25 Ways to Help My Homeschooler Get Organized
We may earn money or products from the companies mentioned in this review or post, but all opinions are our own.
Let’s Cover the Simple Ways to Teach Organization to Your Homeschool Kids at Every Age
Homeschooling is about teaching your child skills that they will use for the rest of their life. Let’s face it, being organized is a life skill every homeschooling family needs. Do you need some ideas to help your homeschooler get organized? If you are lacking in this area, you know the pain of having to work extra hard to learn this on your own.
The greatest benefit to keeping students organized is that you are helping them – help themselves. A new homeschool year is beginning, so we want to help my homeschooler get organized to keep our students accountable, keep their space tidy and to show up prepared for school work each day.
When you buy something recommended here, I may get an affiliate commission — but it never affects your price or what I recommend. I use the products and tools recommended in our home/school and share my honest reviews to help parents like you personalize your homeschool to fit your needs and goals.
My biggest goal is to help my students to solve their own problems.
At every stage of development, we as parents can help our children respond to the world around them. Developing a habit of organizing their personal belongings and sharing the workload with household chores will translate to becoming an adult with the ability to use time management to complete tasks. If you would love for your child to grow up and be the adult that not only writes the grocery list, but remembers where it is and uses it to save money by staying focused, read on.
What is the best age to teach organizational skills?
The best time to begin teaching organization skills, is actually when your child is very young.
-200fingersandtoes
Habit and Patterns Teach Early Organization Skills
If your child can dump out a bin of toys, they can scoop them up and put them in. The transition from infant to toddlerhood is a great window to include your child in the actions of daily chores.
Don’t wait for the move to formal preschool to practice organizational skills, very early childhood is an even better place to begin. You child is watching you from birth. They are learning about how to respond to the world around them by watching you. The best way to learn to be a helper for a very young child is right around the kitchen table.
You are teaching organization skills at meals time
Each meal has a set of activities that the child grows to expect. They begin to organize them at a very early age. Does you little one start fussing as soon as you but a bib around their neck? Why? Because they know that food is soon to follow. They have learned to anticipate what is next already. As humans, we crave patterns and predictability. This is why before school age is such a great time to teach habits that lead to organization and critical thinking skills.
You can incorporate small steps like establishing an organization system for their toys and books, and then involving them in cleaning up. Your child will learn from creating a simple system for meal and bedtime and look forward to the familiar routine. Young children learn cues from their parents and start to anticipate what comes next. Actively use this natural development to establish vital life skills with simple fun play.
ORGANIZATION SKILL BUILDERS FOR LITTLES
- Play by sorting toys and objects
- Establish a clear location for their toys
- Help them recognize cues for daily routines
- Show the example of clean up
- End playtime with clean up
- Joining you for chores in their capacity
If homeschool planning is still a little way off, you can still teach so many meaningful skills to your little one. I love watching my granddaughter pull out all the books from the shelf and “read” to herself. By her actions, I can tell that she loves being read to and that her parents share their love of books with her.
Watching her toddle over with her arms full of board books and dump them back into the basket to help her mama clean up brings me even an overwhelming sense of joy. Why? Because I know that it will be such a blessing to have a youngster that can help clean up her own messes. Her mama won’t be overwhelmed by endless disasters that she has to clean up alone and my granddaughter will enjoy doing a helpful job to show her mama when she is done. We all enjoy the sense of accomplishment when we do a task well.
Don’t believe me, you should see her clap for herself! She is pretty proud of her work already.
Elementary School-Age Organization Builders
Elementary students are wading through the discovering their autonomy and establishing their individualism. A great place for them to learn to be organized is in the management of their personal belongings. Giving your middle graders the reigns in the “HOW’ of household tasks is the ticket for achieving buy-in. Last year, they were bringing you flowers and this year they are writing playlists, giving input on their curriculum and picking up a bigger load in the share of upkeep and personal care.
This season is often where your child will add extracurricular activities to their plate (and yours). Some of the best ways to help your child become organized in this season, is to create dedicated space for important items. Learning responsibility for cleats, gloves and practice times can be the source of a lot of frustration and anxiety if your child is not taught how to be responsible with these.
How many times have you had to look for the soccer shoes or baseball glove. One year, I created a checklist and laminated it for one son, who was having trouble making sure he had everything together. Looking over the list before we headed out the door was a great way to confirm that he had everything he needed for the game.
Passing the torch of responsibility
These years and when we have our kids take responsibility for their homeschool curriculum. My kids start using student planners and use our homeschool schedules as a guide for their day. They aren’t coming to me as the homeschool mom and asking me what to do each day. Instead, my students are looking at their homeschool planner and I am doing my part to make sure that I have a very clear to-do lists for them.
