We all know the essentials for back-to-school shopping – pencils, binders, scissors, glue, all of the classic supplies on the list. But, with many parents starting to turn their attention toward homeschooling, back-to-school shopping gets just a little bit more complicated. From keeping your home organized to offering your kids a useful at-home lesson, the products that you purchase as supplies will make a huge difference in how effective your homeschool is. In this article, you will find the most important homeschool supplies shopping lists for students and parents picked by homeschool educators. It’s important to note that with homeschooling, you’re never alone. There are active and flourishing communities and support groups that understand the practice’s struggles and are always here to help you out.
Our homeschool supply list hopes to act as a helpful marker on where you need to be as the homeschool year is set to begin. Without further adieu, here are the school supplies that will make homeschooling work for both you and your kids.
Shopping Lists for Essential Homeschool Supplies
All of the products we’ve listed were chosen from homeschool parents and educators with an average homeschool budget in mind. To get the best out of your homeschooling experience, here are the many things that will be a necessity:
Shopping List for Homeschool Students
Shopping List for Homeschool Educators
We’ve broken this school supplies list into three different sections: Students, Teachers, and Parents. This may help you organize your shopping list better to pick better and choose your homeschooling essentials. Some items will certainly benefit one category, whereas others may benefit all three. Here are the essentials for any homeschool classroom.
For Homeschool Students
The homeschool should focus on the students. It would be best to tailor your lessons towards their preferred learning method, which applies to the supplies you purchase. The things we’ve listed in this category are the school supplies that kids will directly interact with most throughout the school day.
Many Different Papers
Anything from your classic white, printable papers to durable cardboard sets will be a must in your homeschool adventure. The variety of colors and textures enables you to spice up lessons and better organize your plans.
Let’s start with the importance of your classic white, printable papers. It should come as no surprise that this is a necessity for homeschooling. Without paper, there is very little in terms of tests, worksheets, and instructions. For years, paper has been a staple of the classroom, which still rings true for homeschool classes.
As far as construction paper and pastel color variations, having different options to choose from can help in many ways. For starters, it could help you keep the room organized. You’ll be able to tell which assignments are where based on the color of the paper. For the students, using different colors for printable worksheets keeps the lessons interesting and fun. Construction paper doubles as a fantastic crafting supply.
Pencils, Pens, and Markers
Even in the age of technology, pencils, pens, and markers remain superior. Many kids learn better with the hands-on approach of classic supplies. If you stock your homeschool classroom with great writing utensils, you’ll find much more success than you might with tablets and laptop learning. Keep plenty of pencils and pencil grips on hand, just if you have an active learner who struggles to keep the pencil from breaking.
Glue Sticks
Similar to the advice of pencils, pens, and markers, glue sticks offer a hands-on approach to teaching kids love. The more active you can make the lessons, the more likely they are to respond and the more they’ll start to like school. Glue sticks are a must for any homeschooling environment as so many modern curriculums emphasize arts and crafts. This glue tends to be mess-free and easy to use for kids of all ages. Your students will love using the glue and making crafts.
White Board and Dry Erase Markers
Whiteboards are fun to draw on and make learning easy. With this whiteboard, you can put the lesson in the hands of your students and have them answer questions in a new, fun way that they’re sure to love. If you have whiteboards, you’ll need dry erase markers so that students can always go back and erase whenever they need to without too much hassle. That’s one advantage this board has over printable paper.
Paint Brushes
Again, we touch on arts and crafts that are so popular in homeschool. Paint brushes are one of the supplies that seem to be overlooked most often as parents tend to ignore the painting aspect of at-home learning. With paint brushes, kids can better express themselves in a great and creative way that they’re sure to like. While you’re setting yourself up for some messes, the work that your kids will do in the homeschool classroom will benefit them immensely. Creativity is one of the best ways to learn while homeschooling.
