Study Time Publishers

Study Time Publishers is a plain-community workbook house whose arithmetic and language-arts materials are written for Old Order Amish and conservative Mennonite parochial schools. Its materials reach outside the community only through a handful of mail-order distributors and a small non-plain following that values their simplicity.

Last updated: 2026-04-24 · Every Homeschool Editorial Team

At a glance

Method	Traditional / workbook-based
Worldview	Mennonite-plain (Old Order Amish and conservative Anabaptist)
Grades	K-8
Formats	Print, workbook
Cost tier	Budget
Parent intensity	3
ESA-common	No
Accredited	No
Established	1995, by Delbert Farmwald of the Elkhart-LaGrange Old Order Amish community, Indiana
Website	studytimepublishers.com (primary distribution via Milestone Books and other plain-community retailers)

Our scoreboard (1-5)

Criterion	Score	One-line reason
Academic rigor	3	Adequate arithmetic and language-arts content through grade 8; not written for college-prep ambition
Ease of teaching	4	Self-paced workbooks; brief teacher answer keys rather than scripted lessons
Content quality	3	Functional for its intended market; not distinguished by design or depth
Flexibility	4	Individual workbooks adopt well a la carte alongside other plain-community publishers
Value for money	5	Among the cheapest complete workbook series available; modest by every measure
Worldview scope	2	Visibly plain in word problems and illustrations; non-plain use requires contextual framing
Visual/design	2	Black-and-white, no color, limited illustration, consistent with plain-community aesthetic
Support resources	1	No publisher-facing customer service infrastructure; mail-order only

Who the publisher is

Study Time Publishers was founded in 1995 by Delbert Farmwald, a member of the Old Order Amish community in the Elkhart-LaGrange area of northern Indiana. The publisher serves the same market segment as Schoolaid, Pathway Publishers, and Rod and Staff: plain-community parochial schools and homeschools where a one-room schoolhouse model, peer-taught instruction, and modest workbook-based curricula are the operating norms. Study Time is the smallest of these publishers by catalog breadth, with materials concentrated in arithmetic and language arts rather than covering a full K-12 range.

The publisher operates from within the Amish community and does not maintain a substantial public-facing web presence; materials are distributed primarily through Milestone Books, Raber's Bookstore, Exodus Books, and a handful of other plain-community-facing mail-order retailers. The online bookseller Exodus Books maintains one of the more accessible public product listings for Study Time's catalog.

Study Time materials are used across plain-community parochial schools in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and other Amish-Mennonite regions, and by plain-community homeschooling families. A small number of non-plain homeschool families encounter Study Time arithmetic through the same word-of-mouth channels that lead some to Schoolaid, typically through The Well-Trained Mind Community forums or Cathy Duffy's review ecosystem, and adopt the workbooks for their simplicity and price.

The core pedagogy

Study Time's method, like that of Schoolaid and Pathway, is spiral-mastery workbook-based arithmetic and language arts designed to be teachable in a one-room schoolhouse. The workbooks are consumable (students write directly in them) and proceed in short daily lessons with heavy repetition of operations across weeks. A second-grader working through Study Time Arithmetic Grade 2 will see addition facts reviewed daily for months before moving into regrouping, and will see regrouping reviewed daily for months after it is first introduced.

Scope and sequence begins at rudimentary number recognition in grade 1 and proceeds through pre-algebra by grade 8. The language arts workbooks cover phonics, spelling, and basic grammar at the corresponding grade levels. The publisher also produces four inexpensive activity books for preschoolers, described in the Amish Studies resource at Elizabethtown College, which are typical of plain-community early childhood expectations: puzzles, tracing, simple matching, without a formal academic curriculum.

Signature mechanics: (1) Consumable workbooks only, no hardbound textbook, no separate student and teacher editions in the mainstream sense. The student writes in the workbook; the teacher has an answer key. (2) Short daily lessons with spiral review, two to three pages per day, structured to be completed independently after a brief teacher demonstration. (3) Plain-community word-problem context, arithmetic word problems involve buggies, farm animals, quilts, and families with biblical names, paralleling Schoolaid's context. (4) Ohio and Indiana plain-community distribution, the publisher operates within the Amish community rather than selling broadly into the homeschool market; most non-plain families encounter Study Time only through distributors who carry plain-community materials.

The pedagogy rewards parents and teachers who trust the spiral. Students completing Study Time's K-8 arithmetic sequence typically have fluent computation and strong single-step word-problem ability, at the cost of the multi-step reasoning and conceptual-depth emphasis found in programs like Singapore Math or Math-U-See.

A day in the life

A third-grader in a plain-community homeschool family using Study Time as the primary curriculum begins after family worship and breakfast, around 8:30, with Study Time Arithmetic Grade 3 (30 minutes, the parent reviews the prior day's work, demonstrates the day's new problem type on a small chalkboard or scratch paper, the student completes the day's workbook pages independently, the parent checks with the answer key). Study Time phonics and spelling (25 minutes, similar pattern of brief demonstration, independent workbook work, parent correction). Handwriting practice from a paired publisher, often Rod and Staff or Schoolaid's Pentime or a Study Time penmanship workbook (15 minutes). Reading aloud from Pathway Readers or a paired reading series (20 minutes). A snack break. Bible story reading (15 minutes). The formal work is done by 10:30 or 11:00. The rest of the day is household work, farm chores, and helping with younger siblings, consistent with plain-community educational values that treat productive domestic work as educational.

For a non-plain family using Study Time arithmetic as a single component of an otherwise mainstream homeschool day, the workbook slot is perhaps thirty minutes in the morning, substituting for whatever math spine would otherwise occupy that time. The rest of the day continues in its usual pattern.

