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Experience Biology – Journey Homeschool Academy

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DISCLAIMER: I RECEIVED A FREE COPY OF THIS PRODUCT THROUGH THE HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW IN EXCHANGE FOR MY HONEST REVIEW. I WAS NOT REQUIRED TO WRITE A POSITIVE REVIEW NOR WAS I COMPENSATED IN ANY OTHER WAY.

I need to tell you about Journey Homeschool Academy and their Highschool biology course.  Wow… what a tremendously well done course!  Experience Biology: Upper Level is a video based, online biology course, complete with labs, tests, quizzes, papers etc, to make a good highschool biology course.   I can’t wait to tell you all about it in my review. 

Experience Biology

How I used it

I do need to tell that I took this course as an adult, wanting to see how it compared to another biology course that I grade. I didn’t do the labs, I didn’t the course work, but I read the textbook, watched videos and took the quizzes. 

Journey Homeschool Academy’s biology course CAN be done without the textbook but adding the book to the course makes it more complete. You cannot, if you live in Canada, order the book through their program. I ordered mine off Amazon.ca.

logo for Journey Homeschool Academy

What I am reviewing

I am reviewing an online biology course called Experience Biology: Upper Level.  Experience Biology is the brainchild of Luke and Trish Gilkerson.   You’ll find it a rigorous and thorough look at biology, preparing it’s students well for college.  Journey Homeschool Academy currently has five programs: Elementary and Upper-Level Biology, Elementary and Upper-Level Astronomy and an Upper-Level bible survey class.  Seeing the quality of their biology class has me planning to have my lad take their bible survey class as well!  🙂 

As part of this course you will cover 35 lessons which will include quarter exams, hands-on labs with options to do video labs, quizzes, engaging videos and research questions. 

Experience Biology

How Is a Lesson Laid Out?

After printing off your lesson notes, watch the videos, taking care to actually fill in your lesson notes.   🙂  If you have the textbook read the assigned lesson, otherwise take the quiz.  The quizzes are all multiple choice and you can see where you went wrong afterwards.   Complete the research questions and submit your lab report.  You can easily complete one lesson per week, and potentially two lessons per week. 

Videos

Each video lasts about half-an-hour.  They are interesting to watch and occasionally pose interesting questions.

Highlights of videos

  • overview
  • notes to write are highlighted/put up in text
  • connections to real-life
  • review

One of the things I really, really liked about these videos is they fit them perfectly to their workbooks.  SOMETIME I was so engaged in the video lesson that I actually forgot to take notes.  BUT going back through the video so that I could fill in the blanks was SUPER easy.   You see, if you need to write it down, you’ll find it highlighted in the video.  How super helpful is that eh?  🙂

This is a faith-based program, and you’ll find scripture and references to God interwoven throughout. 

Luke Gilkerson teaches the classes.  He has a light-hearted yet serious approach to science.  You can tell how much he loves his field and teaching others about it.  He does as all good teachers do.  A brief overview, followed by specific details, followed by a wrap up. 

I mentioned earlier about the workbooks.   You get two with the course. The student Guidebook which you use to take notes.  The Lab book spells out the assignments and what you’ll need to accomplish them. 

Experience Biology

Lots of room is given for taking notes.  Important for a person like me with messy handwriting, and for a student like my son who likes to take extra notes.  Even if you don’t need it, it’s lovely that the space is available don’t you think?

Quizzes, Assignments and Grading

I love the immediacy in grading.   Quizzes require 70% to pass.   All multiple choice.   I haven’t reached the point of needing to take a quarterly exam, but I would assume in an online format that would be a similar system.

Don’t you just love the light-hearted options for some of the answers?   I laughed when I saw them!  🙂  This online high school biology course is a pleasure to work through. 

The Riot and the Dance

the riot and the dance

Although you can complete Experience Biology without this textbook, and complete it well, you will find that having the textbook adds a deeper layer of understanding.   It’s a more complete program with the additional reading.  Could you source out the various chapters?  Yes, for instance in the space that it took for the book to arrive I had already sussed out learning about a bit of starter chemistry and about biomolecules.  Having the textbook just makes it easier.  🙂 

I found the text to be technical but an easily understood conversation.  Written by Gordon Wilson who includes his faith in his understanding of science.   Most of the illustrations within the text are done in grayscale, the photos are included in full colour.  This textbook would be helpful in any high school biology course.

