Apologia Educational Ministries is one of our favorite homeschool curriculum publishers. One of the reasons we love Apologia so much is that their curriculum gives glory to Father God our Creator, and they teach all of their subjects, including science, from a Christian worldview.
We are excited to tell you about our experience using the Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology by Apologia for our science studies.
Human Anatomy and Physiology
Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology
1 year Science Curriculum
Text
Audio CD (Text Read Aloud)
Notebooking Journal
Junior Notebooking Journal
Apologia has created four components for this curriculum. Students typically use three of the four components depending on their age and skill level. There is a Text book, an Audio CD, and two different age/skill options for the student Notebooking Journal.
Text:
The text book is a hardback book with 265 illustrated pages. This curriculum covers the anatomy and physiology of the human body. This course text book is suggested for use with kids in Kindergarten through 6th grade. Younger students may need the course read to them or if they have begun to learn to read but still need support, they can follow along with the Audio CD, where other students who are strong readers may not need the additional support.
Also older students (junior and senior high) may find this course beneficial too if they haven’t previously studied this material or to use it as review. Apologia has other science courses they recommend for older students. However it is my opinion that this introductory course is very informative, contains lots of pictures, and covers a large amount of material that students of all ages (even adults) will benefit from reading.
Lessons:
There are 14 HUGE lesson modules covered in this curriculum. Each lesson module has two full weeks of lessons and science experiments within and is suggested to be used at least twice a week. At this pace, it is expected for the curriculum to last about 28 +/- weeks or a full school year.
Lesson Modules covered include:
Lesson 1: Introduction to Anatomy and Physiology
Lesson 2: The Skeletal System
Lesson 3: The Muscular System
Lesson 4: The Digestive and Renal Systems
Lesson 5: Health and Nutrition
Lesson 6: The Respiratory System
Lesson 7: Life in the Blood
Lesson 8: The Cardiovascular System
Lesson 9: The Nervous and Endocrine Systems
Lesson 10: The Nervous System Extended
Lesson 11: Your Senses
Lesson 12:The Integumentary System
Lesson 13: The Lymphatic and Immune Systems
Lesson 14: Growth and Development
Contained within each lesson are components that encourage narration (both written and oral retelling of what has been learned), “Try This” mini-experiments, notebooking journal activities, a personal person project (a paper body model), and at the end of each lesson, students complete various projects and experiments. Each lesson covers different information, but follows the same overall format.
A “Materials List” is included in the front of the Text book and each lesson also lists out the specific items needed to complete the projects and experiments. There are suppliers for materials if you want a pre-made kit too. To further the learning, students are given access to a course website for what is called “book extras” if students desire to dig deeper into learning more than what is covered in the text.
Audio CD
The Audio CD is an audio recording of the course read aloud by the author, Jeannie Fulbright. Using this CD enhances the learning even more because it gives another way for the brain to receive and remember the information.
This CD is beneficial for students who are auditory learners who prefer using more than just a textbook, is helpful for slow readers, or others who may have learning disabilities that make reading difficult. This Audio CD is also great for the whole family to listen and enjoy together too.
This is an MP3-CD and in order to listen to it, you must play it in an MP3-compatible CD player or on a computer.
Student Notebooking Journals:
Apologia offers two age/skill level student journals with this course to choose from. One of the journals is called the Anatomy Notebooking Journal and one is called the Junior Anatomy Notebooking Journal (note the word “Junior” in front of the other words).
Both notebooking journals are huge soft cover illustrated spiral bound books. They both have a suggested schedule for the school year. They both are filled with worksheets and fun hands on activities and projects. They both cover similar materials and review the material learned in the text book lessons.
The Anatomy Notebooking Journal (designed for grades 3-6) contains 202 activity and review pages, plus 65 mini-book (cut, fold, glue, fill in the blank) pages and template pages.
The Junior Anatomy Notebooking Journal (designed for grades K-2) contains 230 activity, coloring, and review pages, plus 67 mini-book (cut, fold, and glue) pages and template pages.
Both notebooking journals are filled with activity and review worksheets and mini-books and templates. Sections in the student journal include:
- Lesson Plan Suggested Schedule
- Fascinating Facts
- What Do You Remember? Review Questions
- Notbooking Assignments, Ativities, and Projects
- Scripture Copywork
- Vocabulary Crosswords
- Project Pages
- Cut and Fold Miniature Books
- More To Explore (experiments and activities, additional book and DVD suggestions)
- Field Trip Sheets
- Final Review: 50 Review Questions that can be answered orally or in writing.
- Answer key included.
The main difference in the two journals is that the regular student Anatomy Notebooking Journal has a higher level of writing expected on the assignments and projects, and it uses challenging crossword puzzles to go over vocabulary words and definitions. There is less writing assignments in the Junior Anatomy Notebooking Journal, flashcard style mini-books and simple crossword puzzles are used to review the vocabulary words (students cut out the word and glue it like a flap onto the definition), and the Junior version includes lots of coloring pages.
Our Experience
We love using Apologia products in our homeschool. I am thankful for these resources to help teach my kids all about Father God’s creation, the human body.
