Mt. Pleasant Classical Academy

Military Kid is studying Earth-Space Science this year and for the first time this hs’er is using a science textbook. ScienceKid for Logic Age Earth-Space Science used Reader’s Digest books How the Earth Works?, How the Weather Works, and How the Universe Works? They were just the right books for SK and were his style. He would sit for hours and read every little detail in these books and spout the information back out with great understanding. They worked great for him. While they aren’t MK’s style I knew I could make them work, but I wasn’t interested in that. I wanted a more canned approach and one with less prep time for ME. I needed short sections, simple pictures, and maybe some little tests thrown in for MK since he likes to know how he’s doing.

Going on a recommendation from Frankie at Kitchen Table Learners I ordered in Power Basics Earth-Space Science (Rainbow Resource item #33192). We’re still on the first of four units, The Universe Around Us. MK reads a section, answers a few questions in the Practice, and moves on. He’s also reading the Reader’s Digest How the Universe Works, DK’s Space Encylopedia, H.A. Rey’s Contstellations, and numerous other star books we have on our shelves. In other words, we supplement tons with other books and living books. It isn’t because the textbook is lacking, but that we are using it as a springboard and our spline for our science course this year. I also stress with the boys that there is always more than one source for information and regardless of the subject they need to investigate what others have written on, or reported about a particular topic. I feel that by having MK read other books I’m helping to cement that idea in his head—regardless of the subject you must read several sources for information.

Besides reading MK has written at least one topic report each week that summarizes what he has learned. He probable wouldn’t describe these reports in the same way, but hey, he’s a kid. For instance he wrote a two page report titled; The Big Bang Theory, another titled; The Life of a Star, one titled, What is an Eclipse; and another detailing The Lunar Cycle. There are a few others he’s written too. I found that for MK writing the report has cemented his understanding of that week’s topic. Besides, in my school, Logic Age kids need to write, often,  a paper everyday.

But not today. Today we spent our afternoon exploring Lunar Phases. What a great site! The site has three activities to help you understand the lunar phases and is quite complete with simulations of the lunar cycle. Going over to their home page we found other simulations for exploring the cosmos, star life and several other sections that we will explore in the weeks to come.

Science is good this year, at least so far.