science

What Is the Bigger Purpose of Science?

October 3, 2017 by Jenna

The aftermath of the Fall is all around us. Today’s mounting concern about issues such as global warming, deforestation, and animal extinction is evidence of that, and homeschool families like yours are often more aware of current issues and events than others.

Though we don’t have the power to stop the deterioration of our environment, it’s our duty as good stewards to care for the world God has given us to the best of our ability. While it may be true that those who spend their lives studying the climate, plants, and animals know best how to care for them, that doesn’t mean we all have to become meteorologists, ecologists, and botanists in order to fulfill our responsibilities. You may have dreamed of your child one day making a great scientific contribution—what parent wouldn’t?—but not every child can be a scientist.

So what is the bigger purpose of your children studying science from elementary to high school? Studying science should give your children the tools they need to take better care of creation.

There are two key tools that your children will gain in science lessons.

• A practical understanding of how the world works

When they know how the world works, they can make informed decisions about real-world issues. If your children don’t know the factors that contribute to climate change, they won’t be able to choose a practical solution to incorporate into everyday life. They may choose something that seems effective without knowing the consequences of that choice. On the other hand, if your children do know those factors, they’ll be able to recognize when suggested solutions either won’t last or will merely substitute one problem for another.

• The ability to think like scientists

Science should teach your children to research, observe, and verify under varying circumstances. Rather than expecting them to go into their adult lives pre-equipped with all the knowledge they will need, we should make sure our children are able and willing to do the work of finding answers to problems they’ve never encountered before.

As a graduate assistant, I helped teach a rhetorical writing class. My students all had to write their research papers on energy technology and policy, a subject most of them knew very little about. It was always obvious when my students thought they could succeed in writing the paper through their own knowledge of the subject alone. They weren’t willing to find out what they needed to know about energy in order to do well on the paper.

BJU Press textbooks drive home a practical understanding of the world and of scientific thinking as they weave together a biblical worldview (presenting the Creation Mandate for Christians as well as the demonstration of God’s character in nature) and the discipline of the scientific method. Life Science for Grade 7 explores the potential benefits of biofuels, while Biology for Grade 10 focuses on a balanced view of the conservation of the earth’s resources.

Armed with both an understanding of the world and a willingness to learn, your children will be better equipped to appropriately use creation, even if they don’t develop a revolutionary new fuel system.

Getting Excited About Logos Science Kits

July 20, 2017 by Guest Writer

Have you discovered the Logos Science Kits yet? These kits were designed specifically for BJU Press secondary-level science courses, and they’re packed with tools, supplies, equipment, and clear instructions to help young homeschool scientists succeed!

Mr. Bill Harmon, a Distance Learning teacher, uses the Logos Science kits during his instruction sessions. As a chemist and a teacher of junior and senior high science and math courses, he appreciates the ingenuity of the Logos Science labs. The instructions are well-written, and the authors came up with creative ways to accomplish the labs in a homeschool setting.

Step-by-Step Guidance

In using the labs for chemistry, Mr. Harmon adopted a “cooking show” style of presentation, revealing each step of the procedure and showing students a sample of the results they should see. “I leave the conclusion questions up to the student,” he explains. “That part is theirs to complete, along with noting any temperature variations of the experiment.”

For almost every lab, students can do all the setup and experimentation on their own, without an extra pair of hands. Thanks to the ten- to twelve-minute videos, students have a guide to help them succeed as they manipulate the materials and use the equipment.

Location, Location

Mr. Harmon recommends storing the materials and supplies for the labs in a dry, climate-controlled space so they will not degrade due to heat or cold. When homeschool students perform the lab, he suggests a location like the kitchen or perhaps a bathroom with ample counter space.

Correlation Between the Student Lab Manual and the Kit

According to Mr. Harmon, the student lab manual and the Logos Science Kits work well together. “The kit functions as an addendum to the student lab manual,” he says. “There are about three dozen labs included in each of the Logos kits. I use about thirty of them for the Distance Learning Chemistry course.”

Once in a while, the experiments suggested in the student lab manual and those included in the Logos Science Kit are different. For example, the lab in the student lab manual might be a specific experiment on titration, whereas the Logos kit may have a different experiment on titration. “They’re both teaching the same concept, though,” Mr. Harmon explains. “The kit often does labs on a micro scale. This benefits the homeschool student and prepares him or her for college science labs.”

Amazing Experiments

What’s Mr. Harmon’s favorite lab? While all of them are fascinating, he enjoys the titration lab the most. “When the material goes from clear to pink then disappears, it’s because the atoms that we can’t see are changing color based on their chemical structure,” he says. “It’s cool!”

Contents of the Kit

Logos Science Kits are available for purchase separately from the other secondary science course materials. When you order your kit, check out the PDF link under the product description to find a list of all the equipment and supplies included . For example, the kit for chemistry makes your life much easier by including science supplies such as pH paper, O₂ test tablets, test tubes, a molecular model kit, and dozens of other items and materials.

