Disclaimer: I received a FREE copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way.
Our family was provided a HelpTeaching Pro Subscription to review which has given our homeschool access to many online and offline resources. We can use worksheets, lessons, and tests that have already been made or I can create our own resources made specifically for our homeschool lessons. There are quite a number of options for how to use the subscription from HelpTeaching.com as you can search by worksheet, test, grade, or subject area making it easy to meet the needs of your individual children and homeschool.
What Is Part of Your Subscription?
While HelpTeaching.com does offer access to their site for free, there are many benefits to having a Pro Subscription. You will have an ad-free experience (which is what most parents wish when using online resources with their children) and be able to save worksheets and tests as PDFs to print offline. So if you are concerned about screen time, this will help you use an online resource offline. Another feature is being able to use either their images in questions or upload your own images. You can see in the comparison chart below from their site the different benefits afforded to you.
How Did We Use HelpTeaching.com in Our Homeschool?
When we first received access, I went through the site and picked out materials I could use with our teen in his final weeks of our homeschool year. I was able to find lessons for him to complete that would review things he learned in his Botany course, a lesson with quotes from Shakespeare (he was reading Hamlet), I created a test on World War I using questions already created, and SAT vocabulary worksheets. The lessons and test were online and I scheduled them so he could take them online with an access code provided to his email.
For our younger two children, I used a variety of online lessons (using the videos and practice sheets) and printing out worksheets. I also toyed around with creating a test for our son's Latin vocabulary.
For our younger son, since we have been studying astronomy, I incorporated lessons on the planets into our homeschool days. I also printed out some of the seasonal and holiday worksheets for our kids to complete. They have a variety of summer worksheets from reading comprehension to word searches. There was even a summer math worksheet I asked our younger son to complete. The questions were money word problems so he had to work out the costs of products and admittance to events like fireworks.
It was easiest to do online lessons with our daughter as she is still learning how to write neatly. I went through the Online Lessons for Self-Directed Learning page and then clicked through to either the English Language Arts Lessons or the Math Lessons. From there, I scrolled through the lessons listed to see which fit her grade and would seem to be of the most help to her. For example, we used the Read Aloud: Five Little Ducks lesson which had a video and summary worksheet that she completed online.
I did print out one worksheet for our daughter to complete as we had been studying punctuation marks together prior to starting to use HelpTeaching.com. The worksheet was a combination of multiple-choice questions and fill-in-the-blank questions. I liked the questions because it was just what we needed to review the information she had been studying.
What Do We Think?
When I was still a public school teacher, I used a number of worksheet and test generators. I did not find this to be easier or more difficult. It was pretty much as I expected it to be. The instructions are clear on the site as to how to input questions, select questions, and more when creating a test. I like that you can select from questions already created.
Our daughter enjoys watching the videos and answer the questions online. For her, we have just been going through and looking at the various options for lessons in English Language Arts Lessons. Her favorite thing so far has been completing the questions online.
Our younger son, who used both online and offline resources from HelpTeaching.com, said his favorite part has been the worksheets and questions that are connected to the lessons. So after he completes the practice questions and watches the video, he answers questions that relate to the video. We can print these out or do these online.
Our older son had no problems navigating the site. I like that I could assign the work online or print out the worksheets to give him hard copies to complete for his homeschool day.
I like that if I find something I would like our kids to work on, I do not have to save it to my laptop or print it out. I can schedule it for my kids and then they can complete it later. My only wish is that each child did not need to have an email address. It is easy to schedule things with our teenage son as he has his own email and computer to complete his homeschool assignments but our younger children do not have emails or their own computer so they need to use my email in order to receive scheduled lessons and tests.
Note: If you are concerned about the material being Common Core-aligned then you can browse their library as a Pro Subscriber to see which questions are aligned. They have a selection of premium content that is aligned to Common Core standards in ELA and Math.
Do You Want to Know More?
Other families used HelpTeaching.com in their homeschool from the Homeschool Review Crew. Be sure to check out their reviews to see how they incorporate the many different options into their homeschool.
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