I received the following curriculum free of charge for my daughter, so we could share our experience with you.
The beginning of this school year marks a change in our homeschool situation. We now have a high schooler, and this makes choosing curriculum a little more difficult. Also, I’ve been working more off and on outside of the home, so we needed something a little more independent for my daughter to do. This is not only to help fill the hours that I’m working but also to allow her to develop independent study habits. This is very important for her to learn!
We searched several different options and finally decided to give Switched-On Schoolhouse from Alpha Omega a try. We had actually purchased a few courses for her before I received the opportunity to review one of their products. For the review, I chose World Geography ($99.95). I had used some Alpha Omega in our first couple of years of schooling, so I was a little familiar with some of their products. The other subjects my daughter is doing are Family and Consumer Science, 9th grade Science, and Pennsylvania History.
When I got the curriculum, I installed in on my computer. PC Only. It took a little finagling to get it installed and to get the scheduling set up. I like that I can tell it what days we are not going to school, and the software adjusts the schedule. I can also change things if my daughter is sick. It appears to keep track of days, but I haven’t looked too hard at that as I keep my days/hours tracked elsewhere. I do like that it keeps the grades and grades most things itself. I’ve found, especially with our other courses, that I do have to grade projects and essay type answers. There are quite a few I have to grade in the Family and Consumer Science course.
My daughter goes into a different icon to get to her side of things. She is able to change up the theme on the dashboard. She also has access to a dictionary and Bible right from the computer.
Please click on the picture to see it in a bigger size. As you can see from her side, her projects and lessons are scheduled by date. What she is going to quickly learn is that she shouldn’t put off projects just because they aren’t due until the middle or end of October. It just builds and makes her schedule look overly busy. However, this is part of the learning process and seems to be a good mix between homeschooling and the scheduling of projects.
She gets on the computer first to do her lessons while her father or I work with her brother. Then, they switch. Her brother has Health and Pennsylvania History on Switched-On, too.
So, what do we think? Well… It’s a mixed bag. I like that she is learning independence while she is learning her school work. However, it’s not quite as “high tech” as I kind of expected. She has done well with it, but I’d like to see more before making a final decision.
Just to interject something from my experience purchasing from Alpha Omega… I felt they were rather high pressured. I’m not sure why, but when I first called to get some information, they insisted on taking my phone number. I gave them my cell number as I tend to keep the ringer off. When I didn’t order right away, I got repeated calls from the sales person I had spoken with. After I got my first set of curriculum, I received a couple of phone messages from a different person. Each time I didn’t answer, she also sent me an email. Never really told me what she wanted but that I should call her back. I finally just sent her an email asking her to send me her questions via email. Shortly, another person emails me, saying that the first person just wanted to talk with me about “accredited” classes. I guess that is their “up sell”? It didn’t give me the warm fuzzies and actually gave me the feeling of dealing with a timeshare sale presentation. I hope Alpha Omega will read this and change their sales techniques as it really is a turn off.
Alpha Omega has a wide variety of electives, so there should be something for most students. I know I had a hard time choosing courses for my daughter, and I’m sure she’ll have a hard time choosing electives for the Spring semester.
Disclosure: I received a copy of Switched-On Schoolhouse’s World Geography for the purpose of this review. All opinions and experiences are mine.
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