Kendall Hunt Science Review

Kendall Hunt Religious Publishers has an extensive science curriculum called By Design Science for grades 1-8. Kendall Hunt By Design Science is a complete science program including textbooks and consumable science journals.

I received this product for free and am being compensated for my time to write this review. All opinions are my own and I was not required to post a positive review.

Complete, In-depth Inquiry Science

We received the fifth grade materials to review and wow. These are for fifth grade, but they are advanced. I was a bit stunned with what this curriculum involved. I even asked some other moms on the review team about this because I thought maybe things had just changed a lot since I was in the elementary classroom, but we all agreed that these are advanced for the grade level.

This is a very thorough and in-depth science curriculum. If you have a child who wants/needs a science curriculum that will prepare her well for higher-level science, this is a great option.

This curriculum is for kids who love science, want to work like a scientist, and want to think like a scientist. I believe this curriculum would prepare kids very well for future lab work, using appropriate scientific terminology, etc. It is also a great fit for moms who might feel overwhelmed trying to piece together a science curriculum. Moms will still have to purchase the supplies needed to do the various activities, but it is all organized for you so all you have to do is implement it.

When we started using it with Caroline we realized we were going to have to adapt it since we’ve never used a formal science curriculum before and, frankly, she would have been overwhelmed by it if we had attempted to use it in its entirety. There is really a LOT to it.

We decided to use the textbook conversationally and cover all the concepts in a general way at this point. We can then circle back around in a few years and use it as it is written. So we are introducing her to all of the scientific terminology which will greatly broaden her exposure to scientific concepts, but are not expecting any kind of significant mastery at this point. We also decided to wait on attempting some of the activities as they are more involved than we want to tackle at this time However, kids who love science and want to be challenged will probably love them!

So here is Caroline doing a classification activity that starts with coins to introduce the concepts and terminology (kingdom, class, order, family, species, etc.). She then decided that she wanted to use these concepts and apply them to her Littlest Pet Shop collection so she grabbed that.

Putting concepts into real-life situations!

Thinking of other ways to classify…

The Kendall Hunt materials are top-notch in terms of the quality.

Very colorful and well-made.

Seventh Day Adventist Science Curriculum

I do want to point out that Kendall Hunt is a Seventh Day Adventist publisher so there is mention of the Sabbath (which for them is on Saturday). There is also an extensive section in our book about Ellen White, health, and why Seventh Day Adventists focus so much on health. I don’t think these additions would hinder most Christians from using the curriculum, but if you are very particular about the Christian theology in your textbooks, I want to make sure you are aware of their Seventh Day Adventist theological framework.

Kendall Hunt Religious Publishers

So overall I would recommend Kendall Hunt Science for families who include enthusiastic scientists-in-training and who aspire to higher-level science programs in high school.

Kendall Hunt Religious Publishers also publishes other curriculum including:

• Pathways Reading Language Art grades 1-8 
• Kindergarten Stepping Stones  

Kendall Hunt offers Talented and Gifted programs in mathematics (M2 and M3) as well as products developed in collaboration with the CFGE (Center for Gifted Education) College of William and Mary in subject areas such as language arts, social studies, and science.