Carrie12345 Posted May 15, 2016 Share Posted May 15, 2016 I thought I'd give the high school board a shot. I'm on the hunt for non-textbook, non-encyclopedia-type books for my rising 8th grader. We have all the experiment/activity aspects covered. She's not ready for a genuinely high school level Physics course, but I figured maybe some of you have come across interesting supplements along the way that you could recommend. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grantmom Posted May 15, 2016 Share Posted May 15, 2016 Not a book, but have you seen Physics Girl? That might be a fun supplement, especially for a female student. So many physics videos have a male doing the talking. I like her a lot. I think she is refreshing and funny. https://www.youtube.com/c/physicsgirl Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grantmom Posted May 15, 2016 Share Posted May 15, 2016 Where else did you cross post? I would love to hear others' suggestions for books. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carrie12345 Posted May 16, 2016 Author Share Posted May 16, 2016 Not a book, but have you seen Physics Girl? That might be a fun supplement, especially for a female student. So many physics videos have a male doing the talking. I like her a lot. I think she is refreshing and funny. https://www.youtube.com/c/physicsgirl Oh, she's going to like that! Where else did you cross post? I would love to hear others' suggestions for books. Thanks! K-8 :) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3andme Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 There's some good possibilities in this thread about Physics for Poets. Also some other good links in this post on the HS Physics. If you're open to video MOOC classes for non-physics majors, try Udacity's Intro to Physics takes a historical approach to physics and then there's Coursera's How things Work. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joules Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 Thinking Physics by Lewis Epstein Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jane Elliot Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 (edited) Physics in Your Life from Great Courses is good. Your library may have it. Edited May 17, 2016 by Jane Elliot Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holly Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 (edited) We'll be using Physics 101 DVDs next year. They are definitely from a Christian POV, so I'm not sure if that would work for you or not. I believe there are 20 episodes and a PDF guide & text with discussion questions. I also plan on adding in some Myth Busters episodes and Physics Workshop from Thames & Kosmos. Edited May 17, 2016 by Holly 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G5052 Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 (edited) We'll be using Physics 101 DVDs next year. They are definitely from a Christian POV, so I'm not sure if that would work for you or not. I believe there are 20 episodes and a PDF guide & text with discussion questions. I also plan on adding in some Myth Busters episodes and Physics Workshop from Thames & Kosmos. Yes, I'm using these as part of a custom high school course. I looked at the Great Courses Physics in Your Life, but mine liked the Physics 101 lectures better. My 12th grader is behind on math, so we'll be putting her emphasis on formal math all year to finish on time. Science is a get-er-done subject on this round. She asked for "real" experiments and a historical perspective. I'm adding in The Cartoon Guide to Physics, the Castle Heights experiment book (probably more advanced than I'd do for an 8th grader), and Tiner's Concepts of Mathematics and Physics. She needs to finish up chemistry over the summer, and then we'll start the physics in early August so we can hopefully be done before the senioritis hits. My older one did the college-level book of Conceptual Physics, but he officially graduated in May and didn't finish physics until mid-July. He liked it and actually wanted to take physics for his science credits in college, but he was just so burned out that it was tough to get it done. I'm not doing that again! My younger one will be completely finished when she walks. Edited May 17, 2016 by G5052 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jane Elliot Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 Yes, I'm using these as part of a custom high school course. I looked at the Great Courses Physics in Your Life, but mine liked the Physics 101 lectures better. I agree. We've used both these, and my kids enjoy Physics 101 more, but it's definitely Christian, and I wasn't sure the op would want that. If so, Tiner's World of Physics goes really well with Physics 101 and is perfect for the 8th grade level. