Changes in technological environment for the last decades, especially the advent of the Internet brought more possibilities to the homeschooling. As most of average family have access to the wide bandwidth Internet, using homeschool software has become a viable and wise choice for parents to download and update necessary lessons from the Internet.
This easy Internet access means that there are two options in homeschool software. The first is buying homeschool software that is to be installed in a personal computer. Usually, this kind of software has basic record keeping functions and individual lessons should be bought separately online.
The second is enroll in online education program. in this case, homeschool software is included in the cost and progress reports and other jobs are taken care of by the service provider.
With homeschooling, keeping records of a child's education is important. Many states make record keeping a requirement for homeschooling. But keeping a record is also necessary to monitor the progress of educational development of children and make appropriate adjustment in contents and pace of homeschooling. Although such record keeping can be done with a pen and paper, using software saves lots of time and effort. That's why using homeschool software should be considered as a priority when homeschooling is done.
There are several homeschool software that can help you to manage homeschooling of your kids or yourself. some of them are commercial and some are freeware. as said before, some are for standalone personal computer and some are web-based software.
The following is the general overview of homeschool softwares - to be installed on PC - that are found on the Internet.
The first homeschool software that is highly visible on the Internet is Edu-track home school. The software developed by an American company is designed for homeschool record keeping and lesson planning. The program has many features such as lesson plans, progress reports, report cards, track attendance, organize student data, diplomas, and track hours.
The program costs $59. The actual contents for studying that covers most of subjects such as math, language, art and etc can be bought separately. Each unit of individual subject costs $1.99. The developer says that the software improve the quality of homeschool planning, rewards kids with accurate records, diplomas and awards, and that the program exceeds all state requirements for homeschooling reporting and tracking.
The second software is homeschool tracker plus. The purpose of the software is almost the same as the previous one, namely that of lesson planning and record keeping. At the price of $49, the program offers features such as tracking attendance and hours, managing assignments, high school transcripts, reusing and sharing lesson plans, courses and weighted grading and several report options.
Basic edition of the software is also available as freeware. The basic edition has features of tracking attendance and hours, managing assignments, tracking resources and generating reports.
The third homeschool software is homeschool minder. The software with the price of $39.95 per year has features that are similar to previous mentioned softwares such as creating records, grades, calendars, assignments and lesson plans.
The fourth software is homeschool solutions. The pc program can manage information such as attendance, books, grades, lesson plans, and courses. the price is $25.
When buying a homeschool software, several points should be checked. Ask yourself these questions before purchasing the product. Is the software stable enough? Does it not crash in operating system of your computer? Does it allow enough flexibility for you as a homeschool educator to arrange learning plans based on academic level of the kids? Is the software easy to use? Does it come with reliable support from the developer? And finally, is the price of the homeschool software reasonable to justify the features of the software?
