Whole life insurance costs a whole lot more, and lasts until you die, as long as you keep paying your premiums.
Term life insurance is way cheaper, but expires after a set period of time (usually 5, 10, 20 years). However, term life may last until your reach age 65 or 70. And, renewable term life allows you to renew your term life policy for another term at expiration.
If you own a family farm, and you want your kid to be able to inherit it, but they'd have to sell it off to pay the inheritance taxes, you probably need to consider whole life coverage.
If the goal of your life insurance is to see your kids raised and through college, then term life insurance is probably a good option to accomplish that goal.
Here's how you can learn more about how term life insurance works and compare rates and plans online among leading insurance companies.