Each Logos Science Kit has enough materials for four students, which works well for homeschool co-ops, for passing on the kit to younger siblings, or for resale. If you have a young chemistry lover or physics fan in your homeschool, you’ll want to invest in this fantastic supplementary resource to encourage that affinity for science.

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Rebecca is a work-at-home freelance writer, novelist, wife, and the mom of two bright-eyed little ones. She credits her success in writing and her love of books to her own mom, who homeschooled three kids from pre-K through high school.

Why Is the Sky Blue and Other Kindergarten Mysteries

July 13, 2017 by Jenna

If you have young children, you know that soon after they get over saying the word no, their favorite word quickly becomes why. Kindergarteners can ask an average of four hundred questions a day. They’re innately curious, and while their curiosity is healthy, some of their questions can throw you for a loop.

They might ask: Why is water wet? Where does the sky end? What happens if a man turns into a dinosaur while he’s being arrested?

How should you respond to your children’s questions? How do you answer when you know they won’t be able to fully understand? Keep the following points in mind when your children ask questions.

Opportunities for Learning Activities

Many of the questions your children ask could lead to activities that you can do together. Even though they may not understand the explanation, they will enjoy, and probably remember, the activity that goes along with that explanation.

If they ask why the sky is blue, they may not understand about wavelengths, the color spectrum, and how light scatters in the atmosphere, but they would have a lot of fun creating rainbows with water hoses.

If they ask how airplanes stay up, they may not fully realize the significance of thrust and lift, but they might enjoy making paper airplanes and watching how the shape changes the flight.

While these activities won’t completely answer the question, they’ll form a valuable foundation. Later, you will be able to refer back to it when your children can understand.

How Much Your Children Want to Know

A question is almost always a request to begin learning, but how much do your children want to learn? They may accept a short, concise answer that gives them a basic understanding of the concept. Or they may try to understand more complicated concepts by asking even more questions. Giving them a long explanation they didn’t want might make your children think that learning is boring.

So, if your children ask how fish breathe under water, telling them that they have gills might be enough. But you may also find yourself explaining how gills filter oxygen out of the water.

Taking Questions Seriously

It’s easy to brush off a complicated question with an empty explanation. For example, when I was little, my family liked to answer questions with “it’s magic.” For us, it was a code for “I don’t know, and you’re too young to understand anyway.”

How might children’s impressions of learning change if, every time adults didn’t know the answer, they responded with “I don’t know, but why don’t we see if we can find out together?”

By taking their questions seriously, you may instill in your children a willingness to find out, even about the simplest of questions, and you may catch them using your methods for finding out on their own.

There will never be enough time in a day to thoroughly answer all four hundred questions your kindergartners might ask. But by taking time to answer some of your children’s questions, you can foster their curiosity and love of learning. What kinds of unexpected or surprising questions have your children asked? How did you answer them?

Homeschool Astronomy: Discovering the Night Sky

June 27, 2017 by Guest Writer

Astronomy is a wonderful field of science for at-home study. The laboratory is your backyard, and the subject of study is right overhead! For Christians, astronomy has special significance. After all, the heavens declare the glory of God (Psalm 19:1). Whether you and your children want to learn some astronomy over the summer or on homeschool weeknights, these ideas will help you get started.

Check Out Helpful Astronomy Magazines

Two major amateur astronomy magazines, Astronomy and Sky & Telescope, are available at many libraries and bookstores. They’re full of good information and advice, including beautiful photos, monthly sky charts, and notes about special things to watch for in the sky.

You can read the magazines at the library, but if you intend to seriously pursue astronomy for several months, consider subscribing instead. You can also subscribe to the email newsletters of these publications and check their websites for digital editions and online resources.

Explore Fascinating Books About the Stars

At the library, online, or at your local bookstore, you’ll find numerous resources. The Stars: A New Way to See Them by H. A. Rey (Houghton Mifflin, 1976) was written for children by the author of the Curious George series. For an interesting discussion of the biblical references to astronomy, have your teens check out Stewart Custer’s book The Stars Speak: Astronomy in the Bible (Bob Jones University Press, 2002).

Some more recent titles that discuss astronomy from a Christian perspective are Taking Back Astronomy: The Heavens Declare Creation by Jason Lisle (Master Books, 2006) or The Astronomy Book by Jonathan Henry (Master Books, 2012).

Use Your Eyes

You and your kids can begin with what astronomers call “naked-eye” astronomy in your own backyard. With some foundational information from BJU Press Science 3, help your younger children learn their way around the sky and become familiar with the major reference points. If you have teens, Earth Science from BJU Press is an excellent resource with plenty of up-to-date information about the solar system.

First, you can teach your kids about the major constellations, the map by which astronomers find everything else in the sky. Even young children can learn the most familiar ones, such as the Big Dipper and Orion. The constellations change with the seasons, and the moon and the planets are constantly moving around. To know when and where to look for them, use the NASA sky events calendar or sky charts from astronomy magazines.

