Books & equipment

Offline resources

Workbooks, reading books, maths and science equipment are all key additions to any educational environment. But as a home educator where can you get your hands on everything you need to help bring learning to life for your child?
Visit our chapter on finding communities and support to discover the best way of linking with other home-educating parents. You might find others in your area who are keen to pool and share resources.

Experiences and real-life learning

The single most amazing resource available to you for educating your child at home is the world around you. Your child can learn all about capacity and measures without even leaving their kitchen. Why not take your lesson about friction out into the garden or the park?
The best bit about educating from home is that you are not constricted by school hours. And so why not visit that museum, explore that castle or walk on that beach? Home education is a great opportunity to share all of your passions and interests with your child as well!

Workbooks and textbook

Most high street retailers stock an excellent supply of National Curriculum aligned textbooks, revision guides and workbooks perfect for supplementing your lessons.
Many of these books are tailored to the relevant exam board if your child is approaching their GCSEs and the younger books are geared towards essential skills in maths and literacy for your primary-aged child.
Your local library will also be an invaluable resource for giving you free access to a broad range of books and texts to study if you don’t want to purchase a copy yourself.

Downloads and printables

The Internet is a veritable cornucopia of printable teaching resources and worksheets. Many classroom teachers magnanimously choose to share their creative endeavors online, many of which you can access and download for free.
TES – A wide range of teacher created resources and activities, many of which are free to download.
Primary Resources – A hub of printable and editable worksheets and activities for all subjects in the primary curriculum.
Oxford Owl – Created by Oxford University Press and packed full of ideas and resources for educators.

The single most amazing resource available to you for educating your child at home is the world around you. Your child can learn all about capacity and measures without even leaving their kitchen. Why not take your lesson about friction out into the garden or the park?

Miss Amy, teacher and homeschooling writer

EdPlace have created a variety of versatile and printable templates, to help children become independent learners! We have a range of supportive resources and guided worksheets that complement our curriculum aligned activities, ensuring an all-inclusive learning experience. Simply download and print off your chosen resource to guide and support planned activities!

• Social Stories

  Download
• Reward Chart

  Download
• Timeline

  Download
• Emotions Chart

  Download
• Thermometer

  Download
• Story Glove

  Download
• Word Mat

  Download
• Now and next

  Download
• Mindmap

  Download
• Colourful Semantics

  Download
• Creative writing frame

  Download
• Story flow chart

  Download
• Self levelling scale

  Download

Online resources

If you’re planning to follow the National Curriculum, however closely, finding a resource site that’s aligned to the schemes of work could be a great asset to your teaching, helping you to follow a logical path of progression through your child’s education and ensure you don’t miss out anything crucial.

One of the biggest challenges in providing an education is keeping tabs on what your child has learnt already, and what they still need to achieve. Gaps in your child’s learning, even at a young age, can cause them difficulties and unnecessary challenges further down the line. But don’t panic! Your helpful heroes at EdPlace have worked hard to keep home educators afloat and their children on track, or even ahead of the curve, with our adaptive and responsive learning tools.

EdPlace offers interactive worksheets covering key stages 1 to 4 in the core subjects of English, maths, and science. Our resources will also help you to keep track of your child’s learning through assessments and tailor their next activities based upon their rate and level of learning. Our resources are an excellent accompaniment to your home education journey, your guru, your guidebook or your light for the road ahead, if you will.

Learn more

Other sites, such as BBC Bitesize, can give you access to topic information, games and competition-based activities to support your teaching. CBBC Newsround is a great resource for approaching current affairs and the news with a child-friendly slant. Oxplore is another fantastic resource to help you tackle big questions with your child.

Don’t write off social media as a mere distraction either. Check out YouTube or other video sharing websites to explore countless videos perfect for supplementing and enhancing your teaching, for inspiring questions and answering them. Simply type your topic into the search bar and have fun falling down the educational rabbit hole (just don’t get distracted by all the cute kitten videos!). You could also join Facebook groups such as Homeschooling Projects and Ideas UK to swap and share ideas with other homeschooling parents.