What they do exceptionally well

Extreme affordability. Study Time workbooks typically retail in the $4-$12 range per workbook through distributors like Milestone Books and Exodus Books as of April 2026, making a complete year of arithmetic at a given grade roughly $15-$30 including a teacher answer key. This is among the cheapest complete mathematics curricula available in American homeschool publishing, competitive with free-tier options and substantially cheaper than mainstream workbook-based curricula.

Uncluttered pages that work for focus-challenged students. Like Schoolaid, Study Time's pages are black and white, with minimal illustration and no sidebar noise. Families whose children benefit from low-distraction workbook designs sometimes prefer Study Time and Schoolaid over the busier spreads common in color-printed mainstream publishers.

Operational simplicity for peer-taught and multi-student households. The workbook-and-answer-key format makes Study Time teachable by a mother supervising four children at four grade levels simultaneously, or by an older sibling helping a younger one. This is the plain community's actual use case, and it is also useful for any larger-family homeschool.

What they do poorly

Limited subject breadth. Study Time is primarily an arithmetic and language-arts publisher. Science, history, geography, and other content areas are thin or absent. Families using Study Time as their primary curriculum need to source these subjects elsewhere, typically from Rod and Staff, Christian Light Education, or mainstream publishers. The publisher does not attempt to offer a complete K-8 program.

Minimal customer support infrastructure. Study Time has no customer service department in the mainstream sense, no active web presence, no parent-support forum, no printable-sample library, and no distribution outside mail-order retailers. Families with questions about placement, pacing, or problems with the workbooks typically rely on community knowledge or on the distributors rather than on the publisher itself.

Worldview visibility. Study Time's materials, like Schoolaid's, are written for and marketed to the plain community. The word problems, illustrations, and reading selections reflect plain-community life. A non-plain family using Study Time is using borrowed materials, which is fine, and which plain-community publishers do not object to, but families should understand that they are not using a publisher designed for a mainstream homeschool audience.

Who it fits / who it doesn't

• Pick Study Time Publishers if: you are a plain-community family sourcing primary arithmetic and language-arts curriculum; you are a non-plain family wanting an extremely low-cost arithmetic workbook alongside another main spine; you value minimal visual clutter on workbook pages; you have multiple children and want peer-teachable materials; you are willing to purchase through mail-order distributors without publisher-facing web support.

• Skip Study Time Publishers if: you want a complete K-8 program in a single catalog; you need customer service infrastructure or a parent portal; you want ESA-approved vendor status; you want conceptually rich, reasoning-focused mathematics in the Singapore or Math-U-See tradition; you prefer color-illustrated, visually engaging workbooks.

Cost honest assessment

A complete Study Time Arithmetic grade-level package, the student workbook or two-part workbook set plus an answer key, typically runs $15-$35 as of April 2026 through Milestone Books or Exodus Books, depending on grade and whether supplementary drill materials are purchased. A complete K-8 arithmetic track assembled grade by grade totals $150-$250 across the full range. Study Time language arts and spelling workbooks are similarly priced.

Against Schoolaid arithmetic ($35-$50 per grade) and Rod and Staff Mathematics ($30-$55 per grade), Study Time is slightly less expensive on a per-grade basis. Against Saxon Math ($120-$180 per grade for the homeschool kit) and Christian Light Education's LightUnits ($80-$130 per grade), Study Time is an order of magnitude cheaper. The value proposition is simple: for families who want a functional workbook-based arithmetic spine and are willing to accept plain-community aesthetics and the absence of customer support, Study Time is among the cheapest complete curricula in American homeschool publishing.

A realistic all-in cost for a plain-community or budget-minded non-plain family using Study Time arithmetic and language arts alongside other plain-community publishers for a K-6 program is approximately $200-$400 per child per year, a fraction of what mainstream Christian workbook publishers cost.

ESA eligibility notes

Study Time Publishers is not listed as an approved vendor on the state ESA marketplaces we surveyed in April 2026, including Arizona's ClassWallet, Florida's MyScholarShop, West Virginia's Hope Scholarship, and Utah Fits All. The publisher's mail-order-only distribution model and lack of an online storefront make it a poor fit for ESA marketplace integration. ESA-funded families in states that permit reimbursement for general mail-order educational purchases with receipts may be able to purchase Study Time materials out of pocket and submit for reimbursement, subject to individual state program rules. In practice, Study Time is a cash-purchase publisher.

Alternatives

• Schoolaid, a family would choose Schoolaid over Study Time because Schoolaid's Learning Numbers with Spunky series has broader recognition and distribution in the homeschool world, similar pricing, and slightly more polish in workbook design.
• Rod and Staff, a family would choose Rod and Staff over Study Time because Rod and Staff publishes a more comprehensive K-10 plain-tradition curriculum across many subjects, with stronger Bible, reading, and grammar sequences.
• Christian Light Education, a family would choose Christian Light over Study Time because CLE offers plain-community-adjacent LightUnit workbooks with better developed teacher support, placement testing, and a broader subject catalog designed to work for non-plain homeschoolers.

How we verified this

Our editorial team reviewed Study Time Publishers product listings through Exodus Books' Study Time Publishers catalog page, Milestone Books' Study Time listings, and the Elizabethtown College Amish Studies reference on Amish publications in April 2026. We cross-referenced the founding year and founder information with Amish Studies publisher records, and we consulted The Well-Trained Mind Community's discussion of Study Time Arithmetic for non-plain homeschool family perspectives. Pricing is characterized in ranges based on distributor retail listings; families should verify current pricing with the distributor before ordering.