Find Dark Places

A little bit of stray light ruins the view of some of the most interesting things in the sky. Modern cities put so much light pollution into the sky that stargazing while in a city is difficult. Many children have never seen the Milky Way because it’s almost impossible to see unless the sky is actually dark. If you’re encountering this problem, plan a trip out in the country, to a spot far from any lights. Pick a night when the moon comes up late or when there is a new moon, so it will be truly dark. Your kids will be amazed at the view!

Look for the Big Ones

Even on days or nights when you can’t drive to the country, you and your kids can still study the sun and the moon. There’s no problem finding them in the sky! Sunsets, rainbows, sundials, eclipses, phases of the moon, tides—all of these are good subjects for study and provide abundant possibilities for projects.

Grab a Pair of Binoculars

Binoculars open up a whole new level of star viewing. With the help of sky charts, your homeschool astronomers will be able to see galaxies, nebulae, craters on the moon, and a host of new stars. You can use any set of binoculars with a large B value (lens size) for a bright, easy-to-see image. A common size that is good for astronomy is 7×50.

Visit a Local Planetarium

If you live near a planetarium, you have a unique opportunity to get a guided tour of the sky. Be aware that many planetariums now do a variety of music and light shows and educational programs that may not be related to astronomy. However, nearly all of them still do simple tours of the night sky.

If you visit the Creation Museum in Kentucky, remember to stop by the planetarium there. The amazing shows in the Creation Museum Planetarium will help you and your kids understand the scope of the known universe and the amazing power of the God who made it all.

Invest in a Telescope

Until you know your way around the sky, a telescope can be more frustrating than helpful. But after taking all the initial steps to familiarize yourself and your kids with astronomy, you might want to consider getting one.

The ideal telescope for home use is three inches or more in diameter, with a sturdy tripod and a mechanism that allows the telescope to move smoothly in order to keep the celestial object in the field of view as the earth slowly rotates. The higher the magnification, the smaller the field of view. But the smaller the field of view, the harder it is to locate and track the object. At 20x (meaning the image is magnified twenty times), the telescope becomes difficult to aim without a small “finder” scope to assist. You can see a lot with 30-50x, including the rings of Saturn, the moons of Jupiter, the Orion nebula, and craters on the moon. Principally, there are three basic types of telescopes: refractor, reflector, and compound. Refractors use lenses; reflectors use mirrors to guide the incoming light to a focal point wherein the viewing lens is adjusted (in or out) to produce a sharp image; compound telescopes use lenses and mirrors. Larger lenses or mirrors are much more important than large magnification since they yield a brighter, finer-detailed image.

Some of the cheap telescopes you can buy online or in stores are of poor quality; they feature high magnification but tiny optics and flimsy mounts. Before ordering or purchasing an inexpensive telescope, check the customer reviews posted for that product to help you decide if it’s a piece of junk or a useful tool for your homeschool astronomy sessions.

Astronomy is a subject you can tackle completely on your own with no previous experience necessary—and children of all ages can be involved. Explore the sky as a family and learn together!

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Should Reading Take More Time Than Science in Your Homeschool?

June 6, 2017 by Jenna

Have you found yourself spending time emphasizing science rather than the language arts in teaching early learning and early elementary courses?

These days we see a lot of emphasis on science and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) activities in early education. That pull towards the sciences can change the emphasis of a child’s education. While it does encourage you to focus on a subject that’s often left behind, it also means giving less attention to another subject.

As a parent, you know that your child needs a balanced education, and this growing trend toward the sciences can cause you to take a closer look at what your child is learning. You may notice that, in the early grades, language arts can span across four subjects, and of those four, reading takes the most time. It makes sense to start balancing your child’s education by looking at the balance between reading and science in early grades—which leads to the following question.

How do you balance your child’s education?

Do you balance subjects by spending more time on one subject? Does equal time mean equal importance? Not necessarily.

Just as different kinds of matter have different weights, different subjects need more or less time for mastery. So a balanced education doesn’t mean equal time spent on all subjects. It simply means that you give your children enough time with each subject to develop mastery.

Why should reading take more time?

Since the best time for your child to master reading is by the end of Grade 4, it’s better to spend more time on reading in the early grades. Reading and the other language arts subjects are critical for your children’s early development. Proficiency in reading skills creates a foundation for their mastery of almost every area of study. Unless they first master reading, they will struggle to become independent learners, even in subjects they enjoy.

As much as one of your children may love doing science, he will be unable to comprehend his lessons or follow directions for experiments if he hasn’t first developed his reading skills.

What should you do?

Take time to build different reading skills—such as comprehension, critical thinking, and vocabulary—before Grade 4. Find topics that your children enjoy reading about and fill their shelves with books about those things. Books with strong visual and informational ties are a lot of fun to explore, and they build a foundation for research skills. Those visual and informational skills will better enable them to excel in the sciences later because they will be capable of comprehending the lessons and instructions that go along with studying those subjects.

As much as you want your children to have a balanced education, encourage them to become readers first!

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