Secular chemistry

[tibbyl]

Need recommendations for high school secular chemistry. Student is proficient in math, so it does not need to be math-light.

[Mandy in TN]

Keystone and Oak Meadow both offer secular chemistry course. Singapore's Chemistry Matters is secular. You could purchase any text used buy your local high school. Also TC offers a high school chemistry lecture and MicroChem Plus for labs.

 

I have no actually experience with any of this. This fall my oldest will be using Apologia and going to the local tutorial for labs.

 

But, HTH-

Mandy

[AngieW in Texas]

I've been looking for a good, secular chemistry course as well. I think I'm actually going to go with Spectrum Chemistry, even though it's Christian. It doesn't seem to be as pervasively Christian as Apologia. My main reason for choosing it over Keystone or Oak Meadow (which I've also considered) is that all the supplies come with it.

 

Another option that I know very little about is http://www.starlinepress.com/ . They only have a few samples on their website. I ordered a catalog from them and I hope it has more information than the catalog they have online (which isn't much more than an order form). When I talked to a representative on the phone, he said that the program is secular.

[gamommy]

My dh teaches chemistry at a public highschool. He recently evaluated several texts and chose one by Prentice Hall. He feels it's a great comprehensive course and it is completely secular.

[JenGeorgia]

I wasn't overly impressed with anything out there, so I am kind of cobbling together a chemistry program of our own using Thinkwell Chemistry, Chemistry: The Central Science by Brown/LeMay/Bursten, and Chemistry by Steven Zumdahl. I originally bought both textbooks to look them over and have the kids try them out and then use one. I really like both of them, however, and so I think we are going to incorporate both until either A) one is clearly superior at meeting our needs or B) we are overwhelmed and play Rock, Paper, Scissors to make the decision.

 

I'm still in search of a good lab manual--have a couple on the way--I do hope I don't "love" them all!

[asta]

We're going to do this. I bought the book, "Chemistry, Matter and the Universe" by Richard E. Dickerson and Irving Geis, second hand, through Alibris. (well, I had to, it's out of print - but it still only cost me $10).

 

The book is marvelous, if not stinky. I think the owner was a cigar smoker. I just stuffed it full of dryer sheets... Anyway, the layout is so LOGICAL. There isn't anything busy about it, yet it still has illustrations that (gasp!) illustrate concepts.

 

I have a quirky, no-nonsense kid. He doesn't like superfluous stuff in his texts. Nor does he like lots of splashy colors in things he needs to read. The illustrations are simple browns and oranges (good).

 

Additionally, I picked up an old Teaching Company Chemistry course (on VHS for cheap) in case there are some concepts that are hard to grasp. For labs, we'll just blow up the kitchen or something...

 

 

asta

[TFJ]

I haven't used this, but I did consider it for my dd. friendlychemistry.com It seems to have a lot of fun ways to learn. We may still try it out for the younger dd. We also used Cyber Ed's physical science through the homeschoolbuyerscoop.org. It has been a good supplement. There are a lot of chemistry games online.

 

http://www.freeworldu.org/static/chemistry_collective.aspx One I have bookmarked, but have not tried. "Located on the Carnegie Mellon Department of Chemistry Web site, the Chemistry Collective's main task is to make chemistry visible and functional to users, particularly high school and college chemistry students."

 

We use the freeworldu for some drills. Including chemistry, but this is with our 11 y.o., I haven't tried the high school materials.

 

HTH

 

TFJ

[tibbyl]

I've been looking for a good, secular chemistry course as well. I think I'm actually going to go with Spectrum Chemistry, even though it's Christian. It doesn't seem to be as pervasively Christian as Apologia. My main reason for choosing it over Keystone or Oak Meadow (which I've also considered) is that all the supplies come with it.

 

Thanks, Angie. I am leaning toward Spectrum precisely because it comes with all lab materials. It has been recommended a few times by non-christian friends.

 

At heart, I am a lazy mom, so science experiments fall by wayside if we do not have materials lying around. Also, what some science ed vendors consider "common household items" are quite foreign to this household.

 

We've used Keystone and Oak Meadow in past but this particular student needs a text with more of conversational tone to it.

[sandellie4]

We use Conceptual Chemistry, and although it is light on math, it's worked really well for us. It's similar in concept to Conceptual Physics, if you've ever seen that. Sandy

[Myrtle]

Need recommendations for high school secular chemistry. Student is proficient in math, so it does not need to be math-light.

 

We'll be using Singapore's Chemistry. None of their stuff is math-lite.

[Miss Marple]

Same here.