Research Assignments

Don’t you just love it when the research questions help advance your learning?  Not just a “do this” but a “do this and you’ll understand your next lesson better”. 

Should you Get Experience Biology?

Whether you want a faith-based Biology course, or prefer to avoid issues of faith, Experience Biology is a SOLID homeschool biology program.  It’s extremely well done and worthy of a second look.  High-quality videos that are easy to understand and well-laid out along with great research questions, and good labs.  This is a well-rounded biology program that is academically rigorous.  I do advise getting the textbook if you plan to go on in biology/science as it makes for a more in-depth course.  

You can also find Journey Homeschool Academy on Facebook and Instagram.

Luke and Trish Gilkerson

Besides this homeschool biology course, other courses were reviewed by other Homeschool Review Crew families. These include Experience Biology: Elementary and Experience Astronomy: Elementary.

Please visit the Homeschool Review Crew to read some of these other reviews about the courses offered by Journey Homeschool Academy.

homeschool biology,  homeschool science, high school biology online

Tiny Bird

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raincoast FTC

Raincoast books is the story of one little hummingbird’s migration journey.  Let’s travel with him from the northern part of the USA to the Gulf of Mexico. Beautifully illustrated with a treasure trove of information about hummingbirds.  It has been my pleasure to review this picture book. 

Tiny Bird: A Hummingbird's Amazing Journey

What I am Reviewing

Tiny Bird: A Hummingbird’s Amazing Journey was written by Robert Burleigh.  Illustrated by Wendell Minor, and published by Henry Hold & Company.   It is 40 pages long and intended for ages 5-9.  Covering hummingbirds and migration, ecology and zoology.   This is a beautiful book.  Reviewed for Raincoast books.  I received a softcover ARC copy for this review. 

The Details on Tiny Bird

I love it when picture books open up with an introduction to the topic at hand before they get to the title page.  Tiny Bird opens with facts about hummingbirds along with a map showing the journey that tiny bird will be taking. 

Tiny Bird

I learned a ton about hummingbirds reading this book, some of it actually surprised me so I had to fact check.  Nothing that I checked was proven to be false, so if you are undergoing a study on hummingbirds, grab up this book!  The beautiful illustrations that show off the speed and grace of the hummingbird will delight you. 

Tiny Bird sample page

Tiny Bird brings out the hardships these little birds face on their journey.  I could see how their tiny size belies the strength behind them. 

Most of the pages have ample white space to showcase these tiny birds.  But occasional pages are full colour.

Tiny Bird sample page

No rhyming lyrics fill the pages, just straightforward informative text, written in easy to understand language for the young reader.   The font size is easy to read. 

Tiny bird, sample text

This inspiring migratory and life cycle story celebrates the important and impressive feat of a small but mighty creature.  You will learn so much about this smallest of birds travelling over 1500 miles.  Many of these birds don’t make it, but in Tiny Bird we celebrate the ones that do!

Young or old, Tiny Bird is worth a look at. You won’t regret the read for yourself or your children. 

Review: Animal Camouflage

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Every once in a while you get a book in your hands for reviewing and you just fall in love.  As soon as I saw this beautiful book “Animal Camouflage” I was like “Son, look at this book”, and talking to other people about it.  I just really, really like this book and thought it a very clever design. 

Now I have to admit that my 12 year wasn’t quite an enamoured as his mother was, but he thought it was pretty interesting, and had fun flipping through the pages and finding the more difficult animals to spot.  I am also concerned that I won’t be able to show you well the beauty and wonder that is contained within this book.

I’m trying to figure out just what I like so much about it.

First: It’s an unusual rendition of a camouflage book. It’s not animals hiding in their areas, with their colours and stripes and stops within a multi-coloured background.  It’s white with dark lines, so the animals are right there and can be seen, some easier than others.  But no colours to look for, just shapes and outlines, hidden with all the white and lines.  

Second: the information is presented in a clear format.  Do you see how each area has a colour?  That colour is used for the four pages it takes for each area.  This makes it easy to differentiate between areas.

Third: It’s a lovely book to hold.  Feels good in the hand.  It’s pretty to look at and to exclaim over.  I showed it to a friend and she agreed it was a nice book to hold in your hand, and loved the ways the animals/scenery was represented.  “It’s very clean”.

