Knobren, I thought I'd add my 2 cents to your original question.
I finally found a science program that I think my son will like and that looks like will teach him something.
http://www.beginningspublishing.com/ I bought the First Year (middle school grades 7-9) of a two year program. It has a textbook where the child reads a short, directed, no extraneous verbiage lesson two days a week (the parent asks a couple review questions the following days,) and then there is a once a week lab done after the two lessons. All lab stuffs are included in a kit (and the items look good, not cheap.) This first year portion covers physics and chemistry and, besides a couple short paragraphs in the intro, does not mention anything supernatural until the very last page. Unfortunately, in reading the website, I did find that the following year, where it covers biology, does teach evolution from a creationist's viewpoint.
I'm totally bummed.
Anyway, if you could come up with something along the lines of this program, but without mention of the supernatural, I, personally, would be very grateful and do know quite a few others that would be interested in it as well. Yes, the majority of homeschoolers in the US are christian, many fundamentalists, but definitely not all and, I think, the numbers of us beginning to homeschool who aren't interested in some unknown organization's religious indoctrination mixing with our children's non-religious instruction is growing. I'm not trying to start an argument, but at least when one teaches specific bible lessons or studies, there is no question as to what the child is being exposed to. This seems to me to be even more important when the child is of an age to do most of his or her studies without parental participation. In something like science, it should be taught to the best of modern research's knowledge. Then, one can teach their child "this is what we believe."
PS. I also wanted to add the my son LOVES doing anything on the computer. If you had an interactive program, lots of clickables, links, demo's of things (things icky and gooey is always good!) he'd be a very happy camper. Maybe with links to current science news, etc. Also, it has to be written in an interesting manner. The program I mentioned above is well-written for the middle school aged brain.
Amusing without being stupid. To the point. Not dry is very good!
Also, if you'd like to toss ideas at me, feel free to PM me. I'll even get my son involved if you'd like.