Discovering Design with Physics

Items listed in this section tend to be complete science programs with a teacher and student component, requiring few supplements besides science supplies.

Believing college preparatory, lab rich science should be a part of every homeschool student's experience, Dr. Wile provides everything necessary for success. With his conversational approach, there is more reading and fewer pictures compared to other curricula. Rather than intimidating, this beautiful approach assumes there is no teacher present and gives students all they need to know about a subject in a clearly explained, user-friendly format.

The Hardcover Textbook offers textual reading, comprehension and review questions, lab instructions and answers to the comprehension questions. The softcover Answer Key & Tests Book includes reproducible tests and answers to the tests and chapter reviews. It also includes grading and testing tips. USB Audiobooks are chapter readings without comprehension questions or experiments. Set includes Textbook and Answer Key/Test Book. Optional Lab Kits or Student Workbooks are available.

This course is built upon the foundational belief that physics governs everything God has created and the more physics one learns, the better one understands the creation.  Discovering Design with Physics provides a one-year college preparatory, lab-based science course from a Biblical worldview.  Successful completion of Algebra 1 and Geometry, including a basic understanding of Trigonometry functions (sine, cosine, and tangent) are required.

Sixteen chapters cover Newton’s Laws of Motion and Universal Gravitation, two-dimensional vectors and motion, uniform circular motion and gravity, Kepler’s Laws, energy, momentum and its conservation, periodic motion and Hooke’s Law, sound and light, the Doppler Effect, optics, Snell’s Law, electrostatic force, electricity and potential, electrical circuits, and magnetism. Throughout each chapter are lab experiments–a total of 45 experiments. Experiments include a materials list and step-by-step instructions. Household or easily found items are required. The chapters also include “Comprehension Check” questions (with solutions), chapter reviews, and access to a dedicated course website including contact information to ask Dr. Wile course-related questions. Students are expected to complete roughly one chapter every 2 weeks, at a pace of 45-60 minutes per day, five days per week. A 36-week schedule is found in the Appendix for your convenience.   

There are two required components: The Textbook and the Answer Key & Tests Book, which are sold separately or as a set.

The hardcover Textbook contains the textual readings, comprehension and review questions, and step-by-step experiments using household items. Currently, a prepared lab kit is not available. The narrative text is written to the student with concepts, definitions and equations clearly explained. The text pages are visually appealing with scattered illustrations and highlighted, colorful boxes for comprehension checks, labs, examples, and information to memorize. Appendices include constants and mathematical formulas, optional daily assignments, experiment supplies listed by chapter, and a glossary.

The softcover Answer Key & Tests includes a brief introduction to the parent/teacher, solutions to chapter review questions, reproducible chapter tests and semester exams for the student, and answers to tests and exams.

Optional supports include the spiral-bound Student Workbook, which is reproducible for students who own the Discovering Design with Physics text. The Student Workbook includes the daily assignments check list, text comprehension and review questions with space to record answers, and blank pages to create a Laboratory Notebook. An explanation on documenting labs is included. Available separately or in a set with the Text and Answer Key. The optional Audiobook will be released later this Summer.

Families familiar with Dr. Wile’s Exploring Creation with Physics, 2^nd edition may be wondering what the differences are between this course and his previous Physics course. One of the first things to note is that the content has been updated to reflect new developments and understandings–for example, Pluto is no longer listed as a planet. Experiments have also been redesigned and are less repetitive and time consuming, while six experiments have been added. The greatest difference is the writing approach. Rather than approaching physics traditionally with definitions and equations taught prior to Newton’s Laws, Dr. Wile covers displacement, velocity, and acceleration within the context of Newton’s Laws. This approach allows students to learn the why of motion.  

Discovering Design with Physics offers a fresh and homeschool-friendly approach to teaching college-preparatory Physics at home. According to Dr. Wile, families currently using Exploring Creation with Physics 2^nd edition will find it is still a very good course, however, Discovering Design’s incorporation of new developments, revised experiments, and integrated information of motion and Newton’s Laws provides improved instruction of a vital subject. ~Deanne