Organization can make some people want to pull their hair out. I am one of those people because I want to be organized but we have way too much stuff and I feel like our house it going to burst at the seams. Homeschooling and downsizing your house is not fun. Here are my homeschool organization hacks to get you on track.
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I have changed how I organize our homeschool stuff so many times, which seems to align with the beginning of the school year and when we switch out the curriculum that we are using, which is not always at the beginning of the year.
Homeschool Organization Hacks
We have very limited storage in our house, which means I have cut down on the “extra” that we keep. I try to make sure that I only keep what we need out and accessible. The rest of our homeschool stuff, like lessons from previous years that I am keeping for Brookland or Gauge as they grade up, is kept in a tote in the basement.
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Homeschool Binder Organization
The best thing I ever did for organization in our homeschool was set up a homeschool binder for myself. It has everything I need in it for a specific amount of time, usually monthly, especially when using BookShark curriculum.
What’s in a homeschool binder:
- It has the worksheets/answer sheets for the all my kids work
- goals for the year
- my why – the reason I am homeschooling for when things get tough
- our period log
- work samples that I want to keep as we do them
- and more!
Homeschool Binder Pages Organization
Plan Month By Month
I have been planning our homeschool lessons month by month for years rather than by the whole year as some homeschoolers may. Even month by month planning can be tricky, things are always changing on our home, for instance, Austin will now be raising her own silkie chickens.
Do you have any idea who much she is going to learn while raising her own chickens, and a breed I know nothing about? And then deciding what to do with their eggs?
Month by month planning means that I do not have to have a years’ worth of materials ready to go all the time.
Storage Spaces
The top shelves in closets and the bottom drawers in cabinets are often underused or misused. Take a look in your home. Does the top shelf hold items that could just as well be donated? Is there a bottom drawer in your home that is practically empty?
These are places where you can store your homeschool supplies.
Library Books
Library books always have their own area. They do not get mixed in with our own because then we end up with late fees or worse, book replacement fees.
Declutter and Tidy
I am an advocate of consistent, little-by-little decluttering, keeping a daily habit of tossing out broken things, donating unused things, and tidying up. But… a couple times a year, a deep clean is necessary to make sure that we are only keeping what we need out and in our space.
