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Exploring What God Has Made (Elementary Living Science)
$12.95 – $16.95
Dig deeper into fascinating general science topics that relate to each day of Creation in this elementary living science course. (Grades 4–6)
Click the Book List tab to see a list of materials needed for these lesson plans. See full description
Product Description
Explore the miraculous variety of what God has made in Creation!
Dig deeper into fascinating general science topics that relate to each day of Creation. Through great elementary living science books, helpful experiments, nature study projects, and a personal nature notebook focused on the days of Creation, your child will explore light, weather, water, rocks and minerals, plants, space, aquatic life, winged creatures, creeping things, land animals, and the human body.
Complete this one-year study with your student or assign portions for independent work.
Exploring What God Has Made will
- Nurture within your child a sense of wonder at God’s Creation,
- Cultivate a habit of careful observation that will serve your child well, and
- Lay the ground work of personal experience that will support future science studies.
“O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all…” (Psalm 104:24).
Note: Exploring What God Has Made (for grades 4–6) elaborates and expands on many of the science topics that were introduced in Discovering What God Has Made (for grades 1–3) but features different animals, birds, insects, and plants, as well as a different schedule. Your student can enjoy either or both of these living science studies. The chart below compares the schedule and topics for each study.
Discovering What God Has Made (2 days per week) | Exploring What God Has Made (3 days per week) | |
Day 1 | Weeks 1-3, Lessons 1-6 Overview of Creation, light, shadows, rainbow | Weeks 1-2, Lessons 1-6 Overview of Creation, evolution, light |
Day 2 | Weeks 4-6, Lessons 7-13 Water cycle, weather | Weeks 3-5, Lessons 7-15 Weather, properties of water |
Day 3 | Weeks 7-10, Lessons 14-23 Rocks, soil, plants, mushrooms | Weeks 6-14, Lessons 16-40 Rocks, minerals, gems, plants |
Day 4 | Weeks 11-14, Lessons 24-33 Plants, day and night, solar system | Weeks 14-15, Lessons 41-45 Solar system |
Day 5 | Weeks 15-19, Lessons 34-47 Water animals, birds, insects | Weeks 16-21, Lessons 46-63 Water animals, birds |
Day 6 | Weeks 20-34, Lessons 48-79 Spiders, worms, reptiles, amphibians, mammals, human body | Weeks 22-35, Lessons 64-104 Invertebrates, insects, reptiles, amphibians, mammals, human body |
Day 7 | Weeks 35-36, Lessons 80-82 Rest | Weeks 35-36, Lessons 105-107 Rest |
- Bible
- Dictionary
- Rocks & Minerals field guide
- Trees field guide
- (optional) Birds field guide
- Insects & Spiders field guide
- Reptiles & Amphibians field guide
- (optional) Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Botsford Comstock
- All About Light and Sound (Physical Science Readers) by Connie Jankowski
- Exploring the Sky by Day: The Equinox Guide to Weather and the Atmosphere by Terence Dickinson
- The Secret Life of a Snowflake: An Up-Close Look at the Art and Science of Snowflakes by Kenneth Libbrecht
- A Drop of Water: A Book of Science and Wonder by Walter Wick
- Oceans by Seymour Simon
- Rocks, Minerals, and Gems by John Farndon
- Plant Reproduction: How Do You Grow a Giant Pumpkin? (Show Me Science) by Cath Senker
- The Tree Book for Kids and Their Grown-Ups by Gina Ingoglia
- The Plant Hunters: True Stories of Their Daring Adventures to the Far Corners of the Earth by Anita Silvey
- The Sun by Seymour Simon
- The Planets of Our Solar System by Stephen John Kortenkamp
- Look to the Stars by Buzz Aldrin
- A Pod of Killer Whales: The Mysterious Life of the Intelligent Orca by Vicki León
- Giant Squid: Searching for a Sea Monster by Mary M. Cerullo
- Pagoo by Holling Clancy Holling
- Kolea: The Story of the Pacific Golden Plover by Marion Coste
- Thunder Birds: Nature’s Flying Predators by Jim Arnosky
- For the Birds: The Life of Roger Tory Peterson by Peggy Thomas
- Life in a Bucket of Soil by Alvin Silverstein and Virginia Silverstein
- Bugs and Bugsicles: Insects in the Winter by Amy S. Hansen
- Sneed B. Collard III’s Most Fun Book Ever About Lizards by Sneed B. Collard III
- Face to Face with Frogs by Mark W. Moffett
- Frog Heaven: Ecology of a Vernal Pool by Doug Wechsler
- The Snake Scientist (Scientists in the Field) by Sy Montgomery
- Big Cats by Nic Bishop
- Marsupials by Nic Bishop
- Face to Face with Elephants by Beverly and Dereck Joubert
- The Brain: All About Our Nervous System and More! by Seymour Simon
- Eyes and Ears by Seymour Simon
- Guts: Our Digestive System by Seymour Simon
- The Heart: Our Circulatory System (Revised Edition) by Seymour Simon
- Lungs: All about Our Respiratory System and More! by Seymour Simon
- Bones: Our Skeletal System by Seymour Simon
- Muscles: Our Muscular System by Seymour Simon
- Flight: The Genius of Birds video from Illustra Media
- Metamorphosis: The Beauty and Design of Butterflies video from Illustra Media
- (optional) Spiders! Ogres, Allies & Architects video by Mike Snavely (available from Mission: Imperative)
Additional Information
Weight | N/A |
---|---|
Dimensions | N/A |
Author | |
Binding | E-book, Stapled |
Charter-Friendly | |
Grade | Grade 4, Grade 5, Grade 6 |
Pages | 80 |
6 reviews for Exploring What God Has Made (Elementary Living Science)
If you have a question, contact us and we will be happy to help.
