Schoolhouse Review Crew: Time4Learning

Time4Learning is an online learning website for ages pre-k-12th grade.  It can be used as a core curriculum or supplement and covers subjects such as language arts, math, science (1st-6th), and social studies (2nd-7th.)  They also have art for grades 4-8 that begins after your first month subscription is over, and health and economics/personal finance for the high school levels.  I recently had an opportunity to use and review Time4Learning  with my 4 year old preschool daughter.


Time4Learning uses animated lessons, interactive activities and reinforcing worksheets.  With your subscription, you have access to one grade level above and one grade level below the grade level you set for your student.  You do not have to set the same grade level for each subject.  If your child for instance is great at math, but weak in language arts you could put them at the 5th grade level for math and 3rd grade for language arts.  A subscription gives you unlimited 24/7 access to the website for the duration of your subscription.  There is no special software required, just a computer that has access to the internet.

The Language Arts component for grades pre-k-8th is split into two sections.  The first is Language Arts which teaches and reinforces; phonics, fluency, grammar, spelling, vocabulary, reading comprehension, writing processes, and more.  The second is Language Arts extensions which is designed to be used alongside Language Arts which includes reading comprehension strategies, grammar, writing, literature, spelling rules and more.  Time4Learning Math covers 5 different math strands: number sense and operations, geometry and spatial sense, measurement, data analysis and probability, and algebra.  Science is available for 1-6th grades.  Kindergarten students can have access to 1st grade science and 7th and 8th graders can use the 6th grade science courses.  Topics include: life science, physical science, geology, astronomy, weather, biology, life cycles, sound, light, matter, and energy.  You can see which topics are covered at each grade level here . The Social Studies program includes topics such as: ancient history and civilizations, modern history, geography, civics instructions, and political science.  You can see which topics are covered at which grade level here.

You can view a lesson demo here.

The cost of a subscription is for grades pre-k-8th is $19.95 per month for the first child, and $14.95 per month for additional children.  The high school cost is $30 per student per month for four courses with additional courses costing $5 more per month for each course.

We reviewed the Pre-K level.  Lillian is 4 and I thought Time4Learning would be a great supplement to our curriculum and something fun she could do on her own while I was working with the older children.  We used Time4Learning 3 days per week for 20-30 minutes per day.  I let Lily choose which areas she wanted to work on.  At the Preschool Level you have access to Pre-K 1 and Pre-K 2.  Pre-K 1 has 20 different themes with a total of 83 activities.  Pre-K 2 has 21 different themes with 92 different activities.

Pre-K 1 looks like this

Each category has several activities to choose from.  As the activities are completed, they get a check mark.  When every activity in the category is finished, a check mark is shown on the category.

Pre-K 2 looks like this

Here are a few shots from the Color Mixing Activity.

The video

Lily playing a matching game

All of the different activities for Color Mixing

Parents can see a report of everything their children have completed.

There is also a section called the playground, that the children can go "play" in after completing their lessons.  Parents can set a certain amount of time the student must be in the learning area before they go to the playground, and also how long they can remain in the playground.  Many of the playground activities are on the Time4Learning website, but a few of them are on different websites.

One of the things that I like the most about Time4Learning is that it is so flexible.  You can choose different levels for your child for different subjects, and even then have access to a grade above and below those levels.  Students can work at their own pace.  There is a wide variety of fun, interactive activities.  Parents can easily see what their children have been doing at any time by looking at the reports.  Lillian has enjoyed having a computer game to play that is just for her.  It is one of those things that she doesn't even think it is school work, just a fun game she can play.  

Good customer service is very important especially when you are using an online product.  If something goes wrong, you need to have it fixed within a reasonable amount of time.  We had a problem using the playground potion of Time4Learning.  I had it set so Lily had no minimum amount of time before going to the playground and could only spend 15 minutes there.  But, for some reason it wouldn't allow her access at all.  I sent a quick email to customer service and within the hour, my problem was resolved and we had access to the playground.

One of the challenges that we have had using the program is that in several of the activities you have to "drop and drag" things to another location.  Our computer is a laptop with a built in mouse.  Lily cannot hold down the mouse and drag it at the same time.  This is very frustrating to her.  Our solution is that she holds down the mouse and tells me where to drag it and I drag it there.  But, that is challenging for me because I wanted her to be able to use the program all on her own while I was working with the boys.  I wish it allowed you to "pick up" the item by clicking on it and then drag it where it needs to go.  You also may be interested to kow that Time4Learning is a secular program.  I have not seen anything in the Pre-K level that has caused me concern, but I wanted to mention it so parents can be aware and preview sections ahead of time that they may be concerned about.

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