Plato vs ThinkWell for science

[bugfree]

Hi,

I was planning on getting either ThinkWell or Plato for science.  Have you tried both or one?  Let me know what you think.  If you have tried either, I would love to know your class and experience,  I am not worried about having a lab, I just want my child to have the information in the class.  I would also like something that tracks the students progress, either from their own portal or a teacher portal. 

Thanks

[GeorgiaH]

I have looked at both, but have yet to decide. Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth uses Plato (Life, Earth, and Physical Science) for their Middle School individually paced online courses, and they use Thinkwell for some of their High School courses. The Homeschool Buyers Coop offers Plato courses at a discount, and Thinkwell courses will be discounted at the end of the month. My son is in Middle School, and it appears Thinkwell only provides Middle School Math for classes for middle schoolers (no science). We have Math covered, so I will probably enroll in Plato's science. 

 

I would appreciate hearing from others who have used either or both programs.

 

I recently looked at another online provider, Acellus, that appears interesting. They offer a variety of courses, middle and high school, for a decent monthly fee.

Edited March 5, 2016 by GeorgiaH

[Corraleno]

I was not impressed with Plato's HS Biology. DS used the middle school science courses (which were designed by a different company, CyberEd, and then CyberEd was bought out by Plato), and I thought those were pretty engaging although lightweight (he did all three of the middle school sciences in 5th or 6th). We tried the Plato Biology course, thinking it would be the same format as the CyberEd courses, but it was very different and we gave up. It was dull and the interface was clunky and annoying. We haven't used Thinkwell for science, but have used it for math, and IMHO it's much better than Plato. Very different format, though — Thinkwell is actual lectures, rather than an "interactive" online program. 

[SparklyUnicorn]

Right now Homeschool Buyer's Coop has a good deal on Plato.  For $15 a month you can access all the middle school and high school science they have.  You can cancel any time and only have to pay for the next month if you don't cancel before 5 days prior to the next billing period.  Can't really beat $15 a month.  I decided to give it a look.  I have yet to get it.  It takes a few days for them to set up the account.

 

We used Thinkwell Chemistry.  It was pretty good. I think I would have preferred more practice problems than what they had, but otherwise the instructor was interesting and the material was very thorough.  Wish I had more profound things to say about that.

 

Obviously I can't compare the two yet.

 

 

[GThomas]

We used Plato (and the co-op's discount) about three years ago.

 

We did not like it because I found it highly confusing for the parent to use their program and my kids' did not enjoy the videos and interactivity. First few times the videos and interactivity were interesting but it soon lost their novelty. 

 

It's designed for classroom teachers and although they give you a document that explains how to use the program, I was still lost. (I have a couple more years of homeschooling experience under my belt now so maybe I'd get it better now...and I was also under the impression it was an "open and go" curriculum, which it is not so part way through I realized we were not doing the whole program.) But I remember thinking that some training would have been very helpful! 

 

From what I remember, you are only supposed to be on the website at certain times (due to bandwidth issues). You are assigned a timeframe. I kept forgetting that and logged in whenever we were ready to do it. No one contacted me but I'm sure they are not happy about this. 

 

Part of the program is interactive and the child can go through it on their own but there is more to the program and I always had a hard time finding the downloadable documents! Some of the documents were well done and others seemed to be created by someone else entirely and I didn't see the relevance of it. 

 

There is a separate log in for parents and there is a particular path you have to follow for just the homeschoolers, while you go past where the school teachers go, and I kept getting lost in there. 

 

In hindsight, it would have been better for us if I had realized it was not "open and go" and spent more time figuring it all out in advance so we were better prepared. 

 

I liked the Discovery Education Science Techbook program (very slick and discounts through the co-op) but again I was under the impression it was an open and go curriculum. You do need to spend some time looking over the units, printing out documents, etc. My memory is not so good on it so I can't remember if there were any tests but if so there was no test preparation help. 

 

We're on our second year using Elemental Science for middle school. It does require a lot of work from the parent (well at least the way we use it because I write up all the flashcards and tweaked/rewrote the program so my son is more autonomous on it for most of the week, I supplement with finding videos, and we start each week with an experiment). We've now starting doing it with friends and the kids love all getting together once a week to do the experiment. That beats doing an online program by ourselves (even if we are introverts). 

 

Good luck in your decision! 

 

 

[GThomas]

We have used Thinkwell but only for math. That was definitely much more "open and go" and tracked the student's progress. 

 

There's also this free program: http://www.ck12.org

 

You can set up a Flexbook for your student and pick and choose what subjects you want them to cover. I'm not sure if they have student progress tracking. We used it to fill in middle school "gaps" my older child needed to review before starting high school. I had her take notes from it, there are occasional videos. There are also tests you can download and print but no test preparation help (like already prepared flashcards). 

[MarkT]

 My son is in Middle School, and it appears Thinkwell only provides Middle School Math. 

OT correction Thinkwell has Math through Calculus.

 

http://www.thinkwell.com/homeschool/placementtests/

[SparklyUnicorn]

 

 

From what I remember, you are only supposed to be on the website at certain times (due to bandwidth issues). You are assigned a timeframe. I kept forgetting that and logged in whenever we were ready to do it. No one contacted me but I'm sure they are not happy about this. 

 

 

Some of the subscriptions work that way, but they have versions where you don't have to sign up for a time frame.  I wouldn't care for that for sure!

[SparklyUnicorn]

I took a look at Plato finally.  I immediately canceled.  Nothing special.  It is mostly an on-line textbook.  I was under the impression there would be more videos.  There weren't that many videos at the high school level. 

[GoodGrief]

My daughter used the Plato high school science course in 7th and 8th (they were Cyber Ed then, and we did the subscription where you could access at any time). I really liked them and they seemed to provide a good preparation for high school science. I would probably recommend them for someone who is looking for an easy way to get in a high school science for a non-STEM student.

[madteaparty]

I have Plato earth science and it seems really glitchy to me. DS is having to rewatch a whole set of slides right now because he gets to the end, everything has a check mark, and yet it states "unwatched slides" and won't let him go on. Perhaps user error, but it's not like I have a number to call and find out.

I'm not purchasing another Plato product just based on our miserable user experience with this one.

Edited March 8, 2016 by madteaparty

[JoJosMom]

DD did Plato middle school biology last year and HATED it.  Gouge-out-your-own-eyes hated it.  She found it tedious and condescending.  From the teacher's perspective, I agree with the comment above that it is not well laid out.  Trying to find resources was way, way too much work.  I don't know who designed it, but they really need to do some modifying.

 

Based upon our experience, I would NOT use Plato again and would not recommend it to others.

[GThomas]

I have Plato earth science and it seems really glitchy to me. DS is having to rewatch a whole set of slides right now because he gets to the end, everything has a check mark, and yet it states "unwatched slides" and won't let him go on. Perhaps user error, but it's not like I have a number to call and find out.

I'm not purchasing another Plato product just based on our miserable user experience with this one.

 

Oh yes, I forgot about that! We had the same problems a few years ago. Sounds like it hasn't changed.