Science Co-op

Speaking of our science co-op, the previous post reminded me that I never got around to posting pics from last semester. This year, we will be studying The World of Animals from the Answers in Genesis, God's Design for Life series. We're all excited to explore the animal kingdom from a creationist perspective. (And we continue to be very thankful for our church, Chandler Christian, which allows us to use 2 classrooms every week at no charge!)

Last year, we spent one semester doing a history co-op and then transitioned to science using Answers in Genesis, God's Design for Chemistry and Ecology: Properties of Matter for the older kids and a human body class for the younger ones. The matter co-op was often challenging, but it was also a lot of fun with many hands-on experiments.

Cell phone pics from our first class. Libby (kneeling) taught and demonstrated the scientific method through an experiment using yeast, different types of sugar, and balloons. (Mary is assisting.)

The kids awaiting their instructions.

One water bottle was the control - only contained yeast & warm water. The other bottles contained yeast, warm water, and a sugar source: one w/molasses and the other w/sugar.

After waiting, the yeast were activated and the balloons started to expand. Which one will grow the most? The kids took measurements of the balloons at different intervals and charted their progress. (As you can see, the red "control" bottle is not expanding at all.)

Blue is winning . . .

Green is catching up.

The boys' table. Wow - look at those balloons expand. What a fun experiment. We took one of the bottles home - the balloon kept expanding for several hours.

Our wonderful co-op moms/teachers (minus Mary & Darlene, who had already left for the day:)

Melissa, Christina, Libby, Laurie, me, and Chrissy. (And Joshua sneaking in the pic :-)

Unfortunately, Ms. Libby and family moved away over the summer - we'll miss you this year!