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Yulia Korotysh –
In 2021 I started homeschooling my 3d grader. I spent most of the time on Basic subjects and we did very little Science. What would you recommend to do: Cover Science in Creation 1-3 grade or 4-6 grade?
Tamara Bell –
How wonderful! Easing into subjects is a great way to begin home education. No matter your child’s level of science experience, if there are no special circumstances, we recommend using the guide that is age appropriate. If she is in 3rd grade, you can utilize Discovering What God Has Made. If she is in 4th grade, please feel free to use Exploring What God Has Made.
Nicoleta –
We are so excited to start this curriculum this year with our family! Most excited about introducing science through the days of creation. Studying with the awe of God and savoring these topics in light of that which is good and beautiful displays His mighty acts. Thank you SCM for putting this together for us and generations to come!
We are starting with Discovery, but some of the books are hard to find and maybe they’ll be hard to find a few years from now, so I bought the books for Exploring so we will have them for next time or reference anyway for our first time through.
Danielle –
We used this for 5th grade.
Probably a bit “late” but we dug in deeper on several areas where my son was interested so this made a great year of science for us. I had previously purchased some unit studies (before I discovered this) and I was able to incorporate some of the activities from those.
I love that this goes through the 7 days of creation and solidifies how God created it all.
I did not buy all the books and I still feel we had an excellent year of science that wasn’t boring, time-consuming, or full of useless facts.
Geneva Hoff –
I love SO many of the SCM curriculum and have used all SCM for years. I was really disappointed in this curriculum. I purchased it, along with MANY of the books that were not available at my library including a DVD on Flight.
The curriculum did not work for my 5th grade boy. There was just WAY too much reading (and we use SCM for all other subjects). Not only were the readings VERY long (most readings were 12-15+ pages), but many of the readings were incredibly boring and hard to glean much from. For example, rocks and minerals probably aren’t super exciting to the average person, but a reading about 20 different kinds, their names, and then trying to narrate that back seemed really tedious.
I also felt that the lessons started out way to easy (draw a picture of the first day of creation) but then progress a few weeks later into these long boring readings. It was just laid out strange for me personally.
I’m sorry to post such a negative review, but I was shocked. There was also a LOT of evolutionary dogma throughout the first month or two of books we tried (it is all notated for you to avoid certain pages/etc. in the teachers guide) but I found that incredibly annoying to have to contend with while reading aloud to my student. Occasionally having to skip a section is fine. But having to look for 3-4 evolutionary references in one sitting is cumbersome.
If you have a child who needs shorter lessons, or books that really grab their interest—I don’t think this curriculum is for you. I’m so disappointed that I had to switch to a different Science and lose the $$ I invested.
Karen Smith –
Thank you for your feedback. We recommend that grades 4-6 spend 20-30 minutes 3 times a week on science. The increase in the number of days and the length of the lessons from the 15-20 minutes twice a week for grades 1-3 is intentional. Students often are unprepared for the workload of upper-level science. Increasing the length of the lessons and the number of lessons each week helps to prepare students for that heavier workload. The number of pages assigned to be read for each lesson was determined by the ratio of text to pictures on a page and the amount of text that could be read by the average grade 4-6 student in 20-25 minutes. If your child needs more time than 30 minutes to do the assignment, feel free to spread out the lessons over more days. You can even spread the lessons out over two years if needed.
“Science” is a broad term that contains many branches of study. Exploring What God Has Made gives an overview of several of those branches, following the days of creation, with the best books we could find. Interest in each branch of science will vary by student. Some students will find the lessons on rocks boring and the lessons on animals interesting. Other students may find the lessons on rocks interesting and the lessons on animals boring.
Exploring What God Has Made does use several books that have evolutionary content in them, particularly books on earth science topics. Not many good science books are written from a literal interpretation of Genesis, so using books with evolution in them is necessary. Exploring What God Has Made is written to the student and is intentionally designed to train the student how to approach and think about evolutionary material that they will inevitably encounter throughout their studies. The tips throughout the book are not there as warnings to avoid that material but are part of the training. As the student moves through the lessons, the tips become reminders for the student to apply the principles they have learned.
Roslyn –
I used this 2 years ago for my then 5th grade son. Yes some readings are long. He didn’t personally love the rock book but we had some interesting discussions with it and he was more interested in rocks when he was done with it. He struggled a bit at first. It was a jump up in expectations, but he learned alot and ended up enjoying it. He is doing Berean Builders Science in the Atomic Age now with an audio and he was ready. He’s doing well with it too.
I’m planning to use Exploring What God has Made again with my will be 6th grader next year. I’m excited! She probably won’t find it hard at all;) Different kid.