Manage your home school materials with these three steps. Stay focused and avoid letting home school materials takeover your home.
Here's what you'll learn in this article:
- Learning can include and generate a lot of materials, but that doesn’t mean they need to be everywhere.
- Three steps for managing home school materials that don’t add overwhelm.
- Answers to frequently asked questions about managing home school materials
- Key takeaways that you can use to manage your home school materials with ease.
- Information about additional resources for homeschooling your children.
Homeschooling can generate a lot of materials. How do you manage them all to keep school from taking over your home?
Homeschooling materials come in three broad categories: 1) the materials you use to plan and execute home school, 2) the materials your children use for home schooling, and 3) the materials that your children create while learning. Your materials might include a planner, books on home schooling, curriculum manuals, and a tablet or laptop for tracking. The materials your children use might include a notebook, books, nomenclature cards, and counting materials. As your child engages with the learning materials, they may create art, models, and research reports. All of these home school materials need a dedicated home and long-term management, so they don’t add overwhelm to the homeschooling experience.
3 Steps for Managing Home School Materials in a Comfortable School and Home Environment
With these three tips managing home school materials can integrate into your home school routine. It doesn’t have to be a project to manage home school materials, nor do you have to live amongst piles of home school materials spread throughout the home.
1. Take an Inventory of Your Home School Materials
First, take an inventory of the current materials you use to home school. Physically walk around your home and jot down what home school materials are in each room (e.g., a shelf with learning materials or table with in-progress projects). Next, over the course of a typical home school day, make note of where your home school activities occurred (e.g., at a table or on the couch).
Then, make notes of what you want for your home school experience—do you want the materials all in one area, fewer materials, or a dedicated work area? What are the disconnects between how you are managing your home school materials and how you want to manage them? For example, are completed and in-progress projects mixed together, but you want them separate? Or are learning materials and non-school materials blended together, but you want them to be more distinct?
With an inventory of your home school materials compared with your desires, you can identify what you need to do to manage these materials going forward.
2. Make a List to Organize Your Home School Materials in Bursts
Make a list of what you need to do to close the gap between the current state of your home school materials and how you want your home school materials. Start with the three types of home school materials (i.e., your materials, your child’s learning materials, and what your child creates).
Which category is the closest to being how you want? Start with that one. For example, if you have three notebooks for home school planning, but you only want a single notebook, then make a list of what you need to do to make the change (e.g., buy a notebook with new features, then transfer the material over).
For the category that is the furthest from what you want, break it into 20-minute tasks and set a timer. For example, if you have piles of completed projects around the house that you need to gather, document, and archive or trash, then set a 20-minute task to gather as much as you can.
The benefit of doing it in short bursts is that you get started and can avoid letting it become a tiresome all-day project. Remember that as with most new approaches, there will be some extra effort up front to organize the materials, but once they are organized you can expend less effort keeping the home school materials maintained.
3. Keeping Your Home School Materials Organized
Finally, once your home school materials are organized you will want simple systems to keep them that way. Managing your home school materials does not and should not take a lot of time because there are much more exciting aspects of home school to devote your time to each day! Return to the three types of home school materials (i.e., your materials, your child’s learning materials, and what your child creates).
It is common to overlook your materials (e.g., using note pads around the house or not even having dedicated materials), but remember that you are your child’s role model, which includes demonstrating to them the importance and care with which you value your efforts as an educator. At key parts of the school year assess your materials to keep and elevate what works.
In managing your children’s learning materials, clear out what is mastered or unused. Most often there are too many learning materials. If you can dedicate even a small book shelf to each subject focus on having only a handful of materials out at a time. Extra materials can be stored in a closet or cabinet.
What your child creates can be fraught with emotional attachment. Is it realistic to keep everything as is? Ideally, you can select some pieces to archive that reflect their learning for the year and photo the rest. The latter is an important step for your home school record keeping. For smaller materials day-to-day materials focus on designated a single space, then archive as appropriate once the space becomes full. For larger projects, make it part of the home school ritual to keep the project showcased for a time, but then archive it to make room for new.
FAQs: How to Manage All of Your Family's Home School Materials
What if my child gets really upset about not keeping everything they create as part of home school?
It is vital to build a culture of respect in your home when it comes to what is created as part of learning. Having a culture of respect means showing them that their first tracing of the alphabet is equally as important as the poetry that you write. For a child, the tracing is the maximum of what they can create at this point in their life, so they value it and won’t understand if you don’t.
This doesn’t mean that you keep every single tracing paper. Instead, involve your children in the archive process. Ask them to pick their three favorite pieces and photograph the others as a collection. With older children you can take it a step further and demonstrate that you also don't keep everything that you create.
What if we don’t have a lot of space to keep school materials separate from non-school materials?
If you don’t have a lot of space, then be selective about what you keep. If your child is reading chapter books, but you still have board books in the house, then make it an event to find a free library and donate them. If you make use of electronic materials and apps to save space, then organize them into separate digital folders to designate what is appropriate for school-time and for home-time.
What if we are on the move or do home school in a lot of different places?
If you do home school in various settings, then have home school “go bags” for yourself and each of your children. As with not having a lot of space, you’ll want to be selective in the materials you travel with for each setting.
Use readying the “go bag” as an opportunity to build responsibility in your child by having them think through and gather what they need. They might include a book for reading, a notebook and drawing supplies, a tablet with learning activities, headphones, and a project. While your “go bag” might include your home school project planner and materials you need for lessons.
What if we use materials for both learning and free play?
It is common to have general purpose items like markers that serve as school and home materials. It is also common to have items sometimes serve as learning materials for the purpose of special projects. Use your judgment on the primary purpose.
If you have a collection of general-purpose items, then keep those accessible in their own space. Likewise, if you have a material that is being used for a special project, then add it to your school materials while it is being used, but move it back to its original location when not being used for school. For example, if your child is building specific geometric shapes with Legos, then use them for the day, but put them back in their room when done.
Key Takeaways
- Managing home school materials is essential for creating a comfortable homeschooling environment. Just like maintaining a home, it is important to maintain your home school materials, so they work for you.
- Inventory your home school materials. Designate what is and is not a home school material to make it clear for you and your child.
- Organize your home school materials in bursts. Since it will take extra effort to get started, break your list of organizing tasks into manageable 20-minute bursts.
- Maintain your home school materials. At key points in the home school year check-in with your materials and make adjustments to keep them well-managed.
Where to Learn More
If you are getting ready to start your homeschooling journey, consider becoming a Crush Home School member. Our members receive a monthly membership package in their inbox that contains tips, insights, suggested schedules and plans, exclusive resources, and much more. Members also receive a 10% discount on all other resources purchased through our website. Learn more about becoming a Crush Home School member.