Schoolhouse Review: IXL

Teaching 4 children language arts and math daily can sometimes get a little hectic. At times I don’t always get to teaching both subjects daily. That’s were IXL comes in! It’s a great way to supplement our regular grammar program. It is also way for my boys to challenge themselves.

Last year we focused on IXL’s math. At the time their Language Arts program only had a few of the lower grades (2nd-4th). This year however IXL has added more levels and now has grades 2nd-8th.

What I received for this review:
One year membership to both Math and Language Arts

Age/Grade:

IXL Language Arts-2nd-8th, IXL Math Pre-K-12th Grade

Pricing for 1 child is $9.95 per month for one subject or $79.00 per year. Each additional child added to the account will cost $2.00 per month or $20.00 a year. For both subjects (Math and Language Arts) the cost for one child is $15.95 per month/$129.00 a year. Each additional child cost $20.00.

When you sign up for IXL Language Arts your child will have access to all grade levels. What I really appreciate about IXL is they give the parent a choice to either use actual grade levels or you can choose levels by letters. I loved this because I have both my 6th and 7th grade boys using grade 5 which is level G.

IXL has a lot of neat features. The one that I really like is instant grading. Below Caleb was practicing with identifying the complete predicate of a sentence. With the mouse he would click on the words that make up the complete predicate.

If he highlighted the correct words he’d receive a checkmark and great job and would proceed to the next problem.

If his answer was incorrect than he would review the skill. Once he read through the explanation and samples he would click “Got it” and continue on.

If you look at the screenshot below you will see problems attempted which shows that Caleb so far has completed 96. Below that is the time. This is timing the child. I know this can be stressful for some children so thankfully if you go into the parent account you can turn that off. The only problem is if you have a child who really likes the timer and one who doesn’t, if you turn it off it turns off the timer for all the children. You have to go back and turn it on for another child.

Lastly there is the SmartScore. As your child completes a problem and correctly his SmartScore rises and he/she earns ribbons. The score will also decrease if the child answers incorrectly. Once the child score is in the 90’s he is in the Challenge Zone.

Again, when the child answers correctly his score will rise but answer incorrectly and it will lower.

Once the child gets a score of 100 he/she is rewarded with a big Congratulations.

Here it will show the time spent, smart score, and the problems correct. Your child can continue practicing or move on.

Here is another one.

Another feature that I think is great is the reports. IXL gives really detailed report of skills mastered and what your child needs to practice.

You can check your child’s status update, usage, performance, trouble spots, and progress.

Click on the tab and a drop down menu opens up. You click on one of the drop down tabs to see your child’s report.

Here is one example of an IXL Report.

And a graph report showing the time spent on a certain skill.

There are different colors to show where your child is at and what he needs to practice and what has been mastered.

How we Used IXL

I used IXL with my 6th and 7th grade boys. I have been super busy with schooling the younger two kiddos which hasn’t left me much time to teach grammar. Twice a week the boys do their regular grammar program and 4 times a week they use IXL Language Arts. This has been a huge help.

The boys work toward a score of 100.

The program is easy to navigate. I have a main account and both Caleb and Brent have a sub account with their own passwords.

There are over 4000 math and language arts skills. That’s a lot of problems and concepts which gives the boys lots of practice.

What really motivated the boys was receiving emails of how much they had accomplished.

Our Thoughts

I love that IXL can be done independently and it’s all automatically graded. This is a huge help to me. I also like that I can check to see exactly what the kids are missing and where they need more practice.

The boys have no complaints with using it and enjoy reviewing their grammar using IXL Language Arts. They mentioned that it’s fun.