19 Essential Homeschool Supplies for 2024

What do you need to homeschool successfully? The homeschooling journey can be a bit overwhelming, especially if it’s your first time. With that said, it’s essential that you have all of the necessary materials to make your homeschooling sessions as productive, fun, and stress-free as possible.

So, whether you’re a veteran homeschooler looking to revamp your supplies or a newbie currently setting up your homeschooling space, this comprehensive guide will give you the necessary tools to get started.

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Must Haves For Every Homeschooling Family

1. A Plan and a Planner

Although a plan is not a physical item, it is the most important place to start. A comprehensive, well-structured plan for your child’s learning is key to successful homeschooling. For some, this might be a physical curriculum. An all-in-one curriculum or multiple curriculums you will combine to create your perfect program. For others, this may be a list of subjects or units you want to cover organically for the year. No matter what your “plan” looks like, it is a crucial launching pad for your homeschool. If you are purchasing curriculum then this is your first supply to buy.

I am a “planner” I love lists, checkmarks, and calendars. So I am a planner girl. Not everyone is, but for those of you who are also planner people, here are a few of our favorites:

• The planner I have used for the last three years is made by one of my favorite homeschool resource companies, School Nest. I love that this planner is undated for flexibility and includes all of the components I need in a planner: reading logs, attendance trackers, and plenty of room to track what you have done each day. They offer a regular planner and a “minimalist notebook”. I prefer the Minimalist version of the planner because it has everything I need.

• I also love Erin Condren planners. They make so many different kinds of planners, and everyone will be able to find a favorite among the many options, but I love their undated teacher planners. All of their planners are beautiful and colorful, most are spiral-bound and have tabs for easy flipping. The undated Homeschool Planner is the one that I used and loved.

2. A Computer and or Tablet

We use both a laptop and an iPad, but you could easily use one or the other. A lot of our curriculum is PDF-based and instead of printing EVERYTHING we add files to our iPad so we can take school anywhere, on the couch, or on a trip! We use audiobooks, educational websites, interactive apps, online lessons, and educational YouTube channels, and having the iPad for the kids to use while I am using my computer is crucial. We usually do research, typing games, and online reading on my computer. We love the flexibility of having both, but we could easily make one work if we didn’t have both.

• We know this is a controversial topic, but we love our Apple products and how they seamlessly work together. We have a MacBook Pro because we use features that aren’t in a MacBook Air, but either will work great for homeschooling.

• There are many tablet options, but again, we prefer Apple products. I love creating a folder on my Macbook, putting it on the cloud, and then accessing it from my iPad or iPhone. This is very convenient for traveling or field trip days. There are many iPad options, we have a 10″ iPad Air that is perfect for us, but if you are looking for something bigger and more powerful, the iPad Pro will be perfect for you.

3. A Printer

There are many different printing styles when it comes to homeschooling. Many people choose to print everything they need for homeschooling, while others print very little. We fall somewhere in between. We print pages the kids need for the week. These may be copies from workbooks, or textbooks, or printed pages from our PDF curriculums. We don’t print all of the educator guides, I read those from the iPad or computer. Whichever your printing style is, a good printer will save you a lot of time and money.

• We love the Epson EcoTank Cartridge free printer. If you haven’t switched from cartridge ink printers to an ink bottle printer, now is your opportunity. Not only do these printers cut down on waste, but the ink also lasts exponentially longer. We couldn’t recommend this printer enough!

4. A Table or Desk

Your child should be comfortable as they work at home. We want to create a positive learning environment conducive to homeschooling. Providing them with a good workspace is essential for their happiness and therefore their productivity. Some prefer desks and others use a large communal table. We use our dining room table. There is plenty of space for all of us to spread out, and we do a lot of schooling before, during, and after meals when we are already seated. I can sit across from both of my boys or sit next to one depending on what we are working on.

• We use our rectangular dining room table like this one:

• If we had a dedicated homeschool room, a double desk, or T-desk would be my dream. Especially with older kids. They each have their own area with plenty of storage! I love this one:

5. Homeschool Cart or Shelves

We love our three-tiered rolling cart to organize all our homeschool necessities. We try to keep these shelves stocked with only things we use regularly. It is easily accessible, holds plenty of materials, and we can wheel it around anywhere we are homeschooling at that moment.

6. Organization Baskets

We are huge fans of organization baskets in every area of our home, but especially for homeschool supplies. We have one for paper products, one for art supplies, one for our library books, and one for everything we use daily like math books, notebooks, and binders. We love baskets for regularly used items because of the easy access versus a drawer or a plastic bin. There are so many options to choose from when it comes to storage baskets, between sizes and materials, the options are limitless. These are some of our favorites:

7. Three Hole Punch and or Binding Machine

As a beginner homeschooler, I was obsessed with our binding machine. I made books out of everything. Since having a few more years of experience under my belt I have found that I like a mixture of binders and books that we make with a binding machine. We copy pages from workbooks so we can reuse the books with our younger son. A three-hole punch and a binding machine allow us to add pages to our binders or homemade books easily.

8. Laminator

Some people laminate everything and others never use them. We fall somewhere in between. We laminate the covers for our homemade books to give them a little more structure. We also love to support the many homeschool parents who make beautiful manipulatives like moon phase cards, animal identification, tree guides, calendar and season manipulatives, etc; we laminate them for durability and the ease of taking them on adventures for hands-on learning. We love this laminating machine:

9. Reusable Dry-Erase Pocket Sleeves

We use these reusable dry-erase pocket sleeves even more than our laminator. They are great for tracing, worksheets you want to use repeatedly, or for a fun and different way to work which our kids enjoy. Our history loving boys also love to print out maps and use multi-colored dry-erase markers to show ancient civilization borders, treasure maps, or anything else their wild little imaginations can think of. We use these sleeves every single day school or no school.

