP SYRWTLS. It has nothing to do with this board. :D I am actually serious. I love GP, but kind of forgot about their science stuff until recently. I am not sure how well I will be able to do CPO, so I am thinking that I might go ahead and grab this anyway.

 

We did CPO last year. It's also set up to read the chapter and then answer questions. The questions do make them think. There's a chapter every two weeks - the first week we read the chapter and did any section reviews, the second week they did the assessment, which often took them multiple days. They seemed to like the indepedence.

 

A major difference I'm hearing between CPO and GP in the OP's post is thtat CPO focuses on one topic a year (standard US model), whereas GP mixes everything in every year (standard European model) - and CPO does include labs. We did labs every other week - many from the book, but sometimes we'd subtitute with something else.

 

I have to say that although CPO focuses on one topic a year, all the books do touch on the other sciences as it relates to the one being studied, showing how they're interrelated. For example, in life science there's a section on how geologic changes affected the evolution of life (earth science), biochemistry (chemistry), and there's a section on the physics of the human body - joints as levers, the optics of the human eye, etc (physics).