I’m sure that some parents of children in school wish they could afford tutoring when their child isn’t doing so well in a subject like Language Arts or Math. Schools sometimes provide tutoring through afterschool problems, but it’s rarely enough when your child is far behind her classmates or just isn’t understanding a concept.

Homeschooled children have the benefit of one-on-one help and extra time to study and learn lessons they have difficulty with, but their traditionally schooled counterparts have to keep up with the class or be left behind. Once a schooled child is behind, it’s nearly impossible to catch up, because his class has moved on to more advanced lessons. Well, if your child didn’t understand the previous lessons that the current work is based upon, how can he understand the harder work? This sets up a cycle, and your child can become discouraged and can begin to feel as though he just can’t learn.

An online supplemental program  can help both homeschooled and public/private schooled children as a supplement. It’s self-paced, it’s fun, and it gives immediate feedback on how your child is doing. She could actually do the lessons with little parental involvement; another way she could do the lessons is with you nearby, giving a little extra help and coaching as needed.

An online tutoring program is a great way for your child to catch up and restore his confidence in his ability to learn.

During the summer, the last thing your kids probably want to hear about is intensive work. They want to have fun, you want to have fun, the whole family wants to have fun! It would be easy to not do any kind of school work, but you know that when kids take a total break from learning, they tend to forget what they learned over the previous academic year.

Some families, like mine, homeschool year round, but do less intense work during the summer months. Online summer school education is a great way to do some academic work without putting on a lot of pressure. It will also give your child time on the computer which most kids love. With a summer computer program, you can review basic skills or learn new ones.

Going to the beach, going to the park, going to summer camp, and enjoying the family should be a priority during the hot summer months. But while families are doing all this, the kids can engage in some “cool” learning on the computer.

I’ve been asked by a few people about the purpose and status of this blog so I thought I’d write up a quick summary of it’s history.  We will probably relaunch this blog soon as some new variant. If you have any suggestions or would like to participate, you can contact us at Time4Learning.

 This blog was started by Time4Learning as a learning experiment.

We asked half a dozen parents (actually, all moms) of students using Time4Learning to write on this group blog about the details of their homeschooling program. What their days were like and what they worried about. And were happy about.

More specifically, we wante to know what was working for them and what wasn’t in terms of their use of online educational materials.  At times, they wrote how much they and their children loved and benefitted from using Time4Learning. Other times, they expressed their frustration that Time4Learning was not everything that they would like it to be.  Often, being homeschool moms, they talked about cooking and their kids, and their homes. As far as I can tell, we never heard about their husbands (whew!)

Often, they talked about how their Time4Learning experience was affected by, or affected, another aspect of their homeschooling program. One mom, whose family used Time4Learning as a supplement to a traditional school program, asked the homeschoolers about their lives. And explained some of the realities of her own.

We ran this group blog twice: once in the fall of 2007, once in the spring of 2008. We encouraged the parents to be candid as we were interested in learning more about the day to day reality of how our service fit into their lives and needs.  To keep them focused, we contracted with them to write weekly over the four month course of each project and they all fulfilled the contract and then some. Apparently, it was a lot of fun.   Most of them posted and commented very frequently.

What did we learn? We learned a lot of details and about other products that are used in conjunction with us. We learned that most homeschool curriculums are a home-made eclectic mix optimized for each child.  And that there is different mix of planning, routine, and spontenity for each family.  We were stunned to find out how unique and useful our service really is. My favorite posts:

The gifted child, with autism, with Time4Learning
Lists of likes and dislikes about Time4Learning
How the Internet changes everything….for homeschoolers
T4L - How it helps everyone. Mom too.

OK I’ve been meaning to write this little story but we’ve been so busy lately and still battleling colds and allergies and sleepless nights. C’est La Vie!

Recently Natalie completed the first series of lessons in her science module which cover earth science topics such as weather maps, thunderstorms and water cycle. I sat down with her to do the one about the water cycle. It is refreshing to see that even I can learn a thing or two. I mean most of this stuff we know but when you hear it put into words for a child her age it just seems so simple and easy to understand. At the end of the lessons I showed her how we (adults) know the daily temperature and what the weather will be on a given day by going on the weather channel and online at weather.com. and things really clicked for her when I explained the different colors they use to represent rain or snow, etc. Later that day when her dad came home she wanted to show him what she learned so she told him to put on the Weather Channel so she could tell him what the weather would be tonight and tomorrow. He was pretty impressed at how much she retained. We don’t get excited about watching the weather channel but it was exciting to see her trying to read the weather on the map on TV.

We had some rain since that lesson took place and Natalie sat by the window and explained to me that the water will “evaporate into the air and then it will rain again when the clouds get all filled up.” Yes, we all sing praises to T4L and it is well deserved. As parents we try to take advantage of every opportunity to teach our kids lessons that are best learned hands on, but honestly, it can be difficult sometimes. However, when they have an incentive to ask and we (parents) have a little feedback to help us answer questions at their level it is a lot easier to reinforce what they learn and we learn right along with them.

Everyone once in a while Natalie will say “see mom, even you learn on time4learning.” She’s right.

Once again, Natalie just amazes me.  I can’t say it enough, I wish I had T4L when Emily was just learning to read, 8 years ago.  Anyway, Natalie is reading on her own now.  This week she went through about 10 small lessons mostly in the Language Arts curriculum for 1st grade and then a few others in the Language Arts Extention for 1st grade.  In these lessons there are sections where the story is read to her, then it asks her to identify different words and finally it makes her read the story back as each word is highlighted with a click of the mouse.  She did great and really enjoyed reading the stories.  As hard as it is at night (because I’m usually very sleepy) I let her read to me or we share the story.  She also reads to her dad when he’s working in the garage.

I am proud of her progress and her dedication to keep learning and to even go on T4L after being in school all day.  She doesn’t go on everyday, usually on Wednesday because she has a half day and Friday’s because she goes to bed a little later than usual.  The other days are optional.  She also goes one if she is reviewing something in particular that she may be struggling with. We just find one of the lessons to help her through that and so far we’ve been able to find something on T4L to match what they have been doing in class.

We are over our colds, still holding on to a little sinus or allergy issues but otherwise everyone is feeling pretty good and looking forward to our family vacation over the holidays.

Everyone, have safe and healthy week.

Terie