We were sent all four components of this course for this review. We used both of the student journals. My 9 year old son used the Junior Anatomy Notebooking Journal and my 13 year old son used the Anatomy Notebooking Journal. My other children enjoyed watching their brothers do various science experiments and have requested to join in the learning fun. I intend to purchase additional journals for my other children to use for this coming school year.
Here are just a few examples of our Anatomy and Physiology learning adventure. These pictures are a few examples of what my kids learned in lessons 2, 4, 5, 6, and 10. Each lesson module covers different information, but follows the overall same format.
Text and Audio CD Lessons
My 9 year old son starts out each lesson with the Text book and Audio CD. He places the CD into the computer and uses his earbuds to listen to the lesson.
A menu pops up on the screen to help you choose the lesson, but there are no pictures or video, so he has to follow along in the text book.
My 13 year old starts out each lesson with his text book and journal. He is a strong reader and doesn’t prefer to use the Audio CD.
However, my 9 year old loves using the Audio CD and it has helped him gain more understanding and helped reinforce how things are pronounced and helped him move through the material at a good pace.
Try This Experiments
The kids can pause within the lesson as needed, or go back after they are done reading, to complete the suggested “Try This” experiments scattered through out the lesson.
Digestive System – measuring length of small intestines:
Digestive System – stomach simulation:
What Do You Remember?
Then we do the “What Do You Remember?” narrative. These discussion questions help summarize the lesson and encourage the kids to put what they have learned into their own words.
Journal Activities
Next we completed the Notebooking Journal activities. If you don’t have the Apologia Notebooking Journals, you can answer the Text questions from the lesson and do the suggested activity in just a regular notebook.
However, the Apologia Notebooking Journals have so much more to offer. They are filled with pre-printed worksheets and hands on activities.
I would recommend you get these journals to go with the learning experience.
Some of the worksheets included are scientific speculation forms, project forms, fascinating facts, vocabulary mini-books, body organ mini-books, coloring pages, vocabulary crossword puzzles, diagrams to label, bible scripture copy work, and more.
Copywork examples from my 9 year old’s journal:
Copywork and Vocabulary Crossword examples from my 13 year old’s journal:
Personal Person Project
Next we added the body part we learned about to the Personal Person Project in the Anatomy and Junior Anatomy Notebooking Journals. If you don’t have a pre-made journal, there are directions so you can make your own person and body organ systems and add them to a homemade journal. At the end of most of the lessons, a new body part gets added.
Experiments
The last thing to complete is the main experiment (s) or project at the end of the lesson. These experiments are in addition to the many “Try This” experiments scattered through out the lessons. There is at least one main experiment or project at the end of each lesson, and sometimes two or more. The experiments and projects at the end of each lesson communicate the overall learning experience and knowledge of the lesson.
Respiratory System Experiments – 1) lung and diaphragm model 2) visual lung capacity:
A Few More Explorations and Learning Fun:
We had a few props on hand to use as models. It makes learning even more fun and interesting for kids to have a lesson related prop next to them while they study.
We used a magnifying glass to examine a plastic skeleton, plastic lungs and respiratory system, and a plastic skull and brain.
The kids made a head with a face from a plastic skull, playdough for connective tissue, a pencil sharpener nose, bouncy balls for eyes, a plastic mini-brain from a game, and a Mr. Potato Head mustache. They played around with their model they created and also used a magnifying glass to check it out.
They have also used playdough for skin and covered the skull with it. But I didn’t get a picture of it. I think we will come up with something else we can use for skin, perhaps we can find a lightly colored but transparent plastic bag material. They also have a huge plastic tooth, a plastic liver, and a few other props not pictured that they used for some of their investigations.
Materials
Several materials are needed to complete the experiments. In the front of the Textbook is a Master List of items needed for each chapter. Most of these items for experiments are easily acquired either from your own cabinets and pantry or from the local store. In addition to the items you need for experiments for this course, you might also have some things on hand you can use a props such as toys, puzzles, games, or books on your shelves that can enhance the learning too.
However, there are various pre-made science supply kits sold by different suppliers online that contain most of the items all in one kit or box. These kits can save you time and makes doing these experiments very simple when you have everything you need all in one box and you don’t have to go and find each item. You can find these science kit suppliers by doing a a quick google search for “Apologia Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology Science Kit”.
Final Thoughts:
My family has truly enjoyed using Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology. This course covers a lot of information. The Textbook, Notebooking Journals and Audio CD are well made. This course encourages lots of hands on suggestions and explorations which makes learning fun for kids.
Apologia Educational Ministries offers wonderful science programs for students of all ages. Their curriculum has won numerous awards and is well respected in the homeschool community. I would encourage other homeschool families to check out these courses, and see what products Apologia has to offer to meet their needs.
Check out this video to learn more about Apologia Science courses. Apologia has many more wonderful products in other subject areas too.
Here are a few links to other Apologia products we have reviewed in our home.
Exploring Creation With Marine Biology
Internship for High School Credit
Where To Buy Exploring Creation With Human Anatomy and Physiology
Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology Text (for grades K – 6)
Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology Junior Notebooking Journal (for grades K – 3)
Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology Notebooking Journal (for grades 3 and up)
Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology MP3 Audio CD (audio recording of the text)
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Homeschool Review Crew
Check out what other members of the Homeschool Review Crew had to say about using products from Apologia in their homes.