School Scissors
It’s okay to get regular scissors for yourself, but we highly recommend sticking with rounded school scissors for your students. You’ll find that sharp scissors are a great way to get interested in first aid, but not so great when fostering a safe learning environment in the home. Having scissors for craftwork is important, but so is safe for all ages. The students can have fun while remaining safe with school scissors.
Craft Sticks
From counting in math to building in art, craft sticks should be in every home learning environment. They’re always an excellent building material and can double as a way to teach your students math via hands-on lessons. You can get these little items from any arts and crafts store for one of the best practical homeschool supplies available. You’ll never run out of fun things to do with these things. Make great works of art or help your student’s organization skills with them. The variants are endless!
For Homeschool Educators
The homeschool supply list indeed focuses on benefiting the students, but teachers need plenty of assistance. You’re trying to curate a safe and effective learning environment for your children, so it’s important to have all of the best supplies to make that process easier for everyone. Here are some of the most important supplies to use for teachers.
White Board and Dry Erase Markers
Yes, it’s fun to draw with dry-erase markers on a whiteboard for everyone, not just the students. Something about writing on the smooth surface with a gliding dry-erase device is just great. For teachers, a large board where you can compile information in the classroom front will make work easier for them. Using a board to keep information organized and accessible is a must for any homeschool classroom. The whiteboard is a good way to impart lessons and keep kids interested.
Hole Punch
Get your children to organize their papers! Studies have found that students who just jam paper into their backpack and call it a day tend to fare worse than students who hole punch and neatly file everything away. With a classroom hole puncher, you can get your children to store their papers away and experience the benefits of an organized binder. Folders, while useful, can easily spill out and become cluttered. With a hole puncher and binder, the search for papers will be easier for everyone.
Pencil Sharpener
As we briefly mentioned, the pencil will likely break, and you’ll find yourself unable to impart information to them. With either a classroom pencil sharpener or a personal one, your students will never be able to use the excuse that their pencil is broken again. We recommend an automatic pencil sharpener, but the little individual ones will work just as well and are even quieter. You can find any of these items online or in a dedicated supplies store.
Sticky Notes
Post them throughout the homeschool room, organize your papers, post them to the board, or create a colorful design to liven up the room. Sticky notes have tons of uses for teachers and are a great way to keep school time fun. Write a nice little note and set post it on their work as you return it to them. Students love to receive these little notes and are often inspired to continue doing good work when given a helpful note. Use them for a personal list or reminders to stumble across throughout the year.
Laminator
Many homeschool teachers swear by this laminator, though using it comes down to preference. You can laminate papers throughout the year, protecting important documents or a way to interact with assignments. Students love drawing on laminated papers with dry-erase markers much more than pencil on paper. These can be expensive and might cost around $30.
Stapler
It should come as no surprise that one of the things on our list that you’ll need most in any homeschool classroom is a stapler. As far as supplies go, staplers have been a must for decades. From organization purposes to simplicity in the homeschool study corner, the stapler is one of the most important homeschool supplies. Use it to organize papers, keep tests in order, and divvy out worksheets without fail.
Desktop Carousel
Thus far, you might have noticed in our homeschool supplies list that many of the products in this post can be found in the in-person school. However, the desktop carousel is a new school supply that seems to be taking the homeschool world by storm. It’s an all-in-one carousel of storage that can fit pens, pencils, tacks, sticky notes, and much more inside of it. Place it at the center of a desk and let the students spin it for easy access.
This is a great way to keep things organized while holding more homeschool supplies within it. Spin the carousel to the one side that you need access to and use whatever is inside. It’s a great product that students will love, and teachers will need. They’re relatively affordable and will be a great addition to use in any homeschool classroom.
Stickers
No matter the age your homeschoolers might be, school time is made better with stickers. Even as adults, getting work back and seeing a gold star sticker provides a great sense of accomplishment. Some might feel that stickers are tacky and imbue a false sense of joy, but we believe them to be a necessary homeschool supply. Use them on tests or homework and get your students to strive for more next time.
