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Vocab for Apologia Gen. Science inquiry
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Do some of you require more of the words in bold for vocabilary than the study guide requires?
For ex: In Mod. 1, the only vocab. words that are required are:
science
papyrus
spontaneous generation
I’d like for him to know more than those, like Alchemy adn some of the sames of the scientists, etc.
Do any of you require more?
I did. All the scientists went on index cards for study. As did many other words. Because Module 1 is SO HUGE they almost died trying to learn them all. I think it would be okay to build in extra study days because learning all those scientists (which they need for the test) was really hard.
Charlotte didn’t teach ‘vocabulary’ seperately – she taught it in context. Here is a quote from a 2010 SCM blog:
“Encourage your child to learn words’ meanings from the context in his books.
Context will teach your child much about words in the books he reads too. Again, don’t undervalue his ability to deal with language. Charlotte cautioned, “We are convinced that they cannot understand a literary vocabulary so we explain and paraphrase to our own heart’s content but not to theirs” (Vol. 6, p. 75). Definitions and explanations interrupt the flow of the book and “spoil the text and should not be attempted unless children ask, What does so and so mean?” (Vol. 6, p. 192).
Scientific terms do sometimes require explanation, but you would be amazed at what the child can glean about meaning from a good contextual reading. Write down questionable words on a white board before the lesson, and discuss the meaning. Then do your reading without stopping to explain the ‘difficult’ words. Afterwards, ask the children the meanings and see if they are having trouble.
I think you will be surprised if you use Charlotte’s ‘method’ of natural vocabulary building, rather than seperating words from their context and over-explaining them.
As far as memorizing specific scientists – find a good living book on the people you would like them to know about! If their contributions are worth ‘memorizing’ their stories are surely interesting. A child does not soon forget the character of a man (or woman) he has made contact with through a great, living book.
Blessings!
Well, if your children do not already know words that are not on the vocab lists, I’d certainly take steps to learn those words as well. As Servingwithjoy says, it’s much better to do as much in a natural way as you can. Learning from context and demonstrating with hands-on as much as possible is good. However, in my family of science nuts, we have found that there is still a body of words with very precise meanings that we MUST learn in order to learn science well. To be honest, I think a lot of the reason people don’t “like” real science work in high school is lack of vocabulary. We have had to at times just plain memorize precise meanings of words, because it matters. You can’t have just a “sense” of differentiating between speed and velocity, or exothermic and endothermic, diffusion and osmosis—you HAVE to know precisely what they mean. Or you don’t get what you just read. Vocabulary and math. You need these two special languages to make any sense out of higher science at all. BUT IT IS WORTH IT.
If a person is using Apologia General Science they don’t have time to have the student read 40+ science biographies during the first module. It is my goal to have the kids read various and many science biographies, but it would take them a year or more to make it through the list and they can’t really stall on Module 1 while they are doing that. I think there IS a place for learning in context AND a place for memorizing facts/equations/vocab. Since this book is usually a self-teaching book (meaning the parent doesn’t read with them and help explain, the student reads it on their own) then making vocab lists/drill cards, etc are a viable option for the child to help them prepare for the test and to build a foundation necessary to progress in the book. There are people who do not choose to use this book, or use it in this way, but there are many people who find that a combination of methods work best.
Thanks, this helps solidify what my gut was already telling me; to go beyond the few words expected.
My children definitely do what your talking about, servingwithjoy; speaking for myself, I just “know” intuitively what words mean, but I actually have difficulty telling others their meanings though in a specific way. I think there’s a time for both ways of learning – the contextual only, without solid definitions, and the memorization of words, especially in the higher sciences. I think it would be a detrement if they were to only have a vague notion what words mean. Kind of like the danger in not knowing the distinctive differences between Constitutional Republic and Democracy; Socialism, Fascism, and Communism; metaphors and allegory, etc; I know much miscommunication, misunderstanding, and misleading (not to mention manipulation by others) can occur when the definite knowledge of words aren’t known by an individual; does that make sense? I see it everywhere around us in our culture; people are mislead and misinformed because the “wordsmiths” can manipulate the language.
Some words and concepts must simply be defined and memorized as such; in combination with the rich understanding that exists in reading the terms in context.
This leads me to my next question: do you require them to narrate this extra knowledge that isn’t on the Mod. tests?
Yes. Mostly because if one of mine doesn’t narrate it doesn’t stick. The other really didn’t need the extra narration so I only required it now and then…as a surprise or scheduled.
I am gicing my son more than 2 weeks on this first module. However, I must say that thanks to Jonathan Park, he’s come across many, if not most, of these names and terms.
We were just listening to Vol. 6 yesterday and they talked about Mendel and genetics. In past episodes, terms like the First Law of Thermodynamics and uniformitarism, etc. And of course, Darwin, Newton, and the great past astronomers.
So, advice for others who aren’t in this book yet: have your children listen – multiple times (my son listens over and over) – to the Jonathan Park series to make this first Mod. easier!
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