Day 1: a reason to home educate.
Day 2: a support network
The term home education or homeschooling suggests that the process takes place at home. Of course, this isn't completely true; education can take place on trips, on nature walks, in home education groups and outside classes but primarily home education takes place at home.
Home isn't school so having a school room isn't an essential. Like most other home educators in the UK, and probably in the world, I don't have a specific school room. We do however, have a place to learn. What is necessary for that place will vary from family to family. For us it includes
- somewhere to sit and read together, for us, the sofa
- a table for written work
- storage space for written work and educational games
- places to store books. This includes those being read and bookcases for the others. We don't necessarily keep all the books in the room in which we work.
- somewhere to display art, posters, weather charts and so on.
- a small blackboard
- computers
- floor space for my youngest to play.
We use our living room for most work although the kitchen table, covered by an old oil cloth, gets used for art and craft.
From time to time, we have had a nature table although I do find that it is difficult to keep this together and tidy.
We have found that somethings change with time but having a set place helps.
A few thoughts that we have found helpful.
- I was concerned about the height of the table for my youngest whilst writing. Having investigated buying a desk, I realised that the higher than usual chair that he uses at the kitchen table would also be ideal for his writing. We just move it each morning.
- The cost of drawers to store work varies tremendously. We brought ours for under £20 per unit at a local cheap hardware store.
- We often/always loose pens and pencils. Having a labelled drawer for these has helped tremendously.
- For anyone who struggles with organisation as much as I do, label the drawers of a unit. This has saved me so much time!
Please share tips for organising your home education space.
Do visit some of the other blogs writing around the theme of Homeschooling Essentials.
Laura @ Day by Day in Our World
Julie @ Nurturing Learning
. Lisa @ Farm Fresh Adventures
DaLynn @ For the Display of His Splendor
Lori @ At Home: where life happens
Nicole @ Journey to Excellence
Adriana @ Homeschool Ways
Brandy @ Kingdom Academy Homeschool
Meg @ Adventures with Jude
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We homeschool around the house and outside sometimes. One thing I do need to get better at is organizing our stuff.
ReplyDeleteBecause we don't have a designated room for homeschool, supplies and materials have to have a place. We found a shelf at a garage sale for $20 and it has been perfect for all of the math manipulatives, curriculum materials, paper, and the girls daily boxes. We also built a bookshelf for the girls books. For the most part, that does us well enough.
ReplyDeleteA very good post! I am fortunate to have a room that I have a classroom and cabinets and closets to keep things separated. But I still have places for everything. I have a book basket, a curriculum basket, a supply drawer. It is very helpful to know where I can go to get what I need!
ReplyDelete