Apologia Science: Exploring Creation with Biology

As I prepared my son's high school science study, I tried to keep Charlotte Mason's words in mind. I truly wanted science to be meaningful and connected to his real life. Not all things can be seen and observed and measured but many can. I took the Apologia Biology text and went through it over the summer and found that without much additional effort, we could make his learning fit Charlotte Mason's model for teaching science. My son still reads the text and completes the notebooks but we also try to find ways of incorporating our nature walks, study, and journals into what he is learning.

"His parents know that the first step in intimacy is recognition; and they will measure his education, not solely by his progress in the 'three R's,' but by the number of living and growing things he knows by look, name, and habitat. A child of six will note with eager interest the order of time in which the trees put on their leaves; will tell you whether to look in hedge, or meadow, or copse, for eyebright, wood-sorrel, ground-ivy; will not think that flowers were made to be plucked, for--

'Tis (his) faith that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes"--

but will take his friends to see where the milk-wort grows, or the bog-bean, or the sweet-gale. The birds of the air are no longer casual; he soon knows when and where to expect the redstart and the meadow pipit. The water-skater and the dragon-fly are interesting and admired acquaintances. His eyes have sparkled at the beauty of crystals, and, though he may not have been able to find them in situ, he knows the look of the crystals of lime and quartz, and the lovely pink of felspar, and many more."

Charlotte Mason, volume 3, chapter 7, page 76 (original text)

Charlotte Mason places before us a mirror. A mirror for us to decide if we are truly educating our children in the realm of science. First consider what many of us do:

"What do we do? We consider the matter carefully; we say the boy will make a jumble of it if he is taught more than one or two sciences. We ask our friends--'What sciences will tell best in examinations?' and, 'Which are most easily learned?' We discover which are the best text-books in the smallest compass. The boy learns up his text, listens to lectures, makes diagrams, watches demonstrations. Behold! he has learned a science and is able to produce facts and figures, for a time any way, in connection with some one class of natural phenomena; but of tender intimacy with Nature herself he has acquired none."

Charlotte Mason,
Volume 3, chapter 7, pages 76-77 (original text)

Here are the ideas we have for adding in nature study and living books to Apologia Biology.

Module 1:
Read biography of Carl Linnaeus
Read Microbe Hunters, chapter 1 Leeuwenhoek

Module 2:
Read Microbe Hunters, chapter 2 Spallanzani and chapter 3 Pasteur
Start a pond study to complement the study of microscopic organisms-protozoa
Use A Golden Guide to Pond Life

Read biography of Louis Pasteur

Module 3:
Continue pond study-algae
Handbook of Nature Study section on insects of the brook and pond

Module 4:
Nature study focus on mushrooms and other fungi
Work with yeast
Work with molds

Modules 5-7:
The Biology Coloring Book by Robert Griffin-color appropriate pages to help visualize the abstract concepts in these modules

Module 8:
Growing pea plants to support Mendelian genetic study (just for fun)
Read a biography of Gregor Mendel
Grow radishes as part of experiment 8.4

Module 9:
Read a biography of Charles Darwin
Handbook of Nature Study section on rocks and minerals

Module 10:
Identify a local mammal and then draw where it fits in the food web.
Learn about your local watershed and then diagram it or draw a map for your journal.

Module 11:
Dissection of an earthworm
Nature study focus on Invertebrates-garden snails, earthworms
Handbook of Nature Study section on invertebrate animals other than insects

Module 12:
Nature study focus on arachnida (spiders) and/or insects and/or lepidoptera
Dissection of a crayfish
Handbook of Nature Study section on insects

Module 13:
Dissection of a perch and a frog
Nature study focus on amphibians
Handbook of Nature Study section on fishes
Handbook of Nature Study section on amphibians

Module 14:
Collect leaf samples
Nature study focus on flowerless plants
Handbook of Nature Study section on flowerless plants

Module 15:
Insectivorous plants-observe a Venus Flytrap or Sundew
Nature study focus on garden flowers-parts of a flower
Collect and press flowers
Germinate seeds
Handbook of Nature Study section on plants/garden flowers

Module 16:
Nature study focus on birds, reptiles, or mammals
Handbook of Nature Study section on birds
Handbook of Nature Study section on reptiles
Handbook of Nature Study section on mammals