Organizing Crates
If the teacher isn’t organized, the study corner won’t be either. With fantastic organizing crates, you can keep all of your supplies in the exact places you need them. Find everything with ease and spruce up the class with a new splash of creativity. This crate is a good addition to any homeschooling classroom, and new products have begun offering wacky designs that students and teachers will both like. Our favorite is the rainbow selection listed above!
Wireless Printer
Not everything can be done online, despite what people might think. Printing out work on paper is one of the best ways to share information with students. Whether it’s a test or a worksheet, having a hard copy can prove to be a much better use of their time. This wireless printer is a must at any home, no matter how digital the curriculum might be. There’s always a paper that needs to be printed out.
Computer
While paper and printers are ample homeschool supplies for active learners, there are plenty of online learning benefits. Computers and laptops allow you to share information, access your emails, and curate creative lesson plans that your children will want to be a part of. As the years of homeschool advance and evolve, many take-home curriculums have begun to transfer online for easier access and a more centralized learning experience.
For Parents
Until now, the homeschool supplies on our list have been concrete products you can purchase and use. However, some concepts should be brought along with you into the homeschool classroom. These concepts should be used to make homeschool learning easy for everyone.
A Separate Space
Experts recommend you set aside a separate room in the house for schooling purposes. If you want your children to thrive in a homeschool environment, you need to create a good space to use for teaching. This space needs to be associated with time in school rather than time with family. If you don’t separate the schooling space from the rest of the house, you may struggle to impart the curriculum’s knowledge throughout the year.
Homeschool Time and Home Time
Free time versus work time is an important concept to impart in your homeschool classroom. Your children need to understand that, even though they’re still in their own house, this isn’t a time to do whatever they want. They need to treat math like math, and you need to treat them as if they’re your students. You want to establish a good report with your students but be able to come out of it at the end of the day. This may be one of the most challenging parts of homeschooling for parents.
Items Already Around the House
The best part of our homeschool supplies list is that much of it consists of products you can get around the house already. One product on our list – paper – is already found in the house, regardless of whether it’s being used as a homeschool supply or not. Looking through the list of what you need to get and discovering that half of it is free because you already own it certainly takes a load off of any homeschool parent.
We all like free things, so you must check our homeschool supplies list to cross-reference what you already have. Our post offers general necessities, so you might have some homeschool supplies already in stock for you to use. Find out what things are free because they’re already in your inventory before you start shopping!
Try Out Gameschooling
One of the best homeschool supplies you can have is games for students. When you use games in a lesson, your students will be inspired to pay attention and focus on the information you share with them. Whether it’s math or science, your students will like the lessons you share and will certainly learn more throughout the year. Including their favorite games in your homeschool supply list will enable you to expand the lesson possibilities.
Certain games qualify as homeschool supplies for you to use, so don’t just go to the store and choose your favorite game without doing your research first. Search for games that your students will love and want to play while sharing the lesson with them effectively and actively. As the years of homeschool roll on, you can search for new games that your students will love.
Fun Homeschool Activities
One lesson plan that students love throughout the year is arts and crafts. Homeschool supply stores tend to focus on using art supplies in the classroom and might offer different activities based on schooling years. Any lesson that you plan that involves hands-on crafts is sure to be your students’ favorite.
Origami has proven to be a favorite among our children as they love to use their hands and figure out the paper’s complex folds. We get to learn along with them as we all fold the papers back on ourselves and discover how they craftworks. Many teachers in the house have discovered their own unique, free crafts to use with their students.
Conclusion
Before the year starts, it’s important to know what you need to fill your homeschool supply with and what you already have. Everything on our list is a must for the homeschooling year, and much of it will last you for years at a time! With more and more parents bringing their children back to the house for homeschooling, the demand for supplies has certainly grown. Know what you need and know what you already have before the homeschooling years commence!