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G5052 Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 I agree. We've used both these, and my kids enjoy Physics 101 more, but it's definitely Christian, and I wasn't sure the op would want that. If so, Tiner's World of Physics goes really well with Physics 101 and is perfect for the 8th grade level. Yes, both are indeed explicitly Christian. I looked at the high school Conceptual Physics book, the online course that uses that, Apologia, and an online course that uses Apologia. All are decent courses for a kid who needs a solid high school physics credit. They do require some level of algebra which is fine. My 11th grader is currently using Friendly Chemistry with some extras, and we couldn't be happier. It's gone extremely well. We did contact them regarding physics, and they have one in the works, but it won't be ready in time. As I said earlier, my oldest liked the college-level Conceptual Physics book a lot. At the time we were half considering engineering for him, but he had a heavy math load, dual enrollment, etc. etc. I wanted him to have a basic physics class that would be foundational if he took engineering-oriented physics later. As it ended up, he's an accounting major. The college he's enrolled in has only engineering-oriented physics, and the chemistry department has a lot of problems. He's going to take two semesters of biology and call it a day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jane Elliot Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 Tiner's Concepts of Mathematics and Physics. Thank you for mentioning this. Although ds is enjoying the two books, The World of Mathematics and The World of Physics, I had never heard about the Parent Lesson Plans. Do you find these helpful? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G5052 Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 Thank you for mentioning this. Although ds is enjoying the two books, The World of Mathematics and The World of Physics, I had never heard about the Parent Lesson Plans. Do you find these helpful? IMHO they're a bit light, but it's something that I can easily assign. I'm going to have her do some of the suggested writing projects. The quizzes and tests are matching, multiple choice, etc. They say 1/2 credit in science for 7th-9th grade. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jane Elliot Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 (edited) IMHO they're a bit light, but it's something that I can easily assign. I'm going to have her do some of the suggested writing projects. The quizzes and tests are matching, multiple choice, etc. They say 1/2 credit in science for 7th-9th grade. Thank you. He's 7th grade right now and has been using these as fun supplements. He enjoys reading the books and doing the quizzes at the end of each chapter. Since these aren't his main texts, I wonder if we should just continue without the parent lessons. Edited May 18, 2016 by Jane Elliot Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carrie12345 Posted May 18, 2016 Author Share Posted May 18, 2016 Appreciating all the info! Yes, I forgot to mention we stay secular, so thanks for including the additional information anyway! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G5052 Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 There's a lot of good stuff out there indeed. It's hard picking, although I found that there was far, far less stuff for physics than biology and chemistry. You can have a really good time with the experiments. With a younger student, I'd probably emphasize that. Somewhat off topic, but related... My oldest was registered for the fall to take biology in college, but noticed that they now have a more basic physics sequence of two semesters. The prerequisite is readiness for pre-calc (he just finished calculus), so we're going to switch him to physics. It's a really fun professor who also teaches at the science magnet high school. They use the Giancoli book. He's much more interested in physics even though he's an accounting major, so we'll get him swapped today. He made that choice on the basis of high school physics, so I'm glad we got that into his high school program. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kendall Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 I she a really strong reader? If so you could browse a college library if you've got one close. I didn't keep any titles unfortunately, but I browsed the shelves and brought home some books for my then junior. He was very interested in sound (and now is an audio engineer for a production company!) so we focused on books that included that topic. There were several that weren't textbooks and didn't have much of the math/formulas. I found what bits I read to be interesting. I've used Elementary Physical Science by Huey in middle school. My kids liked it. Chapters were short and meaty I thought. There are a few questions at the end of each one which you wouldn't need to do. I would not consider it to be a textbook at all. And it is cheap on amazon! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mckive6 Posted May 19, 2016 Share Posted May 19, 2016 G5052, we are in the same boat that you were in with your oldest. My dd went to France on an immersion exchange for 6 months last year (Feb-Aug), her junior year, and didn't have enough time to finish physics. So, she's had a busy, stressful year trying to finish a few classes from junior year. Now that AP classes are done, she's trying to finish physics as a Senior. It is really difficult!! She's ready to be done, but she's majoring in Mechanical Engineering and she needs a good foundation in physics. We'll just keep pulling away! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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