What I'm Using for Homeschool Science This Year (and Why It's Plants)

This year, homeschool science at home is one plant a week. I’m teaching both Sprouts (K-2) and Seedlings (3-5), and yes, it’s the curriculum I wrote, Eden’s Table. You should know that before you read any further.

Why plants for science?

Because a plant is science a child can hold. Botany, plant identification and careful observation are real science, and a young child can do all three with a leaf in her hand. She rolls a dried bud between two fingers, smells it, feels the leaves, then draws the plant and labels its parts. That habit of looking closely before naming anything is what every other science depends on.

It also grows up with them. In Seedlings, color, smell, taste and texture turn into measurements, ratios and a hypothesis your child writes and then tests.

And every plant points back to the One who made it. “How many are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all” (Psalm 104:24, NASB). Every week is anchored in a Scripture memory verse and connects that week’s plant to God’s design in creation.

What’s on the shelf for it?

For each year, three books:

• Teacher’s Guide. Sprouts is 240 pages and Seedlings is 245, both letter size and coil bound, so they lie flat on the counter.
• Student Notebook. Sprouts is 224 pages and Seedlings is 227. This is the book the child writes in.
• Read-Aloud Storybook. Sprouts is 112 pages and Seedlings is 160, both small paperbacks. The Sprouts storybook has seven readings across the year, not one every week.

The herbs aren’t included. Each week uses a small amount of a common dried herb from the pantry, the garden, or the herb list I keep for families.

What does a week look like?

Every day has one job:

• Monday: read-aloud and discussion, and the week’s Scripture memory verse.
• Tuesday: discovery. Study the plant up close, draw it and label it.
• Wednesday: kitchen lab. Measure, observe and record, using common kitchen ingredients.
• Thursday: history, geography and art, all carried by the same plant.
• Friday: the garden, and a review of the week.

One plant carries ten subjects across the week: Bible, science, language arts, math, art, history, geography, Latin, health and character. The Week at a Glance page lists the subjects the week covers, and each day’s page shows how they’re woven in. You can use it as your science and nature study, or keep what’s working and add it alongside.

What’s different between Sprouts and Seedlings?

They teach different plants. Sprouts covers 36 and Seedlings covers another 36, so a family who does both finishes with 72.

• Sprouts (K-2) learns plants by sight, smell and touch, with kitchen labs, memory songs and seven read-aloud stories across the year. It opens with a unit called In the Garden God Made: lavender, chamomile, lemon balm, peppermint, calendula and plantain.
• Seedlings (3-5) brings in body systems, herb profiles and a hypothesis your child writes and then tests. It opens with Fearfully and Wonderfully Made, starting with elderberry.

Every lesson is written at two depths, so a younger and an older child can work the same week at one table. The whole list of plants for both years is on the scope and sequence.

Does it help with records?

Yes. The Notebook is dated and in the child’s own handwriting, week after week: drawings, lab observations, copywork and review. By the end of the year it’s a full year of work in order, which takes care of a lot of record keeping.

What would I tell a mom choosing science for January?

Try one real week before you buy anything. Week 1 is free for Sprouts (lavender) or Seedlings (elderberry), five full lessons you can print and teach the same morning.

If you’re not sure which one to start with, children in K-2 start with Sprouts, and so do children in grades 3-5 who are new to herbs. If your 3-5 kids already know the basics, go straight to Seedlings. Kids in both? Teach Sprouts to everyone together, then Seedlings the next year.

If it fits, the Starter Unit is weeks 1 to 9 as a $39 download (Sprouts or Seedlings), and the whole year in print is $249 plus $12 shipping, at your door in about two to three weeks.