You Can Teach Chemistry From Home…and Be Fascinating!
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Did you know that if you made a glove with the same fibers that cover the feet of a spider or gecko you could walk yourself across the ceiling with one hand? These are just one of a few of the truly fascinating facts that caught my attention during our review time learning about Fascinating Chemistry with Fascinating Education.
One of the largest fears I hear among homeschool parents is that they are not qualified to teach a subject because they are not familiar with the material or they never took the class. This is just not true! Here are three ways you can get ready to teach a subject you have never taken
- You Could Study Like Crazy
If you are a parent who feels like they need to know the ins and outs of what they are going to be teaching, get crackin’. If you have taken the class in high school it might just be a simple overview of the material. If you were a less than stellar student in high school like myself, you could do what I did when my daughter took Chemistry with Fascinating Education. Since each lesson was a 45-minute video, I watched the lessons before or sometimes with her. It beat most of my late-night Netflix picks. I might even have cheated and snuck ahead a few times.
Interest and excitement are contagious. When you can show true interest and engagement, you students are going to pick up on that. I found that it helped me feel more confident to help her with her unit tests, and if we got stuck, we could always use the hints that were provided to help us.
- Choose a Curriculum That is Designed for Self-Learning
My oldest son had no such desire to be led through his studies by myself. He is very comfortable reading new material and applying it. One of his greatest frustrations was when we did science as a group, and he had to wait for the other kids to finish writing or discussing. Yes, he has learned to work well in a group, but he loved the freedom that working on his own affords him. Fascinating Education is designed to have everything the student needs in the lesson. You can feel confident that they are not going to miss a beat if you never learn about molecular bonds and polarization.
As they progress through the lessons a prompt will pop up offering them to do a lab. When they click, the program opens a new window with everything they need to carry out the experiment or observation. You have a clear syllabus right from the start so you can know exactly what your student is going to be covering. We found the Labs easy to follow, clear and always related to the material we just covered. Each felt like time well spent and not just a fun thing just thrown in. They were followed with teaching about what was learned.
- Outsource the Subjects You Feel Less Confident About Teaching
We have a huge household size. Right now, there are 14 of us at home, but for the normal part of the homeschool year we have 10 students. We outsourced science a few years ago when my Mom volunteered to teach it one day a week. That freed up our schedule so we could have a four-day week. On science day Mom traveled to our place. Last year we traveled to hers since she lives in a city where we could also take other lessons like ballet or gymnastics.
This year my two teens who just graduated would like to take a few classes to add to their transcript. We are not required to have a fourth year of science to graduate, but my daughter is thinking about pursuing a degree in psychology and for that she would need four science credits and four foreign language. We have already started using Fascinating Chemistry this summer to get that last credit in before the start of the school year. Instead of having another person physically teach like we have in years past I am having the instructor available at our convince. If my daughter wants to do her lessons at 2am, she can. If she wants to do more than one module in a week she can take the test whenever she feels like she is ready. She doesn’t have to wait. This is exactly why she is a 15 year old high school graduate. She was able to leverage the pace Homeschooling allows and finish her studies at her own rapid fire pace.
If she missed something in the lesson she can go into the full script and search for any items she may have missed. Your student may watch the lesson as many times at it takes. The instructor wont lull them to sleep and there are tons of slides to keep your visual student following along.
