Science4Us.com is a K - 2 grade Interactive Science option for families. It is a complete, core science curriculum. This online program introduces science to students using the 5E Inquiry-Based Instruction Model of Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate. The digital learning style encourages a better understanding of scientific topics by engaging students, but also encourages literacy by using science.
The mission of Science4Us.com is to provide a solid foundation of scientific concepts as early as possible. In the early elementary years, or younger, students can really develop a deeper interest in science that they can continue to build on during their academic career. Science4Us.com wants to make sure that teachers and parents feel comfortable teaching scientific topics. They provide content training and support for teachers.
Science4Us .com provides over 350 lessons in Physical, Inquiry, Life and Earth/Space topics. The provide lesson plans, outside project ideas, worksheets and grade tracking. This complete curriculum is available for the low price of $7.95 a month per student. `
How did we use Science4Us.com?
Caty likes to watch science videos. She does well with interactive programs, so I was very excited to get started with this.
Science4Us.com is extremely easy to use. Once I had our accounts set up, I went through the lesson plans and set up a plan for Caty. Everything is laid out in a very organized and easy to understand way.
I made the plan to start from the first lesson in Inquiry. Each section has roughly 13-14 activity areas for the topics. I took a look at the extension activities. It really took me about 5 minutes to plan out her science for the week.
We having been using this program about 20 minutes - 4 days a week. We watch the videos for Engage, Explore and Explain, and then move on to the "extra" interactive activities. The Explore and Elaborate sections of the topic range in activity from a story to silly songs that really helped the kids remember. I know the curriculum that Lydia is using does not include information on quantitative or qualitative.
Science4Us.comhas language arts mixed into many of the study areas also. I really liked the thought of this, but the language arts sections did not work well for Caty. The material was advanced for her, so she was frustrated. I played in those areas and found it was well presented and had fun games. Topics such as syllables and alphabetizing are touched upon.
She loved the online projects such as for Plants, she was able to create her own plant. She thought that was awesome!! Each topic section had different online projects such as Investigating, the Weird and Wacky Show, and Professor Owlbert. She was excited to learn all types of new and weird facts.
We used Science4Us.com as Caty's full science curriculum for the past few weeks. She has enjoyed all the interactive games. Today she even asked to go back through her science journal. This is a neat feature where the student can do online worksheets and save their work in a virtual journal. We sat and browsed her work and printed for her assessor notebook. She giggled and laughed at her work, and was very proud.
I am very happy with the ease of use and with the information that Caty is learning. We have supplemented with art projects that reinforce topics we are covering, such as making a flower and labeling the parts, and also with science projects suggested, such as using beakers and balance scales. Unless I wanted to though, I really would not need to do this. The activities provided online are thorough and well presented, which is why I know we will continue to use Science4Us.com with Caty.
Still not sure whether or not this program will work for you, please try a demonstration lesson and see how easy this is to use.
You can take a look at the Scope and Sequence of Topics for K - 2nd grade here.
Be sure to check out Science4Us.com. You can follow them on Twitter, Facebook and even check out extra project ideas on Pinterest.