Tips for Homeschooling on a Budget

I wonder how many of our HSV readers are new to homeschooling this year.

• Are you like I was a few years ago, healing scared because public school is all you know?
• Unsure of the decision to pull your kids out {or choose not to send them at the last-minute}?
• Wondering how you’ll do it all, sale and not go broke in the process?

 

Relax. There is a reason you are being called into this. And it is right for you. I’m not going to spend a lot of time pumping you up and encouraging you in this post. There are others who have done that better than I ever could. {Check out the Encouragement tab here at the HSV.}

I am going to help you see that it shouldn’t cost you your family savings to homeschool your kids in a creative and engaging way.

First of all, especially if your kids are coming out of public school like mine did, you all need time to regroup. It is so important that you don’t try to replicate what your kids just left, and create a school-at-home situation. Homeschooling is so much more.

My son started homeschooling in February of his first grade year. He was discouraged and burnt out {and, frankly, so was I}. We kept his math workbooks from the classroom, and he did a bit of that each day, but the only other thing we did was study astronomy:

• He read books from the library about space and famous astronomers {free}
• We attended special programs put on by local astronomy clubs {free}
• We went to the Great Lakes Science Center to look at all of their NASA exhibits {we had a membership, so this was essentially free, and I encourage you to purchase memberships to museums that speak to your children. You’ll use these – and get more out of them – than any prepackaged curriculum.}
• We pulled all his learning together to create a giant lapbook with printables from Homeschool Share {free}.

We have followed a similar pattern of schooling ever since. Anything I do buy must be usable either for multiple ages at the same time or able to be reused year after year. This year, I’ll be schooling a 10, 5, and 3-year-old. I’ve spent $91 for all three of them.

When I’m planning my curriculum, I think about the interests and needs of each child. Once I determine how and what they’ll learn best, I begin searching for the best possible ways to meet those needs for as inexpensive as possible. Sometimes, I need to be creative:

• I ask for educational toys for the kids for Christmas and birthdays.
• Each year, several local groups put on used curriculum sales. I head there with curriculum choices and an open mind. {The great thing about these sales is that they’re not just curriculum. Homeschool moms sell the greatest things – toys, imaginary play props, costumes, puppets, books, and games, among other things.}
• Close family and friends often combine family members to gift us with museum memberships because they know we are more about family experiences than more stuff.
• Especially for the younger years, I take advantage of all of the fabulous free printables offered by bloggers. I’ve pieced together whole ABC and primary math curriculums from blog printables. There is really a rich bounty available if you take the time to look for it.
• Since the kids enjoy novelty and being creative, I try to take advantage of that by having them complete lapbooks and notebooks or a combination of the two. Again, there are lots of free printables online to help.
• I narrow things down to the curriculum items I really want, try to find them used or on sale, and substitute them if I can’t. For example, I really like the Singapore method of teaching math, but two student workbooks each year per child and the initial outlay for two textbooks per level, was more than I wanted to spend. I found a deal on Math Mammoth’s entire elementary eBook curriculum on The Homeschool Buyer’s Co-op site, and realized that it would work out to about $3 a year per child by the time the third child had gone through the program {and will be even less now that we have a fourth on the way} for the same style of learning. While I’ve had to make some adjustments as the pages are a bit busier than my ADHD son can handle, it’s been a great, frugal investment.

I read a long time ago that people typically want things of high quality, inexpensively, and fast. Unfortunately, only two of those things can really ever go together. If you’re looking for a high quality curriculum and want it right away, you’ll have to pay a higher price. If you want something right away and cheap, you may find that quality suffers. But, if you invest the time to search things out, you can teach your kids a high quality curriculum very inexpensively.

 

 *Note: Check-out Free Homeschool Deals for tons of daily free and frugal resources to bless your homeschool family!