10. Small Dry Erase Boards

We use these individual dry-erase boards a lot. We like these ones because they have a blank whiteboard on one side, and are lined for younger grades on the other side. We use them as the teacher for a visual aid during lessons, and the kids use them to practice writing or to show their work on math problems.

11. Clipboards

Clipboards are our favorite on the go homeschool tool. We use them when we go on hikes, field trips, and road trips. They always come in handy and there’s something kids love about carrying around clipboard, like they’re on official business. We like these simple wooden clipboards for active excursions and these clipboards with storage for road trips. They can hold extra paper and pencils and even a few art supplies.

12. Legos

We are a Lego-loving family and we use them for everything! We reenact historical battles, build models of the solar system, create homes, buildings, or ships from ancient times, or use them simply as math counters. The possibilities are endless! If you don’t have legos yet, this “classic” set is a perfect place to start.

13. Desk Pen Organizer aka Desk Carousel

A desk carousel was our very first homeschool purchase. It was so satisfying and useful and made us feel like we were officially homeschoolers. We have never regretted that purchase. We use this desk carousel every day on our table and it has everything we need. We keep pencils, colored pencils, markers, crayons, scissors, glue sticks, rulers, and a small pencil sharpener in ours.

14. Grade-Level Composition Books

An essential part of homeschooling is developing writing skills. Every year we let our boys pick out a grade-level composition book. There are so many fun covers these days, the old black and white composition book as your only choice is a thing of the past. This simple act of picking their own design or animal cover inspires and excites them to write. Just a little homeschool trick, when kids are allowed to pick something for themselves, it automatically instills a sense of pride. This year our oldest picked a composition book with his favorite animal, a squid, and our youngest, sharks. They still love them 8 months later. Plus a bonus, the younger grade books have areas for drawing alongside your writing.

15. Calendar Manipulatives

We like to start every day by discussing the season, month, day of the week, date, and weather. There are so many fun and beautiful ways to incorporate learning about the calendar into your day. Here are a few of our favorites: Melissa & Doug My First Daily Magnetic Activities Calendar, Woody Treasures – Montessori Wooden Toys Kids Clock, and My First Daily Magnetic Calendar.

16. Atlas and Globe

Each week our boys study a different country or civilization from history and we use both a kid’s atlas and a globe to explore the geographic location and compare it to where we live. Although you could certainly use one or the other, we love having both. Our kid’s atlas shows details like rivers, mountain ranges, famous attractions, capitals, and more. The globe gives us a broader perspective of where this place is in relation to where we live and other places we have studied about. We find both essential. There are many sizes of globes, we prefer a larger one for easier viewing. There are also many interactive globes, but we love our simple globe without any of the extras. Somewhere out there is your perfect globe, here is our favorite:

17. Kids Dictionary

We believe in learning to use a real physical dictionary and not just relying on the internet or spell check. There are a lot of fun illustrated dictionaries like the Merriam-Webster Children’s Dictionary.

18. Art Supplies

Incorporating creative activities into your child’s learning will help them express their ideas and creativity as well as help them develop fine motor skills. Basic art supplies such as paper, sketch books, crayons, markers, colored pencils, paints and brushes, clay, stickers, and stamps are all great options for exploration and fun.

19. General School Supplies

Just like in any school, there are standard supplies that are important tools for homeschoolers, such as:

• Pencils: We love the traditional Ticonderoga pencils.
• erasers: we have found that the classic Paper Mate pink pearl erasers and their pencil toppers work the best.
• pencil sharpener: If you really want to be efficient splurge on a mechanical sharpener. I promise you won’t regret it!
• pens: everyone has their favorite types of pens, I love Papermate Ballpoint or gel depending on what I’m doing.
• highlighters: we use highlighters every day! We like these Crayola Take Note Erasable Highlighters because, well, they’re erasable!
• printer paper: printer paper is another item that is controversial, everyone prefers a different weight or brightness. My favorite is 24lb paper, it is thicker and more durable for my kids, which we tend to need.
• scissors: We have 5″ blunt tipped scissors for younger kids, 6″ scissors for bigger kids, and All-purpose scissors for adults or bigger projects.
• rulers: We like clear plastic rulers form some projects and classic wooden rulers for more heavy duty uses.
• tape
• glue: glue sticks, Elmer’s glue, craft glue, and our favorite: hot glue gun.
• sticky notes: we use sticky notes a lot in our Language Arts program (See our review of Rooted In Language’s Pinwheels Program). We use these multi-pack of sticky notes. They feature multiple colors and sizes, including a large size with handwrtiting lines.
• binders
• paperclips/ binderclips
• magnetic bookmarks: We are constantly bouncing between books and these help keep us organized and are great for lesson planning.

Summary

The right homeschool supplies and resources are vital in ensuring your family’s homeschool journey succeeds. With the right tools, you can create a custom, high-quality educational experience tailored to your child’s needs. Starting homeschooling can be daunting, but with this guide, and the proper supplies, you’re well on your way to creating an engaging and fun learning environment. Happy planning and happy homeschooling!