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You are here: Home / Planning and Organization / 10 Essentials for Your Homeschool Classroom

10 Essentials for Your Homeschool Classroom

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We’ll be embarking on our 14th homeschooling year soon. Some of my homeschool essentials may have changed over the years as my children have grown into teenagers (and one young adult), but today I’m highlighting 10 that have remained fairly constant.

10 Essentials for Your Homeschool Classroom
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1. Kids. Let’s face it, y’all. They may drive you batty some days, but kids are pretty important to this whole homeschooling thing. Without kids (or grandkids), who are you going to homeschool? You could homeschool the neighbors’ kids, I suppose, but that’s really tutoring and not quite the same thing. (Plus, you’re a stronger person than I am if you’re willing to homeschool the neighbors’ kids.)

Kids are pretty essential for your homeschool classroom. Beyond that, one mom’s essentials are another mom’s don’t bother. So, take the rest of this list with a grain of salt, but these are items that I’ve thought of as must-haves over the years.

2. Dry erase board (preferably magnetic). I remember talking to my step-sister, a homeschool mom, just before we began. I mentioned that I’d like to have a dry erase board, but that it probably wasn’t necessary. She assured me that it was.

She was right.

We’ve used our magnetic dry erase board for Bible, history, math, and science lessons. Because it’s magnetic, we also used it for spelling with our All About Spelling alphabet tiles.

3. CD and/or mp3 player. Modern technology would push me to list only the mp3 player, but not all libraries and curriculum vendors have caught up with modern technology. We’ve used our CD player to:

  • Practice foreign languages using curriculum that included CDs
  • Sing along and learn facts such as multiplication, states and capitals, and the Preamble to the Constitution (a la, Schoolhouse Rock)
  • Listen to classical music while studying composers
  • Listen to music from various countries while studying the country
  • Listen to lessons on CD from various curriculum vendors

4. Access to great books. It doesn’t matter if your books come from the library or Amazon (love me some Amazon Prime) or you download them to your Kindle, access to great books is a homeschool essential right up there with kids. Historical fiction and engaging biographies are our favorite ways to study history, and The Magic School Bus makes an awesome jumping-off point for elementary science.

5. Good electric pencil sharpener (and Ticonderoga pencils). I thought maybe I was crazy for excitedly sharing a photo of my new pencil sharpener on Instagram last year – until so many of my homeschool mom followers responded with excitement. Hey, when your kids are forever losing their pencils, it’s nice to have a big box of Ticonderoga pencils and a good electric pencil sharpener in your school room – even if your school room happens to be your dining room.

10 Essentials for Your Homeschool Classroom

6. A good planning system. If you’re crazy forgetful like me, you need a good planning system in place. It doesn’t matter if it’s in a spiral notebook, a special mom binder, online, or even my personal favorite, a customized A Plan in Place planner. You just need something convenient that you’ll use consistently.

7. Engaging resources. If you’re bored, your kids are going to be bored. If your kids are bored, they’re not going to be getting as much out of school as they could be. That doesn’t mean that you have to become their entertainment coordinator, but I like to use fun stuff as much as I can.

For example, even my 8th grader (at the time) much preferred the hands-on Pin-It Maps to the blank outline maps in her workbook. And all three of my kids have strongly preferred Teaching Textbooks to any other math we tried.

If your kids (and you) are going to be spending your days doing school, why not make it as engaging as possible?

8. A laptop or computer with internet access. If you utilize online courses, you’ll definitely need a computer with internet access, but even if you’re not using it for full courses, you’re probably going to want to use it for some things. I don’t like the kids to spend too much time online during the school day, but we’ve used our laptops for:

  • Watching YouTube videos related to our topics of study
  • Using Google to find out how to do something or for research on a school-related topic
  • Online dyslexia therapy
  • Watching CNN student news
  • Looking up definitions
  • Playing online review games

9. Storage solutions. Homeschooling often means lots of stuff – books, art supplies, math manipulatives, supplies for science labs, etc. You may or may not have a dedicated schoolroom, but you do need places to store your homeschool supplies.

Why, yes, we do have a bookshelf in our dining room. I also make effective use of my China hutch and a potato bin my grandfather built years ago, and I love me a nifty plastic storage box.

