Apologia Educational Ministries is well known to homeschoolers for their science curricula. It is both well-grounded scripturally and academically strong. The elementary series, written by Jeannie Fulbright, incorporates all of this using Charlotte Mason style methods. We have been enjoying this series and were thrilled to add the Exploring Creation with Chemistry & Physics to our schedule this year. It’s even better when we get to use both the Junior Notebooking Journal and the regular Notebooking Journal.
You may be thinking that Chemistry and Physics is something best reserved for older students. I did. I was sure that my youngest learners would not get much out of our lessons. Boy, was I surprised! Don’t let these ideas hold you and your children back. Not only are our children often more capable than we give them credit for, but this subject is not above them. Many of the questions my children have asked at one time or another (will this float? why is this heavier when they are the same size? how do magnets work? you get the idea) can be answered by chemistry and physics. Once you start doing some of the “Try This!” activities, all of your children will be interested.
With frequent narration and hands-on activities, the hardcover book ($39) is engaging and easy to use. It all starts with a gentle, easy-to-follow introduction into what matter is. The rest of the lessons (14 in all) build upon this foundation. The earlier lessons focus on chemistry – states of matter, atoms, the periodic table of elements, crystals and mixtures. The physics portion starts with lesson 6 and looks at motion, energy, light, electricity, magnetism, and simple machines. Recommended for K-6th grades, we included everyone from the 3 year old through the 7th grader. This is probably the last year I will be using the same science book for everyone. I feel comfortable using this with my 7th grader. She is not looking at studying more than the high school requirements – nothing advanced. Much of what is covered with
Exploring Creation with Chemistry & Physics is also covered in
Physical Science. With our previous study of
Anatomy & Physiology she has also covered a portion of
General Science. Both of these are also from
Apologia Educational Ministries – the Jr High level curricula. We plan to cover these for her 8th grade year.
Although my older girls could read this on their own, we enjoy working together for as many subjects as possible. I read aloud with everyone gathered around. Sprinkled throughout the reading (which reads in a nice conversational style rather than a dry textbook) are activities (Try This!) and narration prompts. Most of the activities could be done easily and on the spot. Other times, we would do these experiments on Fridays – our “fun school” day. At times, the reading after would refer to the results of the just-done activity, this was my cue to be finished for the week or to do that activity now.
The Try This! activities and more complex projects and the end of each lesson mostly used easily obtainable materials. Most have used things we already had on hand. We have purchased Alka-Seltzer tablets, candy and other items with our regular grocery trips. A few items will need to be picked up at a building materials store (stump remover). A complete listing by lesson (for all the Try This and final project activities and experiments) is located in the back of the book. When a specific brand is mentioned, it really is best to use those specific brands (versus store brands, etc.) for the best results of these experiments. The projects and activities with a dramatic or tasty result are the favorites here.
I don’t know about your family, but my children don’t think we’ve done “school work” unless we’ve written things on paper. School work = paper work. The Notebooking Journals are not a necessity, but do add some extra activities to reinforce the new vocabulary and things learned throughout the lesson. There are pages for recording results of the experiments and copywork to complement the lesson. Mama appreciates the schedule to keep us on track and the page with each lesson of additional resources both activities and books. Those are especially useful if we skip over some of the experiments – we’ve come across a few we’ve done on our own over the past year or so. My children remember those and what is happening and why, so we don’t repeat.
We have had the opportunity to use both the
Junior Notebooking Journal ($24) and regular
Notebooking Journal ($24) side by side. My nearly 6 year old kindergarten and nearly 8 year old 2nd grade learners have thoroughly enjoyed their own journals. There are two coloring pages in the beginning of each lesson, the same copywork page – with a change of lines (dashed in the middle with slightly larger spacing). We’ve also seen fewer pages for some of the experiment results pages. The pages aren’t left out, there just are not as many as the regular journal offers. When the Junior Notebooking Journal has a crossword puzzle with the new vocabulary words, it is a simpler version compared to the regular Notebooking Journal. The mini-books for each lesson are the same between the journals. The schedule and Test It Out (pages of additional resources) are also the same. My girls would have been ready for the regular journal around 3rd grade, we’ll see if the current 2nd grader is. For now, the Junior Notebooking Journal is just perfect for him.
Thank You Apologia Educational Ministries!
