Time4Learning

Several of the children have been using the Time4Learning program this past month as a supplement to their school time.  I wanted to test out using a computer based school program but did not want to try it with all the kids at once unless I was sure I loved it.  Katie, Liam and Kieran tested out this one for me.

This program has a lot of beneficial features.  I love that everything is in one place.  There are no books to misplace.  Each student is able to progress at their own rate.  There is very little teacher time needed to look over lesson plans and find materials.  The program keeps track of each students progress and sends the parent a report on what has been accomplished.  The program also contains daily lesson plans and extra resources that you can print out to reinforce what your child is learning.  Each lesson is presented with games to reinforce basic concepts in a fun manner.

The program requires internet access to run.  This is both a positive and negative feature.  It means your child can pick up their work from any computer with internet access which is a good thing.  It also means that each child needs their own computer with internet access to do their work so if you only have one computer connected to the internet at home it can be a challenge to use the program with multiple children.  The program has a competitive monthly cost for each child with a multiple child discount.  Once the child is familiar with the program, they are able to use it independently or with minimal adult help.

Although my children enjoyed using the games in their lessons, I don't believe our family would use this program as a full homeschool curriculum.  For our family, the greatest benefit would be as a supplemental program to help fill in gaps or provide extra practice in the areas a child is struggling academically.  I found with 3 children who needed internet access that is was hard to coordinate each child's computer time and assure they were accomplishing everything needed each day.  We also had two other students who needed access to the internet connected computers during the school day for some of their classes.  This left us with 5 students shuffling between 2 computers and it simply was not enough to coordinate things easily.  Perhaps this problem would have been remedied by having a third computer available for school use.

Bottom line, this program is great for providing everything in one place.  It is great for filling in gaps and providing an extra help for busy moms.  I could absolutely see using this program with one or two students if you had a very busy year ahead of you and were worried about younger students falling through the cracks in your packed schedule.  It is easily affordable for most families and options are provided to defer the cost of the program through reviews and referral programs.  Even though Time4Learning does not meet the current needs of our family, I was happy with what I saw and what our children experienced with this user friendly program.   With a 14-day money back guarantee, you have nothing to loose if you try the program yourself.

Just a short note: I was given a one-month membership to the Time4Learning program in exchange for doing an honest review of the program.