History Odyssey and/or R.E.A.L. Science

[rnacree]

Anyone use either of these? I am looking at using level 1 ancients and level 1 life science with my 1rst grader to be next year. I would like to hear if anyone has actually used either of these and what they thought.

Renea

[smythen]

I'm using R.E.A.L. Life Science with my 1st grader this year and it's great. Each lesson has a one-page reading and then an activity to go with it. We don't do every single activity, but the ones we do my daughter really enjoys. She always asks to do science!

I used History Odyssey Middle Ages Level 1 last year. I liked it. We switched to Sonlight this year, and next year I've decided to do a hybrid of both. We'll be using the History Odyssey schedule and add in the Sonlight readers. I like the H.O. schedule and it's all very concise. Not too much writing, which was a good fit for us.

HTH!

[winoelle]

We are using both and we love them! I had been putting together my own science and history and while it was good it was WAY too much work/time for me. We made the switch and now I add in when I need to, and both programs are fun and engaging.

Noelle
DS 7: ETC 3, Singapore 1A, R.E.A.L. Science, History Odyssey

[nukeswife]

I've used HO for the last 3 years. We had some times where doing it all was too much (that was the year my oldest was trainsitioning from PS) so we just took it slowly. My kids really enjoy it and I love that it's all laid out so simply for me. We tried SL for a few months last year and it was ok but we preferred HO. My kids love the definitions, the history pockets and projects in HO. This year I started using R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey (the name recently changed. The added the Odyssey to help differenciate it from another similarily named program) and we LOVE IT!!! It's so much fun and the amount of reading before the projects is perfect. It makes it easy to add library books and books we may have here at home if we want to dive in a little deeper. So far all of the activities have been excellent and the kids have really enjoyed it. I also love that they now offer the Try it Before you Buy it feature. It's much better than just a small sample, you can try it out for about 5 weeks or so to know if it's right for you.

[allearia]

We loved REAL Science life science. We are almost done with it and will be ordering the Astronomy/Earth Science one soon.

We tried the History Odyssey and I decided it just made it too complicated and switched to straight SOTW with the activity guide. I thought doing the narrations from the activity guide a lot more valuable than the copying definitions from the dictionary recommended by History Odyssey. History Odyssey had tons of egypt/mesopotamia projects but for Greece and Rome just used history pockets, while the SOTW activity guide has projects for everything. If you do decide to use History Odyssey, I would also get the Classical Kids: An Activity Guide to Life in Ancient Greece and Rome by Laurie Carlson if you want some of those projects.

History Odyssey is really fine, but for this age I liked to use something more straightforward.

[Mommy22alyns]

I use HO Level 1 Ancients right now. I plan to use Level 1 Medieval next year and R.E.A.L. science Earth/Space as well.

I really like HO - it's good for me because of all the extra activities and reading ideas. I don't mind going slowly through history right now.

[StaceyL in Canada]

I use HO Level 1 Ancients right now. I plan to use Level 1 Medieval next year and R.E.A.L. science Earth/Space as well.

I really like HO - it's good for me because of all the extra activities and reading ideas. I don't mind going slowly through history right now.

We've used part of REAL Science Earth and Space, and now Life,and have liked both very much. I add in assorted books to the subject of a given lesson for the week. The labs/ activities are generally easy to do yet offer worthwhile results.