Jen500 Posted July 25, 2008 Share Posted July 25, 2008 Can anyone compare these? Pros and cons? I was getting ready to buy some books and activities from AIMS and then I started looking at TOPS and GEMS...aaaah! Feeling overwhelmed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nikita Posted July 25, 2008 Share Posted July 25, 2008 Well, I've used one or two of both AIMS and GEMS, and while they were good, I really felt they would be better for classroom use, which is why I'm looking at the TOPS units for this year. I think I'll get more value for my $$. From GEMS, I used the Cabbages and Chemistry, which took the basic purple cabbage experiment (acids and bases) a little farther - the emphasis is on scientific method and we did most of the activities. Each lesson builds on the previous one. My son (11 or maybe 12 at the time) got bored quickly. My daughter (she was 7 or 8) enjoyed it a lot more but didn't have the patience for the very specific instructions and she wanted to explore a little more freely. I've also looked at the GEMS elementary algebra books as well as one on plate tectonics and didn't find them too inspiring - they are quite scripted for a classroom situation and I think they would work very well there, but they seemed cumbersome to do at home so I didn't attempt them. I've also borrowed a couple of the AIMS math/physics units - the pre-algebra one called Learning with Lines, I think, and also one that uses Lego to do basic physics experiments. We tried some of the Lego one, but it required a lot of building before we could do the activity, and seemed quite prescriptive and not as open-ended as we wanted. My sense from both books was that the activities were excellent, but were most useful if you wanted to cover exactly the material addressed in each activity. There is a lot to choose from in each book, but you likely wouldn't want to use all the activities because that would be overkill. I do think that you get more value from the AIMS books because there are more activities and it's easier to pick and choose which to do, whereas the GEMS activities all build on each other. I was originally planning to purchase some other AIMS books for this year, but then I came across TOPS and it really sounds like it will work better in my home. My kids are used to some pretty free-form exploration in science though - we don't do the spine/reading/report type of science here so YMMV. Hope this has helped, Nikita Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HollyinNNV Posted July 25, 2008 Share Posted July 25, 2008 Can anyone compare these? Pros and cons? I was getting ready to buy some books and activities from AIMS and then I started looking at TOPS and GEMS...aaaah! Feeling overwhelmed. I used TOPS through SL. The one I remember using was on magnets. The co-op I organized has used various AIMS. I personally taught some of the geo ones. My friend taught two of the GEMS units. From my own experience and talking to friends I'm going to make gross generalizations. TOPS: The younger age group activities seem to work better. I hear people get mixed results with the older ones. Many of the activities seem challenging to implement. I found the instructions a little hard to understand at times. I am buying Lentils for ds this year. I don't plan to buy any of the older plans ever due to my varying success getting the experiments to actually work. Grade: C overall because I routinely hear moms saying it is hard to make it work, although there is always someone out there who thought it was cake:glare: Grade: A for the younger more do-able books GEMS: If you are willing to put in a bunch of time and gather a ton of materials, these are great units. I looked at the materials list and my eyes bugged out. There! is! no! way! Only my friend, the uber-dedicated science guru who doesn't mind making many trips to many stores, would do this type of set-up. And believe me, the kids in her co-op class could never appreciate how much work went into the rad class they experienced! Grade: F for teacher prep time Grade: A for excellent final product AIMS: These books rock! I loved the geo books. My ds loved the primarily series of books. The materials needed are usually cheap and easy to obtain. The teacher instructions are clear. The activities are usually interesting to the kids. The books are right-on as far as grade level. I look for reasons to buy AIMS books. Grade: A for prep time Grade: A for student enjoyment level I would agree that the GEMS are designed for classroom use. But I think AIMS could be used for homeschool without too much trouble. There are lots of online samples. I'd look at those and decide. Holly Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jen500 Posted July 25, 2008 Author Share Posted July 25, 2008 Thanks so much for the input. I think I'll go with AIMS. I like that you can pretty much preview entire books by looking through the individual activities. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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