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Is outdoor secrets enough for science in second grade?!
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We are hoping to finish up 106 days of creation this month and trying to plan my science for the start of our new school year in August. I picked up Outdoor secrets and outdoor secrets companion while at a homeschool conference from Sonyas booth. I was thinking this would be enough for a second grader! I got so overwhelmed in te vending hall with all the products. After hearing Ken Ham speak I feel so safe using his science curriculum but when I looked at it…..it seemed very text book heavy! Then I looked at Apologiaa science and now feel torn. Apologia seems more CM friendly than AIG,s science. We want to teach from a young earth creation point of view. Should I hold off on adding in more? Is outdoor secrets enough for a second grader! I have really enjoyed all the wonderful living books we did with106 days of creation! I feel so torn!
In our PS they did half year of science and a half year of social studies. Sometimes we make things so hard on ourselves, and I *really* think elementary grade science is one of those areas. So my answer is yes, especially if you add in nature study.
I am going to do Outdoor Secrets this summer and the books look amazing!
We did it but it did not last us the full year…about 1/2 the year. We did like the extra book selections and nature notebook entries. It was enough. We are now doing Apologia Exploring Creation through Astronomy and like it as well. Different strokes for different folks.
Just a thought: If doing OS 1 time a week and Nature Study 1 time a week doesn’t feel like enough, I was thinking that this might be a fun time to schedule in the Burgess Bird, Animal, and/or Seaside Books.
Thanks for the tips guys! Im going to sit down with my son and have a good long talk about our year and our upcoming year to find out what he’s liked and has not liked. Then I can go from there! The out door secrets seems so sweet and right up my alley….not overwhelming at all. I know we will probally need to use a stronger course once he hits upper graders so just wandering if I should start the AIG or Apologia then. What did you guys like about Apologia and what didn’t you like? What did you like about AIG’s science curriculum and what didn’t you like? I wanted to look more indepth at the books while at the vendor hall but didn’t have much time. Wish I could borrow the books from someone just to look at!
Well…my 2 cents… We like Apologia books in the early years. My children have really enjoyed the journals to go along with it. It is not truly CM, however we do narrate what is read. They pick up living books from the library or I find cheap books online that go with the topic to compensate. Nature Study makes up for what Apologia lacks in the CM area, I think anyway.
Thanks guys! I think what I need to do is find someone locally who owns some of these books that I can sit down and look at myself! I really want to steer clear of too much textbook type of work for atleast the first few years of homeschooling and trying only to use living books! I don’t want to buy something I can’t view or look at first! Thanks for your opinions!
We love apologia. I have textbooks and it isn’t a textbook in my opinion. The books are loaded with hands-on activity suggestions actually. For instance, in the Swimming Creatures, we were instructed to draw a life-size chalk drawing of a sea turtle. We measured it all off and the kids were AMAZED at how large these creatures grow to be. Of course, this led to chalk drawings of many other sea creatures, all of which they wanted to be to scale so of course they had the book out looking up sizes of other sea creatures (as well as other living books we had on hand).
We have done all of them except anatomy and the new chemistry one (which some of our children will be doing next year in tutorial if it goes to press in time).
We DON’T do the lapbooking or notebooking. We DO use narration with it. The books has narration questions in every chapter throughout and encourages narration. They also have the questions listed at the back of the book as well (with answers where applicable; some questions are more open-ended while others have definite correct answers). All of the questions are worded in a way to get the students thinking out loud.
I think the value is part of it for me as well. I can use these books as a spine and add based on their interests and what is sparked from the books. My older children read on their own. I admit I don’t read all of it to our younger ones, but they love the pictures and the activities and I read it with them picking and choosing what to skim over.
It works for us, and we’ll stick with Apologia. We are continuing with it into high school, though my son had a huge learning curve I’ll admit when moving to general science. He was in public school though through 4th grade, and had a very limited science base coming out of PS.
I have not used any of the other things mentioned including Outdoor Secrets, but it is on my wish list!
potpourri,
Thanks for your suggestion for NOEO science! I think im gonna check them out soon and see how we like them. My sons love for science is so sweet right now and I just don’t want to kill his spirit while he’s so young. Not saying that a certain science curriculum would do hat but trying to stay gentle right now as much as I can. For a seven year old he is still a dreamer and loves play, doesn’t not do well with too much of any one thing!
LDIMOM,
Thank you for breaking the Apologia down for me….this really helped me get a glimpse of what it all entails. I think if we used Apologia we could break it apart and use what we wanted of it so that’s a great idea too. I do like that you said it has hands on activities. My kids like anything hands on and it really helps them grasps concepts!
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