What do I need for Apologia Biology?

[Perogi]

Dd 14 is entering grade 9 this year.  I planned to do Apologia Biology this year but when I went to order I'm seeing that there are all kinds of supplemental needs, like dissection kits and a microscope and slides.  If I buy everything "recommended" I'm looking at $500!  My other option is to do an online grade 9 science class through our school board but......I would really rather not.  The only pro is that it's free.  And I guess that it's "recognizable" and accepted on a transcript. 

 

Do I really need all that stuff to do Biology properly for her this year?

[mschickie]

If you are going to do the labs you will need the microscope, slides and the dissection kit/specimens.  Have you checked out home science tools for their packages.  It is still a bit pricey but not $500.  You can also normally find the slides and dissection kit used which is what we did.  We also already had a microscope so we just had to buy the specimens new.

 

https://www.homesciencetools.com/apologia-biology-kit-bundle-microscope

[cbollin]

When I did Apologia with oldest and middle, I don't think some of the supplements like Student Notebook Journal existed yet.  Instead of having that journal, we just used those composition notebooks for lab reports, and the free "book extras" on the website (check the textbook for the password) as a template for formal report.  The "study guide" was on normal notebook paper and on your owns were treated like self check out loud questions.  Now with youngest, I did find a used copy of that journal locally and I do like it.  But the person had used some pages and I only needed some, not all.

 

I didn't have a DVD either.  We did end up with audio reading of textbook for middle child as she needed that to keep on keeping on.  The multimedia CD is optional - it just has some fun extra videos of some things in book.  We'd remember some of the time to use it.   So those things you may not need.    You might like to know that virtualhomeschoolgroup dot org may have an At Your Own Pace option for free helps.

 

The dissection kit and specimens can wait until around second semester.  You may be able to find someone local to buy microscope. I did get my lab supplies form home science like mschickie did.

 

Also, we didn't have problem with apologia with our cover school, and colleges didn't ask that level of detail to care what we used.  Apologia uses "real stuff" so you shouldn't have issues if your college ask for more detail than our colleges asked.  You can do 4 (1 per quarter) formal lab reports like the bookextras on apologia website suggest. (again, that info for extras part of website is password protected and in the textbook itself)

 

 

[MerryAtHope]

If you don't already have a microscope (or access to one), biology is more expensive than the other sciences. We had one, so we bought the text book, test booklet and solutions manual, dissection kit and specimens, and the set of slides. I usually got the multi-media CD-ROM too, though my kids didn't use it much. I think the notebooks are really helpful, but they weren't out when we did Biology & you can do without. Try Rainbow Resource Center though--you can probably save some on your materials through them. 

 

[Perogi]

Thank you so much everyone.  Home Science Tools definitely has the most affordable supplies!  I am in Canada so I'm just trying to figure out how to get it all here without breaking the bank on shipping alone!!  Dd reminded me that she did a frog dissection at coop 2 years ago and last year went and observed a sheep dissection.  So I think we will maybe just do one actual dissection so she can write up the lab and do the rest by watching YouTube videos and simulations.  I would like to get her the microscope and slides though.