10. Printer. I have had a printer since we began homeschooling and I honestly can’t imagine homeschooling without one. I use my printer for printing:

  • The kids’ assignment sheets
  • Pages from digital curriculum
  • Written assignments that the kids typed on their laptops
  • Recipes to add to my meal plan (Yes, that’s school related. Hello? The kitchen is our cafeteria.)

Over the years, we’ve upgraded our printers a few times. These days I would not buy a printer that didn’t have the following features:

  • Flatbed printer/copier/scanner
  • Wireless printing capabilities
  • Auto-duplex
  • Black and color printing

I’m probably spoiled, but that auto-duplex feature is such a time- and sanity-saver!

I know I’ve probably left some things out, but overall I think this list is fairly universal despite your students’ ages (mine are teens) or your homeschool style. (More relaxed homeschoolers may not need a good planning system, but a good system for recording your students’ accomplishments could fall under that heading.)

What must-have items would you add to the list?

This post is linked to Hip Homeschool Moms.

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By 11 Comments

About Kris Bales

Kris Bales is a newly-retired homeschool mom and the quirky, Christ-following, painfully honest founder (and former owner) of Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. She has a pretty serious addiction to sweet tea and Words with Friends. Kris and her husband of over 25 years are parents to three amazing homeschool grads. They share their home with three dogs, a fluctuating number of cats, and seven birds.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Shelly says

    July 12, 2016 at 7:27 am

    #1 is my favorite! That made my morning. I think I would add lots of art supplies, just because all of my kids are rather artsy and Netflix.

    Reply
  2. ejohonson says

    July 18, 2016 at 9:05 am

    ~ Please tell me how you use the potato bin,lol, very curious ~ I have one that I do not use any longer & I was going to give it away, so please, do tell 😉

    Reply
    • Kris Bales says

      July 18, 2016 at 9:40 am

      The top is mostly for craft supplies, while the bottom is the perfect size for storing CDs and DVDs.

      Reply
  3. Jennifer says

    July 19, 2016 at 11:49 am

    Hi Kris, I was wondering if you could share about the laptops you bought your kids awhile back from Amazon. I’m looking for new school laptops for my two girls basically for the same things you mention here. They don’t really need to be fancy but for papers & research and to free me up to be able to use my own when I need it. Thanks in advance!

    Reply
    • Kris Bales says

      July 19, 2016 at 11:59 am

      Hi, Jennifer. They actually no longer sell the laptops that I purchased because that’s been 3 years, which is eons ago when it comes to technology. Basically, I was looking for no less than an i5 processor with a decent amount of space (we went with 6GB DDR3, 500GB HDD), and it had to have a disk drive (many new laptops don’t). When I found one that fit the bill at an affordable price, I snatched 2 of them up. Hope that helps!

      Reply
      • Jennifer says

        July 19, 2016 at 3:22 pm

        Wow, good to know and yes this does help! Thank you for the specific details about the processor and such. I need laptops with a disk drive as well. Didn’t realize many do not have that option any longer. Would it be too much to ask how much you paid per device with the details you mentioned above so I know about what to expect?

        Reply
        • Val says

          July 30, 2016 at 9:53 am

          We bought basic HP laptops from Amazon for under $200 and bought an external CD drive for $15. The laptops do not have a word program (forgot about that essential!) So we will have to install that also. We also set them up with outlook accounts (attached to mine) that make it easy to control websites and content AND it sends a weekly report of where hey have been online.

          Reply
        • treen says

          August 1, 2016 at 9:55 pm

          You should be able to get a separate disk drive that can plug into a computer via USB port. The drive on our main desktop broke and since it’s a big all-in-one unit, I have no idea how to fix it or if it can be fixed at all. So that’s how we got around it. We got one for 20 bucks at Best Buy.

          Reply
          • Kris Bales says

            August 2, 2016 at 10:21 am

            That’s true. We did that when the disk drive on my son’s laptop quit working.

  4. Nelly N says

    August 24, 2017 at 9:13 pm

    Large calendar would be great for field trips and any other events

    Reply
  5. Monica says

    May 30, 2018 at 9:28 pm

    I know you already mentioned a planner but I would probably add an Erin Condren teacher planner along with a Keureg (okay so these are mom items but still!! Caffeine helps me lol.)

    Reply

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