Review—Apologia—Exploring Creation with Chemistry and Physics

• Apologia Educational Ministries
• Exploring Creation with Chemistry and Physics
• written by Jeannie Fulbright
• K-6th Homeschool Science Curriculum
• $39.00 textbook
• $24.00 Notebooking Journal and Junior Notebooking Journal

About the Product

Exploring Creation with Chemistry and Physics is an amazingly in-depth elementary science curriculum. This course is written from a creationist world-view. God is glorified again and again as the Master Designer of the world and how it works. 

The main focus of the course is the textbook. This is a hard backed, full color textbook of approximately 280 pages. It contains 14 lessons as well as supply lists, an answer key and index.

Each lesson is designed to take approximately 2 weeks. A schedule is available in the notebooking journal, or each family can decide on natural stopping points depending on the level and interest of their kids.

There are multiple experiments for each lesson. “Try This!” activities throughout the lesson reinforce the concept being studied. Then each lesson ends with a larger project or experiment.  Even more reinforcement can be found by visiting the book extras on the Apologia website and entering the password provided in the textbook. This provides multiple websites general and specific for each lesson.

A notebooking journal is available in two formats, a junior version and a upper elementary version. While not strictly necessary to the success of the course, it is a very in-depth and easy way to record the learning that is occurring. These notebooking journals provide a place to complete assignments from the textbook as well as puzzles, copywork, booklets to make and even extra experiments. By the end of the book it becomes a unique record or learning.

ClarkClan Experience

I used the Exploring Creation with Chemistry and Physics course with Ben (12), Rebekah (10), and Miriam (8). Ben and Rebekah used the Notebooking Journal and Miriam used the Junior Notebooking Journal. We would all work together on this science course, with mom reading the book and kids doing the notebooking journals and experiments (under supervision).

This is a very “hands on” curriculum. There are many experiments to try throughout the chapter. Some are very simple, while others are a little more complex. All the experiments take common materials. While I did not always have everything on hand, things were easy to obtain as needed (like a soda bottle).

I started out using the schedule that was in the front of the notebooking journal. This is a weekly schedule, having lessons two days a week. What we quickly found out was that this pace was a little bit fast for us. Between the reading, the notebooking journal and the experiments, science was taking us up to two hours. So we began to spread the lessons out a little bit every day.

The kids all really enjoyed this science curriculum. The experiments were a big hit. They loved that there were so many of them. Ben, Rebekah, and Miriam were not used to notebooking, and they all began by being very brief. As the lessons progressed they began to write longer and longer entries. They also liked the other types of activities, crossword puzzles, copywork and little books to make.

One of the best features of the notebooking journal is that all the papers needed are in the book. When there is a little pop-up or miniature book to be made, it is in the back of the journal ready to be cut out and made. Basic materials are needed for this journal, pencils or pens, crayons or colored pencils, glue and brads.

To make this science curriculum the most effective, gathering supplies for the experiments is essential. I quickly found out that a lesson can be abruptly stopped when I did not look at what was coming up next or what was needed. Checking the supply list included in the back of the textbook, makes it easy to gather what is needed.

Recommendation

I have been very impressed with this curriculum. It is in-depth, yet easy enough to understand at any level. If you are looking for a thorough, hands on science curriculum then Exploring Creation with Chemistry and Physics is an excellent choice. I think my kids are learning a lot by using this curriculum.

Many of my Crew Mates also reviewed the Exploring Creation with Chemistry and Physics. Visit the Crew Blog to read what they thought about the program.