We did this with my middle son over 2 years.
There are not a huge number of experiments. It seemed like a "downgrade"' to us after what we'd been using, which was God's Design. It is a good solid basic first "textbook" science course, but it is not always exciting. Module 1 in particular has been accused of dullness. The topics are pretty different and have quite a range--if she likes it the first year I see no reason she'll have trouble with being bored the second year. The experiments are OK--not jaw-dropping, but if she's not done many it should be OK. My son read and answered the On Your Own independently; I "lab-assisted" at some of the experiments and showed him how to fill out the lab reports, and I helped him learn how to study and begin taking exams. There is a lot to really learn here--lots of vocabulary, although not as much as will be needed in biology. This is where I start taking a turn from narration-only; narration isn't quite sufficient to learn large bodies of scientific terms. We learn how to study and then learn how to test. This course is a good intro for that.
I have no idea what the DVD lessons are. I never heard of them and don't see them on the website. There is a CD of someone reading the book, there is a multimedia CD--those are nice, and there is the book on CD-Rom. We had that. I did not like it, we both would have preferred a written text plus the multimedia CD. I can't answer about a DVD because I've never seen one and it must be made by another company to go along?
We used Donna Young's lesson plans and cut the amount in half for each day. I never tried doing it for three days. When we hit this level, for retention purposes I believe a short amount daily is preferable so that's when we move to daily lessons.
The supplies for General Science are really, really, really basic. Mostly just household stuff. So I didn't buy a supply kit. Do check the lab list on the Apologia site and see if you really need it.
We've never done the lapbook elements, my second son would have rebelled. If we use it with #3, I might consider it, but using little dinky paper folds for basic science info seems busyworkish to me so not something we've tried.
We go ahead in this text and start the process of learning how to prepare for and answer actual test questions. I do narration combined with On Your Own for the daily work but we use the study questions as an assignment, go over how to answer things when asked, and do the test. In my experience the first few tests done this way are a pretty steep learning curve. Being able to use actual factual data to answer specific questions is a very different beast than just telling what you learned or remember. I personally find it a useful skill for later.
We always read a scientist bio each year and do a number of living books, especially nature-oriented, at this age as well. I'm not sure which ones you might have read in the past. We schedule in time for them separately on the schedule and I don't try to "make" them fit the book outline. I'd just glance through the resource then go looking for things that fit the topics or people that most interest your daughter.