Fourth: It’s educational.  The text is brief, but more animals are covered than just a couple for each area.  I do wish that they talked about the TYPE of camouflage that each animal possessed, like the gazelle with a stripe down it’s belly.  The spots of a giraffe helping it blend into the browns of the savannah, and the brown pelt of the cottontail helping it hide in the underbrush. 

Fifth: I think that it’s perhaps less about the camouflage of animals, but more how they create a fun camouflage search and find to help children want to learn more about the different animals represented.    Honestly… it’s a FUN book to look through, to find the four reindeer or the 10ish wolves or can you find the anaconda slithering along the ground?

If you get stuck, or your child needs help, the answers are in back of the book.

Animal Camouflage: Search and find
Sarah Dennis & Sam Hutchinson
Princeton Architectural Press
Hardcover, ages 6-9
Animal, elementary, nature

Reviewed for: Raincoast Books.

Where can you Find it?   Amazon Link.

Review: Fascinating Education

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Currently I am grading a highschool biology course, I’m doing pretty good on it but sometimes my students ask me a question that requires some research, ergo when I learned about reviewing Fascinating Biology put out by Fascinating Education, I thought, what a perfect opportunity for me to brush up on my highschool biology!! Thank you Fascinating Education for the opportunity to do so.You have been a good help to me.  🙂

About Fascinating Education
It was created by Dr. Margulies.  Fascinating Biology, is an online biology course, that comes with 18 lessons.  His goal is to break down the sciences into bite-sized, manageable chunks to increase the learning potential in his students. As you can see, each lesson is broken down into several components.  If you stop your video, it will pick up again where you left off when you return which is ever so handy.  Means you can just stop and not worry about having to start all over again.  Having each section clearly labeled also means you know where he is going as he moves through the lecture.

Each Lesson also comes with a built in glossary/vocabulary section.   If you highlight a word, it’s definition shows up below. This is a very handy feature.

How I used it.
One of the things I love about fascinating biology is that I can pick the order I want to do the lessons in.  For instance, one of my students was having a problem with understanding mitosis and meiosis… so I went directly to that section, listened and got the answer.  AND since we get a full course transcript it made it really easy for me to get the answer to my student, and help them find additional support online to help them gain better understanding.  Pretty cool eh?

The 18 lessons are as follows: 

  • What is life
  • Chemistry review
  • The cell membrane
  • Take in Nutrients
  • Take in Energy (four parts)
  • Grow
  • Reproduce (three parts)
  • Homeostasis (two parts)
  • Adapt (two parts)
  • Prokaryotes, Protists, Animals, Fungi
  • Plants

So other than researching areas of concern for my students, how did I actually use it?  
At night!  Seriously, hubby would go to bed, and I’d put in my ear phones and just listen.  I could work on other things, listen and do my brushing up.  It was great!   When an area was harder to understand I could stop what I was doing, rewind the video and listen again while watching the slides.  Then if I really didn’t understand I could pull up the transcript and read through it.  Have these two different ways to access the material I felt completely covered! 

I honestly didn’t really look at the tests a whole lot but I did take one and much to my surprise I pulled off an 80% which tells me that if you listen AND read the transcripts…you’ll nail the material.  The questions come right out of the script.. so honestly listen, read, test yourself if you like to.  BUT as an adult using it as a refresher, seriously its optional.  As a highschool student needing a transcript.. take the test.  🙂

If you do take the route of using the tests, as you go through your results you can easily see where you went wrong. Helps with the learning eh?  But seriously, unless you are you taking this for highschool biology credit, don’t worry about the tests unless you love taking them.  🙂

Taking the Chemistry course first is recommended, but if you choose to do Biology first they have a short chemistry course you can take first. Six lessons to make sure you understand the chemistry part of biology.  It’s called Chemistry Pre-course for Biology.  It’s a subset of the chemistry course and would be an added cost.

My thoughts:
I love love love how everything is covered in this biology curriculum.. the full course transcript, the ability to watch or listen to the video being taught, the slides, being able to jump around from lesson to lesson learning what I need to.  It’s great.  Seriously.  For the purposes for which I am using it, it has been a useful addition into my household. 

Fascinating Education. 
Fascinating Biology, along with a pre-course (6 lessons that cover the basics of Chemistry bonding methods) to help me brush up on my chemistry.
A full year subscription
Cost $79/yr
Pre-course Chemistry $20
Learn more here.

