I enjoy getting things organized and ready for the new homeschool year. Over the course of 14 years of homeschooling, I’ve organized our school area in a dedicated school room, our kitchen and our dining room.
I’ve taught my children their lessons in just about every room of our house as well as in our backyard, front porch, in our van and at the park.
This year we are back to having a dedicated homeschool room. I’m guessing most of my kids will scatter around the house to do their work though.
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If you don’t have a dedicated room for homeschooling, don’t worry. Almost all of my homeschooling supplies are stored on 3 bookshelves (1 large and 2 narrow ones) which can be placed in any room of our home. So whether you are doing school in your kitchen or your living area, you can take these same ideas and make them work for your unique situation.
Homeschool Room Tour
First, let’s take a look around the entire room. I have 3 bookshelves full of homeschool supplies and curriculum. There is also a wardrobe in my homeschool room that holds our printer and other odds and ends that don’t have to do with homeschooling. I have two maps on our walls along with 2 white boards. And then there is my desk that I use mainly for blogging, editing YouTube videos, consulting and preparing for my speaking engagements.
The Bookshelves
My three bookshelves hold almost all of our school supplies. Each child has their own area to store their curriculum and binders. I have most of my language arts stuff on the left shelf. Math curriculum and manipulatives are on the right shelf.
What’s On the Left Shelf
The top two shelves on the left hold my Spell to Write and Read materials. The top one has a plastic box full of phonics and spelling games along with some game boards tucked underneath the box.
The next shelf holds my Spell to Write and Read book, the Wise Guide, a binder of SWR resources and a large binder for SWR lesson plans. I also have other SWR resources on there like the Alpha List and the Wise Guide Enrichment Activity Worksheets.
There are two black boxes on the second shelf. One of those holds my SWR phonogram and rule cards. The second box holds cursive sandpaper letters. (Getting curious about Spell to Write and Read? I explain all about it in this video.)
The next shelf down on the left is full of books. These are mostly early readers along with the current school year’s BJU Press Book Links. I also have a cup full of dry erase markers and an eraser on this shelf since it is located next to one of our white boards. My goal for this shelf was to have it low enough for my budding readers to reach. I wanted them to easily grab books to enjoy for school and for leisure.
Now we are at my 1st grader’s shelf. This is where I keep all of her textbooks, BJU Press Distance Learning DVD’s and all my teacher binders and resources for 1st grade. I chose this shelf because it was low enough for her to reach but still high enough for me to access easily.
Everything she needs to complete her school day is on the left. I fill her binder with a weeks worth of worksheets every Monday which means all of her workbooks are on my half of the shelf (on the right). In the middle is an index card box where she will store her spelling flashcards.
The very bottom of my left shelf holds supplies for my preschooler and toddler. My preschooler has workbooks, a binder and art supplies that can only be used when his older siblings are doing their school work. His art supplies include markers, crayons, scissors, a glue stick, dot paint and stickers.
The green tub is for my toddler. It will be filled with toys that only come out during school time. When he gets bored with a set of toys, I will trade them out for different ones. I have a stash of “school-time” toys to rotate through in the white wardrobe and in my garage.
What’s On the Middle Shelf
Now let’s move on over to the middle bookshelf. The top shelf has my salt boxes for teaching letter formation using large motor skills. It also has two baskets. The basket on the left is empty. I did such a good job clearing out supplies I wasn’t using that I had some extra space. The second basket is full of educational CD’s and SWR DVD’s.
The next shelf holds my 7th grader’s textbooks and binders along with my teacher’s binders and teachers manuals for 7th grade. I had a little extra space, so I stored all of our BJU Press video lesson guides and our BJU Press Writing and Grammar 7 curriculum that we won’t be using until later.
The third shelf is for my 5th grader. Her textbooks and binders are on the left and all my teacher’s binders are on the right. I had some extra space on this shelf as well so I stored a few miscellaneous homeschool books like Window on the World and America’s Federal Holidays.
The bottom three shelves contain writing supplies, reference materials, mini-white boards and our Spanish materials.
Our writing supplies (and art supplies) include: lined paper in 3 different sizes, pencils, pencil sharpener, colored pencils, markers, crayons, scissors, glue sticks, Sharpies and highlighters.
The next shelf has our dictionaries, thesaurus and atlases on the left. On the right is our BJU Press elementary Spanish curriculum. I still need to unpack it and organize it a little better on the shelf but that’s where it will all go.
On the bottom are our encyclopedias and mini-white boards. I love small white boards. They are great for little ones to practice handwriting on and useful for giving instruction to one child.
What’s On the Right Shelf
This bookshelf holds my 3rd grader’s school work and our math curriculum and manipulatives. The first shelf has an empty basket. I still can’t believe I have empty areas! The second shelf has odds and ends like our stapler, tape, tissue box and index cards.
The third shelf has Math-U-See teacher’s manuals, DVD’s and the fraction overlay kit. Next on the shelf are four Life of Fred books. I also have a magazine holder that holds math fact flashcards, fast fact sheets and rulers. Our calculator and learning clock are also stored on this shelf.
Under our Math-U-See shelf is my 3rd graders shelf. I chose a shelf that was easy for him to reach. It includes his textbooks and binders as well as all my teacher binders for 3rd grade.
The last two shelfs hold math manipulatives. I have a plastic box for Math-U-See blocks and another one that holds our algebra/decimal kit. Below that are pattern blocks, geoboards and clock puzzles.
The Rest of the Homeschool Room
Now, for the rest of the room. This will be short and sweet as most of our school supplies are on the bookshelves. I have two white boards up on the walls. The one next to the alphabet chart is used for spelling lessons. The white board above my desk is where I write the date and any information that needs to be up for an entire day or week.
There is a basket on my desk for assignments that need to be graded or checked. I try to check the kids work as they complete it but that doesn’t always happen. If I’m busy with something else, they can drop their assignment in the basket and I’ll grade it before the next day.
I also have two maps up. In the past we have stored these maps on the shelfs and pulled them out on the floor or table to look at. Since we have a dedicated school room this year, I figured I’d put them up on display. There is also a globe that I store up on the white wardrobe.
And that’s our homeschool room. You can also watch the tour in the video below.
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