My biggest homeschool organization help hacks are simply to support good planning by you. A solid daily lesson plan for you as the leader is vital. Make sure that you have ALL your homeschool supplies, art supplies and copies of sheet work printed and ready for the day. I like to keep a file folder for the week. This is nice if we want to get ahead.
HOMESCHOOL ORGANIZATION HELP FOR MIDDLES
- Give them ownership of personal property
- Responsibility in breakfast and lunch meal planning
- Give them a daily planner
- Transfer responsibility of personal health routines
- Assign and execute weekly and daily chores
- Transfer responsibility of homeschool materials
Favorite Homeschool Organization Ideas for High Schoolers
If you’ve been able to get a head start on your homeschool routine with your high school students, they should be well on their way to being organized young adults. But if this is your first year of homeschooling with high schoolers, be assured, they can learn organizational skills in their everyday homeschool life.
Older teens often like to work away from the noise of younger siblings. if your are in a small space you might consider allowing your teen to work in their room, with the agreement that they need to check in and prove that progress is being made.
You can help your high school student develop their organization skills by providing a dedicated learning space. You don’t need a school room. You can homeschool quite well in small spaces. You need to be creative, but you can still have neat and orderly spaces. (at least at a few key times in the day) A work space doesn’t have to be large for your teen. In fact they tend to prefer nooks and cubbies to a larger, shared homeschool space.
One ways to help your teen get organized is to help them enjoy their work space. Additions like a lap desk for their bed or storage bins for their craft supplies and science experiments can go a long way. Provide great lighting for your night owl readers. Any organizational system that keeps them moving forward with less interruptions in their work day are a huge help.
Teaching Organization to Teens – Clear Instructions!
Get everyone on the same page from day one. Display a daily schedule and a establish a clear, location – like a designated shelf to TURN-IN completed work. Teen with good organization often are following clear instructions. A few of the different ways I have helped my teen while supporting their independence it to create an EXIT document. In it, I define what DONE looks like.
Line it all out for them. Assignments completed, chores done, school books putaway and so on.
In high school I hand over the filing system to them. I don’t spend time looking for a child’s assignments, text books, library books, or last minute small items they might need. I’ve had a few kids purchase a new workbook for one they lost and another work off lost library books with odd chores.
It is NOT personal
Your teens are responsible for their materials. It can be frustrating when they lose or destroy a book they need for the rest of the year. Don’t give in to the temptation to nag or get mad. Simply resolve the problem in the most efficient was possible. Buy a replacement and have them work for the balance.
What do I do if it shows up a month later? Let your teen sell the new copy on the local swap for half their money back. Let them learn the value of their time and labor.
Do you have trouble getting frustrated? Why are you helping your homeschooler get organized in the first place? Remember the focus is on helping your teen to become the best, responsible adult possible. Getting mad at them doesn’t add anything to the equation. If you need to, imagine that you are employing this kid. How would you solve this problem? This can help you look for rational, natural consequences that would occur in their future life.
I recommend connecting with the Love & Logic Institute with Jim Fey. I have adopted his cheery mantra, “Not a problem.” Every incident is an opportunity to find a meaningful solution and give your kids a chance to make things right. Can you imagine if everyone developed this habit? The work world would sure be a better place!
Resist the temptation to rescue them or to remove difficulty from them. Your teen can run to the store and inconvenience themselves if they forgot something. By high school we need to be giving some kind, but tough love.
My rule of thumb is; If employers and professors aren’t going to fix it for then, neither am I.
HOMESCHOOL ORGANIZATION HELP FOR HIGH SCHOOLERS
- Provide a space for their school supplies
- Clearly express the expectation that they arrive for the school day prepared
- Provide the ability to determine their school schedule with clear accountability
- Transfer responsibility of personal care, tracking/making appointments
- Provide a standard checkout procedure for school
- Establish a habit of cleaning up at the end of the school day
Homeschool Parents are in this together
As the homeschooling mom, you are not responsible for all of your family activity. Your biggest challenge is going to be passing off your responsibilities to their NEW owners. The homeschooling days are short when it comes to teaching your kids everything they need for life, but helping them live an organized life by keeping track of assignments, sticking to the chore chart and knowing how to create a meal plan is going to help them in life. Field trips get forgotten, note cards and glue sticks get tossed, but the work you do as homeschool families lives beyond the new school year. Remember that as you help your homeschooler get organized.
HOMESCHOOL ORGANIZATION HELP FOR THE WHOLE FMILY
- Provide clear expectations for every member
- Clearly define what each job looks like when it is completed
- Evaluate your spaces and homeschool setup
- Consolidate and purge extra items
- Get input from the whole family
- Use the power of play in building organizational skills sorting identifying like items and such
- Break down large tasks into manageable step by step operations
- Create a printed CHEAT SHEET for larger jobs like kitchen and bathroom cleaning
Are you a podcast listener?
Listen to episode 2 about to get more homeschool organization help in your homeschool at the In Due Season Homeschool Podcast.
