TOS Review: Time 4 Learning

I first heard about Time4Learning when I met a group of moms who were forming a group for homeschoolers with special needs. Several of the families in the group were using Time4Learning as their sole curriculum and I was curious about it. Upon investigation of it, I was very interested in the program and liked the features but decided that we needed to focus on the basics last year. I wanted the experience of hands-on schooling rather than my child working at a computer for his lessons. Now that I have reviewed it as part of the TOS Homeschool Crew, I can see the benefits of using it along side of our regular curriculum.

Since before they could manipulate a mouse, my boys have gravitated to the computer. They love to watch me while I work on the computer, viewing pictures and videos or even checking the weather. As they have gotten older and begun to understand how to do things on their own, I would allow them to play (educational) games, view science videos for school and work on language arts skills on various sites online.

From the website:  

"Time4Learning is a student-paced online educational system covering preschool through middle school. It is popular as a homeschool curriculum, for afterschool enrichment, for remediation, and for summer study."

One of the features in Time4Learning that I noticed (and loved) immediately was the timer function. Parents decide how much work (or Lesson Time) must be done before their kids enjoy a visit to the Playground. The Playground is what my kids looked forward to the most because as it implies - it is playtime!! The Playground is an area of the program where kids can click carefully chosen links to places on the web. There are educational sites and totally fun sites listed in the Playgrounds and kids can chose what they want to do in their Playground time. Parents set the timer for the Playground as well. We usually did 30 minutes of lessons and then 20-30 minutes of Playground time. Once the Playground time was up, they could either quit the program or go back to Lesson Time and complete the time requirement again in order to gain access to the Playground again. This was great for going to grandma's during the week and me having peace of mind about what they were doing on the computer.

The graphics are entertaining and very appropriate for elementary kids. There is a lot of music incorporated into the program for is great for Music Man.There were several modules they they wanted to watch over and over such as the science unit on thunderstorms.

This program can be used as a stand-alone curriculum for homeschooling and even provides free lesson plans! I love that my students can work at their own pace, going back to master a concept if they need more practice in an area. Time4Learning is very affordable, too, at $19.95 per month for the first child and $14.95 for each additional child. In the parent area, you can track what lessons your child is doing and what still needs to be completed.

Still not sure? Check out the screenshots! Then slip over to the free demo area.You may learn a thing or two yourself! I did!

As a member of The Old Schoolhouse Homeschool Crew, I received this product free of charge  for the purpose of review. No other compensation was received.