How to Make Homeschool Materials

Do you need some ideas for homeschool materials that you can make at home? With some simple supplies you can make a lot of inexpensive materials.

Flash Cards Rings

Flash cards rings make good homeschool materials.

Flash card rings are great to take with you when you need to go on errands with your child. Your child can do drill work in the car. Flash card rings are a lot smaller than workbooks so they are easy to take with you.

To make flash card rings write what you want your child to study on three by five cards. You could even have your child make the cards.

If you did not want to use three by five cards you could use the computer. On an office program type your information. Print onto cardstock. If you want information on both sides of the cards you will need to glue the cards together. If you want the cards to be more permanent you can laminate the cards.

There are several types of flash cards that you can buy from your local variety store or dollar store. You can find flash cards for shapes, colors, and math facts.

You can also download flash cards from the internet. There are several good sites for flash cards. On some sites you can create your own cards. I typed in free printable flash cards and came up with a lot of sites, too many to name here.

To make your flash card rings punch a hole in the top of each card. Then add a metal ring. By adding the metal ring your child is less likely to loose a flash card. The set will stay intact.

You can make flash card for any subject. Here are some of my ideas:

• Vocabulary words
• Math facts
• Shapes
• Colors
• Weekly spelling words
• Foreign words

Educational Games

Games are easy homeschool materials to make. There are several games that you can make. All you need is a printer.

Bingo

Using a spread sheet program works well for making bingo cards. On the top of the card write the letters of bingo in each square across the top. The grid is usually 5 by 5. If you do not want to take the time to make a grid on you office program, I did find a free bingo generator on the web at Print Bingo.

Bingo works well for math. You can print the equations on the bingo card. Then call the answer. Another way would be to have the answer on the card and call the equation.

You can also make bingo cards for shapes, vocabulary words, states and their capitals. Be creative, almost any subject can be made into a bingo game.

Match

You can make several match type games. When I worked in the school we played a simple match game with easy reading words. The children matched a word such as "cat" with a picture of a cat.

Remember for match you are matching two cards together. Here are some other ideas.

• Match the word to the color. You could do this with young children by printing the word in color.
• In another game your child could match the capital letter to the small letter.
• For an older child that is learning a foreign language, make a game where they match the foreign word with the English word.

A Map Game

For a map game print out a large outline map of the United States. Print out cards with the names of the states on them. The child draws a card. He places the card on a state if he is correct he gets a point. After he knows where all of the states are you can play with state capitals. Another idea would be to do the countries of the world.

The problem with games is that it usually takes more than one person to play. You could share your game with children from your homeschool group. You could also invite the neighbor kids to come over.

Manipulatives

I do not like to spend a lot of money on a manipulative because my children only used them for a short time. They are also easy homeschool materials to make.

Math

My page Math Manipulatives has several ideas for manipulatives. Also the book 40 Easy-to-Make Math Manipulatives is a good book to have.

Language Art Manipulatives

Cut three by five cards into four equal pieces. On each piece write a letter of the alphabet. If you want use a different colored card for the vowels. You child can now make words out of the cards. When you introduce blends make some cards with blends.

Making your own homeschool materials can save you money.

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