5 Must-Haves for Your First Year of Homeschooling
Starting your first year of homeschooling? These five practical homeschool must-haves help simplify your days, organize your supplies, support hands-on learning, and create a homeschool routine that works for your family.
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New to Homeschooling? Start With These 5 Things
Starting your first year of homeschooling can make you feel like you need to buy all the things. A full homeschool room. Shelves of curriculum. Every manipulative. An entire closet of craft supplies.
You don’t.
One of the biggest things I’ve learned is that the best homeschool supplies aren’t necessarily the ones that make your space look the most like a classroom. They’re the things that make your actual days at home easier.
The products I reach for most either keep our materials organized, give my kids a functional place to work, make everyday learning easier, or save me time and money behind the scenes.
If I were starting my first year of homeschooling all over again, these are the five things I’d want from day one.
1. Mainstays 12 Qt Clear Plastic Storage Bin with Carrying Handles
If there’s one thing homeschooling produces quickly, it’s stuff.
Curriculum books, workbooks, flash cards, manipulatives, pencils, scissors, glue sticks, the pile grows faster than you think. Having a simple system for containing everything from the beginning makes a huge difference.
I love these clear Mainstays storage bins because they’re inexpensive, portable, and you can immediately see what’s inside. Use one for each child, dedicate different bins to different subjects, or create a grab-and-go bin with everything you need for your daily lessons.
And that portability matters. Homeschooling doesn’t necessarily have to happen at a desk, or even in the same room every day. You can grab the bin and move to the kitchen table, couch, porch, or wherever makes sense that day.
You don’t need an elaborate organization system. You just need your homeschool supplies to have a home.
Why it made my top five: It keeps homeschool materials contained, accessible, and easy to put away when the school day is over.
2. Martha Stewart Kids’ Art Table and Stool Set
You absolutely do not need a dedicated homeschool room to homeschool successfully. But I DO think having a designated place where kids can comfortably sit, work, create, and learn is incredibly helpful.
The Martha Stewart Kids’ Art Table has been one of those pieces that works for so much more than “school.” It can be used for handwriting and math one minute and LEGO builds, coloring, Play-Doh, or crafting the next.
I especially love having a child-sized workspace for younger learners. Instead of trying to make an adult-sized dining table work for little bodies, they’re able to sit and work in a space designed for them.
A dedicated learning space also creates a subtle routine cue: when we sit here, we’re ready to work.
That doesn’t mean you need to recreate a classroom inside your house. The goal is simply to create spaces within your home that support the things your family wants to do there.
Why it made my top five: It’s a functional, kid-friendly workspace that can grow far beyond your homeschool lessons.
3. The Peanutshell Learning Calendar Wall Chart
When you’re homeschooling for the first time, figuring out the rhythm of your day can feel harder than choosing the curriculum. This calendar gives us a simple visual anchor for starting our homeschool day.
Calendar time naturally introduces so many early learning concepts, days of the week, months, dates, seasons, weather, patterns, counting, and the passage of time, without needing to turn each one into a formal lesson.
It’s also something kids can actively participate in rather than simply look at.
Especially with younger homeschoolers, I love resources that allow us to build learning into predictable daily routines. You don’t have to teach every skill through a worksheet or curriculum lesson. Sometimes the things you repeat for five minutes every morning end up creating some of the most meaningful learning.
Why it made my top five: It creates an easy starting point for the homeschool day while building practical calendar and early learning skills through repetition.
4. Canon PIXMA G6020 All-in-One MegaTank Printer
Of everything on this list, a good printer might be the thing I underestimated most before homeschooling. You will print. A lot. Curriculum pages. Printables. Activities. Coloring pages. Worksheets. Games. Last-minute resources you find at 9:47 the night before you need them.
Having a reliable printer at home means I’m not thinking twice every time I want to print something for my kids.
The Canon PIXMA G6020 uses refillable ink tanks instead of traditional cartridges, which is a huge benefit when you’re printing regularly. For a homeschool family, the cost of constantly replacing traditional ink cartridges can add up quickly.
