How to Create Learning Spaces

So you’ve decided to homeschool! Congratulations! You’ve bought the curriculum, books, resources, and supplies. But where do you put everything?

Any Available Space Will Work

The good news is you don’t need a separate homeschool room to store it all. Use your dining table, the couch, or even your child’s bedroom. The great thing about homeschooling is it can be done anywhere.

Separate Room

If you have a room you don’t use much you can convert it into a homeschool room. We have a den that we never used was completely empty. When we started homeschooling our oldest daughter four years ago we added a desk and a cube storage shelf for curriculum, books, and supplies. It was perfect for us starting out in kindergarten!

Over the years we’ve added bookcases, a storage cabinet, a comfy chair for me, and another desk for my youngest daughter. Just remember you don’t need all the things! We’ve accumulated resources and books over the years.

How To Utilize Every Space

Most homeschool families do school work at the kitchen table. It’s a perfect spot really! Plenty of room for everyone to sit together and sprawl out any books or resources you need to use. If you’re using your kitchen or dining room for homeschool a great way to store things is in a hutch, buffet table, or even a kitchen cabinet! I store a lot of various supplies in the hutch in my kitchen as well as a lot of arts and crafts supplies in a kitchen cabinet.

If you are using your living room or even your child’s bedroom a great option for storing supplies is a small bookshelf or cube storage unit. If you have multiple children you can use a separate shelf for each of their books and resources. Or use different shelves for different subjects. I’ve also seen families store all of their resources in a storage tote under the bed. Just pull it out when needed and hide it away when you’re done.

Another great option for limited space storage is a rolling cart. It’s a perfect way to store multiple resources, books, and supplies. And the great thing about them is they’re on wheels and can be moved throughout your home! I’ve also seen storage compartments that fit perfectly inside the cart!

Functional Storage Pieces

I’m a huge fan of organization! I feel it makes the day go smoother when things are easy to find. One of my favorite sayings is “A place for everything and everything in it’s place.” I love having a spot for everything so it’s easy to locate items. I love finding storage containers for various supplies. If you are using a shared space for homeschooling, but don’t want to see all the homeschool supplies storage containers are perfect to hide things! When I’m beginning to organize I set out all the things I would like to hide. Then I think about what type of container I could use to store them. I love browsing the aisles of Hobby Lobby to find cute but functional storage pieces.

A great way to store curriculum is using magazine holders. You can get one for each child or for each subject. They’re perfect for holding books and notebooks.

We use a file folder box for storing loose worksheets. I keep worksheets for both of my daughters in the same box separated by weeks. These boxes are also a great option to hold your child’s completed work from throughout the year.

If you have any small resources or supplies like manipulatives, photo storage boxes are a great way to keep them all together. I have one box for all math related supplies and one box for language arts.

I also use them for nature resources. Any 3 part cards, fact cards, and other small cards are a perfect fit. These particular photo storage boxes come with tabbed dividers so I separate the cards by topic.

Speaking of nature resources, I use a binder with page protectors to store all of our large printed resources. Anytime we are learning about a certain topic I can just flip through the binder and easily find what in need.

I am a huge fan of buckets for holding art supplies! They’re perfect for pencils, paintbrushes, markers, crayons, you name it! You can find so many various shapes and sizes at Hobby Lobby. We love this utensil holder from Ikea repurposed as art supply storage. You can also store them in a box with a handle for easy transport.

Pretty much any type of container or basket works. I always try to think about the things I need to store then look for containers/ baskets that they could fit in easily.

Use What You Have

One of my favorite ways to find storage solutions is just by looking around my house! I like to repurpose a lot of jars from marinara sauces or candles. I just clean them out and remove any labels. We store a lot of art supplies, loose parts, and these coins from Treasures From Jennifer in old candle jars.

You can also repurpose various packaging. We used this divided wooden tray from a Melissa and Doug car set for our nature treasures.

Multi-use Resources

When looking for resources I always like to find multi-use pieces. I like looking for high quality items that can be used as the years go on. There are so many beautiful homeschool resources available now. It’s easy to want all the things! Whenever I find myself interested in something I always ask myself two questions before purchasing. Can it be used more than once and can it be used in more than one way? If the answer to both questions is yes then it’s in the running for our homeschool. I also like to see if I have things that are similar or have the same goal or purpose. If I do then I typically won’t purchase it. You can read more about my favorite homeschool resources here. One of my favorite resources is this Hundred Frame board from Treasures From Jennifer. This is the most used resource in our homeschool! There are many different coins available to use with them board. Numbers, fractions, multiplication facts, letters, and math symbols. We use this many ways when studying math and even language arts.

Utilize the Library

It’s so hard for me not to buy all the books! I love books! If I wouldn’t have become a teacher I would have wanted to be a librarian. We use so many books in our homeschool! If I bought every book we have ever used in our homeschool journey, my entire house would be filled with them! So instead, we utilize the library. I typically look on our library’s online catalog and reserve books pertaining to what we’ll be studying. I try to get books for a whole month but sometimes there’s a lot so I just get a few weeks worth.

I like to keep our library books separate so it’s easier for me to keep track of them. A floor basket or small bookshelf is perfect for storing them. It also makes it easier to see what’s there. I love this book display from Ikea.

Just remember, every family’s needs are different. Some families need to store a lot of books because they’re library is closed. Some families need more manipulatives and hands on resources to store because their children are kinesthetic learners. Some families need storage for arts and crafts supplies because they do a lot of hands on projects. I tried to list some ideas for all types of situations and storage solutions, but I know there are even more needs that I didn’t cover. But hopefully this gave you some inspiration and will help you to think outside the box for storage solutions. If you still have questions about creating learning spaces and storage solutions I’d love to help! Feel free to send me an email (withhisgrace@yahoo.com) or message me on Instagram!