Home schooling with Time4Learning an Online Curriculum

My son is entering his senior year this fall, he is 17 and has Asperger's and Dysgraphia. Dysgraphia is a deficiency in the ability to write, primarily handwriting. So traditional school and school work is nearly impossible for my son. Public schools even with an IEP can't meet my sons needs. So when he was in 1st grade we started our adventure in home schooling.

I bought workbooks and all kinds of things for my son and what took my daughters 2- 4 hours to complete took my son 8-10 hours because of the Dysgraphia. He was so frustrated and we were making very little progress that we could show. I knew he was smart, but I couldn't figure out a way to actually figure out what he knew, we even did a virtual public school program for a few months, that was horrible for him.

My daughter's grandma found this site called Time4learning and told me about it and I signed my son up to use the curriculum as a tutoring program. He would fly through the lessons in just a few hours mastering the quizzes and tests. But I was still doing other curriculum for two years, thinking there is no way it could completely cover what we needed to cover.

By the time he was in 3rd grade I started to realize that the other stuff we were trying for him wasn't working for him but time4learning seem to work great. So I decided to use the CATs (California Achievement Test) to test to see where he was. He was about a 1/2 year behind at this point (I think using t4l for tutoring helped make sure he wasn't further than that) And at the end of the year we would test again to see where he was at. He jumped 2 grade levels in that year.

Because he could do it so quickly in a day I would give him enough work that he could do a full year in 90 days. In the lower grades time4learning you have access to the grade below and the grade above what ever grade you enroll your child in. So I had my son start in 2nd grade, by Christmas break he was finished, then we started the 3rd grade work he was done by the end of the year. The following year we started in 3rd grade redoing the work, then moving on to 4th grade and so on till his 8th grade year where we added some AP courses. (yes you can add high school courses to your middle schooler's classes by just calling customer service). I also insisted on Mastery scores for him to be allowed to move on to the next section in these grades, so some lessons he had to repeat.

Fast forward he is in high school now. He just does what grade he is in and it takes him the full 180 days about to complete everything. He also is enrolled in some dual credit courses. The last three years of high school my son has mastered everything without having to redo the lessons. He types everything out, and rarely ever writes by hand unless it is his name. He uses his phone to make notes when on the go and uses his computer for notes and to do all his work, including his math. He would have been left behind in Public School, but because of Time4Learning, he not only has his high school education, he is set to graduate with 4.0 if he keeps up the hard work through his Senior Year. And will graduate with some college credits too.

I don't know if we would be as far with him if we didn't find this program. And though it is a great fit for my son, it is not a one fits all program. No program is and if someone says there is one, they are lying. But if you would like to check it out here is a link https://www.time4learning.com/signup/step1.aspx?rid=F/f01pXBmtGU2rA2a0tJnw==
They offer a 2 week trial if you want to try before you buy. It is one of the more affordable online curriculum for the lower grades it cost $19.99 a month and for each additional child you get a $5 off discount. High School is $30 a month and you get four course, and can add more for $5 a month. They offer a foreign language program that runs $60 for 6 months.

We unschool for our electives and let our son lead us in what he wants to learn more about. Time4learning offers core course work, that is English, Math, Science and Social Studies/History. They do have a program called time4art it is included for the first 6 months, you can get it longer for a small fee. (I am sorry it has been so long I can't remember what we paid for it) The high school program also offers 3 electives on top of the core courses.

That is the one thing we wished they did offer more of, is electives. But we have been just find without them, and my son has really excelled in his interests and without the freedom to choose what he wants to learn about for those classes he may not be as advance as he is in his interests.