For the past few weeks I’ve been reviewing Fascinating Education along with 50 other reviewers.     We’ve been using these courses:
Fascinating Chemistry
Fascinating Biology
Fascinating Physics
Do check them out, and look over their sample lessons too!
I invite you to click here or on the image below to see what we had to say about them.

http://schoolhousereviewcrew.com/biology-chemistry-physics-fascinating-education-reviews/

You can see my review of Fascinating Chemistry here.

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Fascinating Fungi

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One of the things that I like to do when out for a walk, particularly if I have my camera is to stop and take pictures of fungi.

My boys shake their heads at me and keep walking, they simply don’t understand why I wouldn’t rather take pictures of birds and what not.   But Fungi are cool, they are helpful decomposers of the plant world. 

Most of the fungi I find are this lovely white/beige colour.   Aren’t they gorgeous?   Just look at all the variety in them, from rounded shapes, to rosettes or jutting out like mini shelves.   They are fascinating to me.   🙂

Imagine my delight when  I spotted this beauty.   It’s orange!   Every fungus on the tree was this same shade of orange.   I showed it to my lad when I got home and asked “What do you think makes it that orange colour mom?   I’ve never seen one like this before.”

I have to tell you that I don’t know a whole lot about fungi, I just know they are helpful plants that are often overlooked.     They come in a variety of shapes and sizes.   Some…are edible, others will kill you.   Others are so small you wouldn’t even know they were there.  

Once when we were camping we learned about a fungus that lives inside of plants and is able to figure out the shortest distance between points.   If you had the time and patience, you could map out a number of landmarks, lay out oatmeal in that pattern and that fungus will figure out the best route for you.   Amazing eh?   They are apparently using that to figure out the best ways to lay down a subway system.   Go figure.

Did you know that fungi are not plants nor are they animals.  They have a classification all their own. They are highly variable in their appearance and action. 

I love how you can find one all by itself, just doing its thing, and at other times you see so many of them, you can hardly see the wood it’s growing on.    Such variety in what seems an insignificant organism.  They just delight me.

So I heard that Educents was going to have a sale and they sent me a reminder that I have a credit with them and that perhaps I might want to use it up.   This made me wonder… might they have information about fungi?

And look.. THEY DO!!!

They have this bacteria and fungi kit. Young
Scientists of all ages will be fascinated by growing bacteria and fungi
of all colors and textures in Petridishes. They will discover how
antibiotics cure disease. Students finish the kit by “waking”the common
fungus called yeast.

Or check out this product: Germs and Fungus Lessons and Experiments.  Learn how to prevent the spread of germs.  Describe the various shapes of fungi and more. 

Oh Ick.  Gives students a chance to do science, including observing fungi growing as they make a mold zoo.   Not only that, there are 114 science experiments to be found at your fingertips, so even if you aren’t fascinated by fungi, you are bound to find something that intrigues you.  🙂

Just think of the fun one could have working with fungi, growing it, examining, watching it and most importantly…learning about it.   And Educents will give you a discount to do so.  Cool eh?

If you are  first time member did you know you get a discount on your first order?   You can find out the details for that RIGHT HERE. 

For all other discount options, see the image below.

Snakes

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yesterday was Easter.

WE have a tradition in our house whereby I find some small toys and some candies and put them in eggs and hide them about the house. 

This year I found some snakes (three of them) and put them into eggs. One Six year old was thoroughly delighted. 

This of course has led to tons of questions about snakes.

He’s learned about milking poisonous snakes.
 

He has asked how long it takes for snakes to replenished their venom. And discovered that it takes up to 24 hours for it to be replenished for most snakes, but some snakes it can take longer. 
He’s learned how green snakes camouflage themselves in .. green grass. 🙂 And how other snakes can do the same thing.

Currently working on…ecosystems

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Building a study on ecosystems.

NOT a particularly easy thing to do as ecosystems can be as generic as “oceans” or as specific to “this puddle of water”. Since the lad is six, I won’t be doing EVERYTHING that there is to learn. But I will give him a good overview and hopefully start it as a small binder so that over the years we can add to it.

I think I’ll concentrate on Forests, Water (salt and fresh), Tundra and icecaps, Deserts, and Grasslands.

I’ll be pulling in information from a variety of sources.
Pronto Lessons on the ecosystem will be a starting point.

Then I’ll pull in information from national geographic, Canadian forest services, Geography4Kids, KidsGeo.com, KidsCorner, neoK12, and ecosystems.

time to homeschool.
will do more planning later. 🙂