Story of Science for 5th?

[faiths13]

I am going to use Joy Hakim's Story of Science for my 7th grader, but Im not sure if its a good choice for my 5th grader. I would love some input on if it might work for a younger child, and if not, what might be a good choice. Also, I was wondering if I will need to pair anything with the Story of Science?

[serendipitous journey]

:bigear::bigear::bigear:

 

I've been drooling over this myself, but Button's too young by any standards. Well, nearly any: mine, certainly. I saw that someone was reading it successfully (Amazon review) to an 8-year-old, a 10-year-old, and some older siblings; Booklist reviewed it as for grades 5-8 but Library Journal for 8 and up; and one reviewer had a 6th grader stumped by it. So there's clearly some variability.

 

Folks seem to agree that for teaching it you'd want the Teacher's and Student's Guides. I'm curious that the hive thinks ...

 

:bigear:

[Thea]

My 6th grader is using The Story of Science along with SL's Core 6/G. It's been a great fit for her. She reads it independently -- I'm not that impressed with the teacher's guide as most activities are geared for classroom use and difficult (read: too much work for me) to adapt to an individual student.

[Deniseibase]

I'm currently teaching Aristotle Leads the Way to a co-op class of 10-13 year olds. The one fifth grader, a 10 year old, is extremely interested and engaged in the class, but some of the things we talk about are over her head. The bits about math, particularly :-) But, if your fifth grader is interested, I think they should be able to understand most of it.

 

BTW, I use the teacher & student Quest books, and I agree with the previous poster that they are not easy to adapt to an individual student. An awful lot of the 'activities' are nothing more than some variation on 'have the class read this aloud and discuss'. We're up to Ch. 15 in the book this week and have only found 3 hands-on activities in the book that would be something that I'd try to adapt for a homeschool.

[ChrissySC]

I am saving the Story of Science. Have you looked at Great Scientists from Elemental Science? This might be more appropriate. They are divided by historical time period too. They are free as well!

 

I have them on my blog with our easy notebook studies, but the downloads can be found on the ES blog, which is here. I have shown how I organized and used this download. I believe that it is rich enough, but also encourages research. I have matched literature where possible. I am looking for videos too. :) Add to this a more CM approach to "smash" in your notebook, and you will have a neat resource as well as documentation for your portfolio.

Edited November 15, 2011 by ChrissySC

[higginszoo]

My fifth grader asked to put it aside for now, but he was definitely absorbing a good bit of the information. I had been using it primarily with him, so it's not a great fit just yet, but if it were something that I was including my older dc in, I wouldn't have any hesitation having him use it, too.

[Halcyon]

I am debating between that one and the Visual Science Guide, which looks beautiful. It's also written chronologically, which is a plus. They're not exactly alike, and may serve different purposes, so we may get both.

Edited November 15, 2011 by Halcyon

[Jay3fer]

Just got these this week (for my older kids), and imo, the first one MIGHT be okay for younger kids, but the second two I would save for a higher grade. Also, for some reason, the first is in past tense while the second two are a little obnoxious in that they use the present tense ("Along come the two Bernoulli brothers. They read Leibniz’s paper on calculus and at first have a hard time understanding it. The Bernoullis study Leibniz again and again...").

 

(I REALLY don't like the present-tense form; I think it's very forced when you're talking about the 1600s. Some readers, I guess, would find it fascinating and immediate.)

 

Anyway, that's just from a cursory look through them... I think the first one is much easier to understand than the other two. Please feel free to flame me if I'm wrong. :-)))

[Veritaserum]

We did almost half of the Aristotle book last year in 5th. I found it incredibly interesting. Dd hit a wall. I decided to shelve it until 7th grade+. I agree that the teacher book is geared toward classroom use.

[masaki]

OK, sorry OP, I just realized that after writing all that below that I hadn't answered any of your questions! I would say, based on our experience last year, that Story of Science would be a good read-along activity for your 5th grader at the very least. If you think his math so far has prepared him for those topics I mentioned below, then he would probably be fine to do Story of Science side-by-side with his older bro. I think you'll have to spend time on going through the Quest Guide to figure out what would work for him and what won't. If he sits out a particular activity that your 7th grader is working on, maybe he could work on one of the Curriculum links instead? I think you could make it work for both of them.

 

For the last third of 5th grade and through summer, ds worked through Elemental Science's Logic Stage Biology. It's a well-organized program. You can look through samples of this on their website. We are doing MPH Science 5-6 this year, in addition to Story of Science. It requires some planning as well, but I like the different approach. It's meant to be a two-year program, grades 5 & 6.