It also prints, copies, and scans, so it becomes one of those behind-the-scenes homeschool tools you don’t realize how often you’re using until you don’t have it. If you’re building your homeschool supply list and debating where to spend versus save, I’d put a quality refillable-tank printer pretty high on the list.
Why it made my top five: It makes printing at home easy and practical without making me feel like every full-color worksheet is costing me $4 in ink.
5. Fiskars Training Scissors for Ages 3+
This might seem like a surprisingly specific product to make a top-five list, but if you’re homeschooling preschool, kindergarten, or younger elementary kids, hear me out. Learning to use scissors is a skill.
Kids have to coordinate opening and closing their hands, moving the scissors forward, holding and turning the paper, and following a line, all at the same time.
Training scissors help bridge the gap between I have no idea what I’m doing with these things and independently cutting with traditional scissors.
The spring-action design helps the scissors reopen after each cut, allowing kids to focus on learning the squeezing motion while they’re developing the hand strength and coordination they need.
Cutting also isn’t just an art skill. It’s fantastic fine motor practice that supports many of the same hand muscles kids eventually rely on for handwriting and other everyday tasks.
Why it made my top five: They make it easier for young children to learn an important fine motor skill independently and successfully.
Honorable Mentions: Two More Things I’d Add to Your Cart
I promised five, but there are two inexpensive supplies I would have a hard time homeschooling without.
Ticonderoga My First Short Triangular Wood-Cased Pencils
For little hands learning to write, pencil size and shape matter more than you might think.
These short triangular pencils are much easier for young kids to control than a long traditional pencil, and the triangular shape naturally encourages a more functional grip. They’re especially helpful during those early years when kids are still developing the fine motor strength and control necessary for handwriting.
9″ x 12″ Double-Sided Dry Erase Boards
If you’re homeschooling, get the mini whiteboards. Actually, get several.
We use dry erase boards constantly because they allow the girls to practice without the permanence of putting an answer on paper. They’re perfect for handwriting, spelling, phonics, math problems, drawing models, practicing letters and numbers, or quickly working through something together.
They’re also one of my favorite tools for direct instruction because I can model something on my board while one of the girls works alongside me on theirs. Erase it and try again. No wasted paper and no big deal if the first answer is wrong.
What You Actually Need for Your First Year of Homeschooling
You can homeschool without every single product on this list. You can homeschool at your kitchen table. You can use supplies you already own. You can slowly figure out what your family needs instead of buying an entire classroom before your first day. In fact, I recommend it.
Your first year is going to teach you a lot about how your family learns best. The goal isn’t to make your home look more like a school. It’s to create a home that makes learning easier to live out every day. That’s ultimately why these five products made my list. They aren’t here because they’re trendy homeschool supplies. They’re here because they solve little problems that otherwise create friction throughout the day.
A place for the stuff.
A place for kids to work.
A visual rhythm for the day.
A practical way to print what you need.
And tools that make learning new skills a little easier.
Start there. You can build the rest of your homeschool as you go.
If you’re ready to take things a step further, head over to my Homeschool page, where I’ve rounded up even more of our favorite homeschool supplies, learning tools, organization must-haves, curriculum resources, and products we actually use. Think of this list as your starting point, and that page as the place to go when you’re ready to up your homeschool game.
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I’m Katelyn!
Hi, I’m Katelyn! Join me for creative, intentional family fun and practical home management tips! Parenting is hard, but I’ve got the tools to help you create a calmer, more intentional home!
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About Katelyn Collier , MAT
Katelyn Collier is a former elementary school teacher turned homeschooling mom of three and the founder of A Pop of You. She’s passionate about helping families step away from the pressure of today’s fast-paced culture and create homes filled with presence, joy, and balance. Through her resources and podcast, she shares simple, practical tools to reclaim childhood and make family life feel lighter and more intentional.
Masters DEgree in elementary education
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