stephanie Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 Ds15 (9th) started Biology in August, but I feel like we're getting nowhere. We've tried a few different curricula this year that were in textbook format and ds was totally overwhelmed. He's not a reader as it is so all the words on the High School text was too much. So we've been working along with Time4Learning, supplementing some reading, and doing dissections with his younger sisters who are doing Marine Biology. I just don't have that feeling in my heart that you get when you KNOW you're doing enough. Of course my idea of enough may be skewed because I do a lot of comparing myself to other homeschoolers, but it just doesn't feel good for me. Ds career goals center somewhere around military technology or something in the Technology field. So how can I give this boy a solid Biology course, without traumatizing him? I honestly get overwhelmed when I look through his texts and I have my Bachelors in Science! It all looks so boring and not necessary. I want a happy medium for us, but one that I can live with. I hope someone else has had this experience and can offer some suggestions. Thank you!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swimmermom3 Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 Which texts have you used that don't work for your son? That would help us narrow down a direction for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
at the beach Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 Here is a link to a non majors college level biology textbook that is manageable and pretty engaging. We used parts of this. http://dieterleclassroom.wikispaces.com/Exploring+the+Way+Life+Works There also used to be audio of this available somewhere online. I couldn't locate it right now. Or take a look at education-portal.com. They might have biology lectures your son could listen to to add to what you are doing. HTH a little. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kroe1 Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 To me, science is the lab and research, everything else memorized in texts just shortens the research time. LOL. Probably the most bare boned science I would ever allow would be a daily science lab. I would get the labs from a couple of reputable publishers and just go at it. I would have kiddo tell me what he did, why, and what he proved or disproved. I would probably throw in a couple of vocabulary words each day. I probably would require 2 or 3 long term research projects for the year, and that would be that. For elementary and middle school, I always required a daily science lab in addition to whatever text we were using. That was probably overkill, but science is really important in our family since all if us work in the field. At least for the younger years, the lab never took more than about 15 minutes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 I have the baby Campbell and it was too wordy for my kids. They like the Miller Levine textbook on the ipad as it is less words per page. Other resources we like that are not wordy is the Pearson's biology coloring books for the visuals (Link is to the microbiology book) and the crash course biology videos on YouTube. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heathermomster Posted January 16, 2014 Share Posted January 16, 2014 http://www.wiesereducational.com/products/ags-biology-mm7381.htm The link above contains a preview option, which may give you some idea of the text. You could just pump up the text that you are already using. I like viewing pre-made slides with a microscope. Perhaps have him build an incubator and grow bacteria. Maybe perform a dissection or two coupled with documentaries and youtube. The website biologycorner.com may give you some ideas. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephanie Posted January 17, 2014 Author Share Posted January 17, 2014 I've tried Dive with Abeka, LifePacs, The Way Life Works, added Tiner's Biology book, and now Time4Learning. I'm just all over the place with Biology,and I'm sure ds is feeling it. He was interested in the Virus chapter so I may let him expand his studies on that for now. I've got my Home Science Tools catalog and I'm going to look through it for some ideas. I'm also going to look into yalls suggestions. Thank y'all! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chiguirre Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 How about The Teaching Company's Biology course? That would be video or audio based but contain a course guide with an outline of key points. If you're lucky your library might even have it. One caveat though, it will be evolution based unlike the resources you've tried so far. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matryoshka Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 How about The Teaching Company's Biology course? That would be video or audio based but contain a course guide with an outline of key points. If you're lucky your library might even have it. One caveat though, it will be evolution based unlike the resources you've tried so far. Actually, The Way Life Works is extremely evolution-based - it's the foundational organizing principle of the book (and modern biology...) I'm guessing Time4Learning also covers evolution? OP, do you care one way or the other? PP could be right that video-based could be a good way to go, but I also see you started with Dive (isn't that video?). That's a lot of courses to have gone through in one semester... We're doing Biology this year; I outsourced the labs, as that's what I never seem to get to. And dd is also not into reading herself, so I've ended up reading it to her - the auditory reinforcement seems to work better (I'm a bit worried about how that will play out in high school - I can't read things to her forever...). She's only in 7th, though, so I haven't been worried as much about output and testing as I would if she were in 9th. She's going to get lab write-ups in the outside lab class, though, and I'm making her put vocab into Quizlet and self-test. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephanie Posted January 20, 2014 Author Share Posted January 20, 2014 Actually, The Way Life Works is extremely evolution-based - it's the foundational organizing principle of the book (and modern biology...) I'm guessing Time4Learning also covers evolution? OP, do you care one way or the other? PP could be right that video-based could be a good way to go, but I also see you started with Dive (isn't that video?). That's a lot of courses to have gone through in one semester... We're doing Biology this year; I outsourced the labs, as that's what I never seem to get to. And dd is also not into reading herself, so I've ended up reading it to her - the auditory reinforcement seems to work better (I'm a bit worried about how that will play out in high school - I can't read things to her forever...). She's only in 7th, though, so I haven't been worried as much about output and testing as I would if she were in 9th. She's going to get lab write-ups in the outside lab class, though, and I'm making her put vocab into Quizlet and self-test. We are Christian therefore we do not believe in evolution, but I like for my kids to be educated in it so they can know why they believe what they believe....not just because Mom and Dad told them so. The Way Life Works is very evolution-based, and I found it hard to weed out the evolution in the mix of other concepts. I did use that book for some of the pictures that help explains concepts. Time4Learning also covers evolution, but it's more in just a chapter instead of it being thread through the entire course. I'm able to work with that a bit better. I have bought a few different courses because I got them cheap at our homeschool store, but I'm really not enjoying any of them. I did order some kits from Home Science tools so we can supplement our studies...I hope that works. Part of the problem is that Ds is just not interested in Biology on the cellular level. He's interested in more concrete concepts like dissections and the human anatomy...lol. I understand that. I'm hoping as we move forward we can start to pull some of these concepts into our studies that he's not been so interested in. Maybe he needs something to really "put his hands on" so he can pull it altogether. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephanie Posted January 20, 2014 Author Share Posted January 20, 2014 I'm not sure how I managed to mess up that previous post of mine... :huh: It's included with previous poster's comment. Sigh.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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