Online Home Schooling Resources
Home School Materials and Educational Activities on the Internet
Oct 31, 2008
Families looking for learning games and free educational activities have a wealth of resources available. Online home schooling websites and resources for learning with printable worksheets and games are widely available.
Educational Activities
Many public learning institutions like libraries, zoos and museums have developed websites with learning games and activities. These can be fantastic home schooling resources because they strive to educate the public. In addition to providing educational activities for home use, they also expose children to a real-world learning environment, where adults pursue knowledge because it is interesting. Their websites often reflect a passion for the material, and embrace the entire field in games, puzzles and stories. Visiting museums and interacting with volunteer docents is another way that children can learn from experts with a passion.
Learning Games
Finding an education website with fun learning games is always a pleasure. Children enjoy learning to read at Starfall and playing math games at Rainforest Maths. Starfall offers free education videos and games, with printable worksheets, booklets and certificates. Other popular resources for learning activities include websites published by toy manufacturers. While some parents might be uncomfortable with the shopping websites like Club Penguin and Stardoll, they offer children the opportunity to personalize and individualize their doll or igloo, while handling and managing their budget as well.
Printable Worksheets
While Enchanted Learning might not be an entirely free website, the annual subscription is inexpensive and many homeschooling families enjoy supporting a work-at-home homeschooling mom. There are over 20,000 free worksheets and activities to print at Enchanted Learning. Other popular educational websites with free printable worksheets include Ed Helper and ABC Teach. Each site has a different menu style and classifications. Enchanted Learning is popular among homeschoolers because activities are divided by subject instead of by grade.
Homeschool Materials
Parents wishing to find homeschool materials online should check out Donna Young's website. She offers printable planner pages and scheduling documents that can help plan lessons, keep track of grades and create transcripts and report cards. She takes a holistic approach to homeschool family management and also offers chore charts, menu planners and other downloadable and printable documents for home management.
Classic literature is also available online, often for free. Through online libraries, students can download electronic versions of the classic texts that are widely recommended in many homeschool curriculum programs.
Online Home Schooling Support
Several websites offer helpful articles and advice for homeschooling parents, whether they're looking for help teaching a specific subject, adapting an educational philosophy or dealing with common parenting or homeschooling situations. Message boards provide a forum where homeschooling mothers and fathers can participate in discussions with other families to share wisdom, experiences, victories, hardships and friendship.
There are so many ways a homeschooling family can find social support online, whether it's the emotional and practical support of having veteran homeschoolers to consult with, a variety of learning games and education websites to browse, or the wide variety of free printable activities and worksheets. Online home schooling can be a pleasure for every member of the family.