 

HTH :)

 

We tried to use Aristotle Leads the Way at the beginning of 5th grade last year, but it didn't work out for us. Ds did history and science the wtm way and it was just too much to consistently add another component. I thought it would be a nice bridge between the two subjects--and it is--just couldn't find a way to make it happen last year.

 

This year we're approaching both science and history a little differently and making connections between all subjects is something I'm trying to keep in mind as we go. I agree with Deniseibase that an understanding of certain math concepts is needed to get the most out some of the Student Quest Guide activities. Topics such as pi, the Pythagorean Theorem, figuring out length on days based on the tilt of Earth's axis, Euclid's axioms, prime numbers, figuring out density, angles, absolute zero, Fibonacci's Numbers, and even a little bit on calculus are covered in the Quest Guide.

 

As many others have said, the teacher's guide is set up for classroom use. It takes some time to go through and pick and choose good activites to do. Having said that, I'm glad that we have it. I like some of the offbeat suggestions offered in the Curriculum Links sections for further exploration. There are ideas for geography, art, language arts, history, science, and math activities.

 

So, we started back up with Aristotle Leads the Way a couple of weeks ago and it feels totally different this time around. We have followed the 4-year history cycle up unil the end of last year, so ds is really enjoying making connections between what he's learned so far, and what he is now learning from a different perspective. The more time ds and I spend with this program, the more we like it.

 

We also have the Milestones in Science kit, as well, and the plan was to work through it along with the book, but it doesn't look like a lot of the experiments/demos will fit in this year. Aristotle Leads the Way ends at 1500, and of course there have been many milestones since then. :lol:

 

I'll definitely check out some of the other resources suggested, like Great Scientists and the Visual Science Guide.

 

Marilyn

Edited November 15, 2011 by masaki

[faiths13]

thanks so much for all the responses! Neither of my ds's is at a very high level in math, but Im hoping that it will be ok. Do I really need to teachers guide if there arent many activities that we can use? I guess there are helpful links as well though? I dont have a ton of time to go through a teachers manual to read it etc, (I have 4 at home). My boys love to read though and from the sample I have seen it looks great. Maybe I will try to use it for both with a backup of something else to go with it jic.

[Deniseibase]

thanks so much for all the responses! Neither of my ds's is at a very high level in math, but Im hoping that it will be ok. Do I really need to teachers guide if there arent many activities that we can use? I guess there are helpful links as well though? I dont have a ton of time to go through a teachers manual to read it etc, (I have 4 at home). My boys love to read though and from the sample I have seen it looks great. Maybe I will try to use it for both with a backup of something else to go with it jic.

 

No weblinks in the teacher's manual at all, sorry. You don't really need to be a very high level in math, they take the time to explain some interesting math concepts, but it's not NECESSARY they grasp it to move on in the text, and in fact the math info is often in little side articles. If I were doing this with a 5th and a 7th grader, I'd have them read the chapter & then if I didn't have time to find them outside activities, have them go to the library and find some reading on their own to tie in. They should not have too much trouble finding books about most of the subjects.

[Momling]

We're just finishing up with Story of Science Aristotle and have Newton ready to go. We began it a while ago... in the spring maybe? And we did the quest activities for a month or so before they started seeming more like busywork. They are definitely aimed at a classroom setting.

 

Now we just use the text. It's become a bedtime story which we take turns reading. My fourth grader likes it a lot, but then... she loves history. She did OUP Ancient Times is currently doing OUP Medieval world and she does make connections with people and places that she's already learned about. I've learned a lot too.

 

I would say that a motivated 5th grader (or younger) would do just fine with the text. The activities do add a nice element if you want to expand on it. Some are better than others.

[enviromommy]

I am using it with my 6th and 4th graders, including the teacher's guide and student quest guide. They both really like it except for some of the math, so I don't force that. We started it last year as a read-aloud but I decided to purchase the curriculum and start over. The concepts have not been too difficult, just some of the math, as I said. As a read-aloud I think it's definitely fine for that age.

[faiths13]

so im wondering, do i really need the teachers guide?

[Momling]

If I were teaching a class, the teacher's guide and quest guide would have been like gold. It's scripted... but it's scripted in a way that I like to teach. It did a great job of prompting kids to really think about the text.

 

We used it for a month, but in the end it felt too much for just one child.

 

On the other hand, I sold it for pretty close to the same price I bought it. So maybe you should give it a try and sell if you don't like it.

[faiths13]

i am going through a charter, so if i dont need the book i cant sell it. the money is just wasted. i would love more opinions on if it is needed : ) also im wondering if this curric is enough on its own. we are switching curric next month.

[faiths13]

do i need the teachers guide for the answers for the student quest guide?

[faiths13]

thanks!