Have you SEEN the price of ink toner recently? (Gulp.)
Like everything in our society, prices are really going up. For some homeschooling families, spending tons of money on printer ink toner is just not as important as purchasing meat for tacos on Tuesday night — and those are just the facts!
Our family was in a similar situation back in 2013, when we first started Homeschooling Torah. In fact, we never envisioned families needing to print very much at all in order to homeschool their children.
However, over the past 11 years, we have had numerous requests to make printable workbooks for students to use. Those are definitely handy on busy days — but I thought you might enjoy hearing some good, old-fashioned ideas for homeschooling economically.
Idea #1 – Use a Kindle or Tablet
My TOP idea is to invest in an e-reader like Amazon Kindle. (Yes, this is an affiliate link.)
Another option would be to get an inexpensive tablet, such as the inexpensive Amazon Fire or a small Samsung tablet (and yes, these are also affiliate links).
Tablets and e-readers are awesome because it’s easy to turn PDFs, like the ones we use at Homeschooling Torah, into e-books you can read on Kindle’s app or in any PDF reader. Refurbished tablets usually work just fine for this.
Idea #2 – Download Your Curriculum to Your Kindle or Tablet
Now that you’ve got your Kindle or tablet in hand, it’s time to open your Homeschooling Torah membership and download the PDF teacher guides to your device.
- On a Kindle: You can send all files to your Kindle with their “Send to Kindle” app, and it’s so easy!
- On a tablet: Here is a blog post that explains how to read PDF files on ANY device. It’s not hard!
Idea #3 – Stay Organized
I honestly think the key to using a device instead of printing your curriculum is to STAY ORGANIZED. It’s easy to lose virtual files on a device, amen?
If you struggle with staying organized in a digital world, check out my handy blog post on that here. The general idea is to be sure to make folders where you consistently save files. Bible files should go into a Bible folder… Arithmetic files into an arithmetic folder… and so on. Set it up right the first time, and you’ll have a huge head start.
Idea #4 – Teach from Your Device
This is the easy part. Simply open the PDF lesson plans on your device and start teaching. Here are some screenshots of how this might look.
Idea #5 – Have Children Make Their Own “Notebooks”
Children don’t NEED workbooks. (Gasp!) It’s true!
For thousands of years many years, we parents all used old-fashioned notebook paper and spiral notebooks, and we copied from textbooks that the public schools let us borrow.
This method still works!
Your Kindle or tablet can become the “textbook,” and your students can write their answers on notebook paper or into a spiral notebook.
For example, if they want to make a “notebooking” page for Science, it can go onto notebook paper instead.
The same holds true for Torah notebooking pages, history notebooking pages, or any other writing assignment. (Learn more about notebooking here.)
For arithmetic, simply have your students write their answers onto notebook paper, rather than using up a worksheet.
Children who are learning to read and write might need LARGER paper, such as special paper usually available at a dollar store. Here is an example of 500 sheets of paper from Amazon.
You could also encourage them to write on an inexpensive white board, such as this example from Amazon. This is MUCH cheaper at your local dollar store.
Here is how their Word Power pages might look on a Kindle. How could you creatively turn this into something you could do at home without printing?
All of this can get a little tricky if you have many children and only ONE tablet or device, so this might take some scheduling forethought. You can get scheduling ideas on our website here.
Idea #6 – Keep Track of Your Homeschooling Records
In 2023, I made a video about how to keep good homeschooling records. I mentioned our “Together School Planner,” a free resource available to all Homeschooling Torah members.
Here’s the secret… You could quickly MAKE a planner like this for YOURSELF, on inexpensive paper or in a spiral notebook. 🙂
And so it goes, across the curriculum.
I have no doubt you can be resourceful! You will still need to purchase a few books for history, but even here, you can get the e-books MUCH cheaper — or use interlibrary loan to borrow books as much as possible from your local library. Don’t forget to check out the “bonuses” section of your membership, where you can get MUCH of what you need for Ancient History at a discount or no cost at all. Your cost for books can be lowered WAY down with these methods.
May YHVH our Father supply your every need and fill you with His Creative Ruach, as you teach your children in His paths!
P.S. Epson EcoTank is an over-the-long-run option for more affordable printing at home. It’s not cheap to invest in an EcoTank printer, but once you do, the price of refilling ink is much cheaper than many other options.
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