Book Review: God's Design for the Physical World - Homeschool Text

Disclosure / Disclaimer: I received this ebook, free of charge, from MasterBooks, for review purposes on this blog. No other compensation, monetary or in kind, has been received or implied for this post. Nor was I told how to post about it.

This brand new text is a complete physical science curriculum
 for 3rd-8th graders, so you can use it for multiple students, 
saving you money!

God's Design for the Physical World will have your students study introductory physics and the mechanisms of heat, machines, and technology, including the following:  -  Machines & Motion: Learn about many fascinating inventions, such as the physical principles behind flight and the advances in communication as you study airplanes, rockets, telephones, computers, and more!  - Heat & Energy: Discover many kinds of energy that power our lives. From fossil fuels to nuclear power plants, see how God provides our energy needs and learn the wonders of electricity, magnetism, light, and sound.  - Inventions & Technology: Understand simple machines such as levers and inclined planes. Learn about the law of motion. You will enjoy experimenting with friction, racing rollerskate cars, and making pendulums.

Each lesson contains at least one hands-on activity to reinforce the concepts being taught and a “challenge” section with extra information and activities designed especially for older students. In addition to the lessons, special features in each book include biographical information on interesting people as well as fun facts to make the subject more engaging. The course aslo teaches children in a worldview text, giving them an understanding that God is our Creator, and the Bible can be trusted.

This course is designed to build critical thinking skills, and is flexible enough to work with all learning styles. Lessons require minimal teacher preparation, are multi-level for 3rd–5th and 6th–8th grades, as well as being fun and easy-to-use.

Review:

As you can see above- the course shares some sections with all students, and others are aimed at older students. Students can quickly learn which button avatars are for them, to read and study. Having used another publisher's science books for all 3 years of Miss Grace's homeschooling, I find myself comparing their set up to this one. Overall, this is the easier set up, as the different levels are laid out very cleanly.

I also liked better, how each unit starts with a heads up for both teacher and student, advising them of not only the chapters, but the key areas that the student will learn within the unit. Each of the 3 sectional topics (Mechanics, Heat, Inventions) are each composed of 6 chapters. So you have a total of 18 chapters for the course, which can be spread out how you would like. In comparing this to the books we previously used, Miss Grace would probably go through it in half the time allotted, as the chapters are very short and she is used to longer, more involved chapters. So depending on your child, this could be really a half a year course, versus a full one.

Each chapter starts with the premise of the chapter (and what kids need to be able to answer after reading it), vocabulary words and challenge words. These words are defined and discussed in the chapter, and can be used as a mini quiz after it, to test for retention of material. They could also be used for relative spelling words for the week!

The included pictures and diagrams are very good, and very helpful to explain what is being discussed. Miss Grace also liked the bios that were included, like Albert Einstein. She found them a fun break from the science. And they would be a good way to segueway to a writing component, if you wanted your child to write about that person, after learning more bout them!

For older kids, the Calculating Work, What We Learned and Taking it Further sections help them to really APPLY what they have learned and use critical thinking, and some math skills! Homeschool parents love it when multiple subjects come together! LOL. Unfortunately Miss Grace found the experiments to be pretty basic, compared to ones she is used to, and she felt they were more on the elementary level and she would have liked to have seen different ones for different grades. 

Additionally, there is no included quizzes or tests for the book. You DO need to buy the additional Teacher's Guide that goes with the course. It provides you with a helpful daily schedule, as well as the worksheets, quizzes, and tests. I really think these are a VERY important part of this course, as without them,  you would be needing to add in additional activities and experiments to make it a full year's worth of work. Plus, the additional sheets help older students work with scientific theory, which they will need for high school courses. And if science isn't your thing, the included tips on how to teach the course, how to properly contrast creation vs. evolution, the 7 C's, and how to integrate the biblical worldview, are VERY helpful!

Overall, this is a good text and course for the elementary level, 3-5. But if you have kid who really is into science at grade 5, or junior high students, I think you might find yourself having to add in a lot more material to make it meet their needs. High school science courses are generally much more involved, and for junior high, I think the text needs to include more information, to adjust kids to high school courses, and the additional resources from the Teachers Guide MUST be used. But if you're teaching grades 3-5, this is a must have text!