Homeschooling can generate chaos unlike anything else if you do not have some sort of planning and record keeping system. There are a variety of homeschool planners and organizers available online, both free and for purchase. The organizers are in several formats. The most common free planner type are files in PDF. These can be downloaded and displayed in the free Adobe Acrobat Reader. There are also organizer pages that are in word processor or spreadsheet format. These can be changed and customized to fit your homeschool then printed. Online record keepers that are accessed through the Internet are also available although they are less common. Finally, there are several excellent software programs that allow you to keep a wide variety of records on your computer. These programs have many different options for creating reports and assignment lists and some even offer the ability to create transcripts. The one that is best will depend on your family, your organization style, and the ages and learning styles of your children.
Free Online Homeschooling Organizers
Home School, Inc. has a comprehensive planner called PER - Plan, Educate, Record. PER is a "FREE web based planner for your home school. Use PER to plan ahead, or as a diary to record your children's learning accomplishments. PER does the clerical work creating flexible schedules, calendars, summaries, and reports. Use with any homeschooling method or curriculum. PER creates a safe place to show you what your family has done, is doing, and will do!"
Free Homeschooling Organizers To Print & Complete
Free Homeschool Organizer Download - TheHomeSchoolMom Homeschool Organizer is a weekly planner with assignment sheets designed for moms with any number of children. Simply choose the number of columns you would like to have on your Assignment Sheet (up to 3), and print as many as you need for your students. The organizer has a "week-at-a-glance" style planner that can be used in any three ring binder. The planner includes a Unit Study Planner and Unit Study Worksheet as well as an Unschooling Record Keeper.
Donna Young - YoungMinds has put together the largest selection of record keeping forms for homeschool that I have found. Forms are available in either PDF or Word format. PDF documents cannot be edited without expensive software, but Word documents can be edited on your computer and the resulting forms can be printed. If you wish to customize your forms then you should choose the Word format.
Organized Home Household Planner Forms - If you are looking for a place to help you get started on your way to organization, Organized Home is that place. Be sure to look around the whole site and take advantage of the many free articles, but the real jewel are these household planner forms.They offer dozens of forms for just about any organizational need you may have!
Heritage Highland Forms - Almost 500 forms, most using Acrobat Reader, for organizing your homeschool. Includes teacher forms, portfolio forms, and a variety of academic forms that would be excellent for notebooking and lap books ™.
Chart Jungle - Daily, weekly, and monthly homeschool schedules; image files to be printed from your browser
Free Homeschooling Organizer Software
Homeschool Tracker - Keep track of assignments, attendance, reading logs, field trips, grades, and more. Tracker allows you to print a variety of reports including assignments on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. We use Homeschool Tracker and I can't say enough about the value of this free program. The free version is not a trial and has no expiration date. Tracker also offers an upgrade to the Plus version with more features for a fee. Windows only.
Homeschooling Planners Available for Purchase
Price key:
$ 1-15
$$ 15-25
$$$ 26-35
$$$$ 36+
Full-Year Notebook System - A customizable download that can be used by everyone from unschoolers to packaged curriculum users, the Full-Year Notebook is a system that organizes all of your curriculum choices for the whole school year and compiles all of it into one notebook per child. It is more of a complete scheduling product than just a homeschool planner. $$$
Homeschool Solutions - With Homeschool Solutions, you can easily record, organize and print all kinds of important information from your PC. 30-day free trial; Homeschool Solutions requires a Windows 95/98 PC with at least a 486 processor, at least 32 MB RAM, and a CD-ROM drive; There are two products that allow Mac users to run PC software: Virtual PC by Connectix and SoftWindows by Insignia ( If a Mac user has either of these products, they can run Homeschool Solutions.) $$$
Homeschool Reporting Online - Internet-based record keeper; 30-day free trial; discount for HSLDA members; free for umbrella organizations or schools $$
Homeschool Planner and Portfolio - "The Homeschool Planner and Portfolio is a record-keeping software designed to keep all of your homeschool information neatly organized on your computer... This program allows you to keep track of attendance, exactly how much time was spent on each subject, and the course grade received for each subject." Windows & Mac. $$
Homeschool Easy Records - Features: K-12, unlimited students, unlimited years, lesson planning and individual assignment printouts, progress reports, report cards, and transcripts - automatically, customizable school calendar and grading scale, unit study and course planning, reading list tracker , journal capabilities, automated time and attendance tracking - no daily entry required; Windows only. $$$$
Homeschool Organizers - Loose leaf 3-ring binder with a complete year's worth of record keeping logs and forms. $$$
Homeschool Organize - "Home School ORGANIZE! is a tool for home schooling parents to organize some of the aspects of home education and family life. It allows users to create customized lesson plan, chore and theme charts. It also includes a calendar printing module and a database to track the family library." Windows only. $$$ (Developers will consider barters for homeschool curriculum; missionaries and clergy can get a copy for $5)
Edu-Track Home School Organizer - Comprehensive software program tracking all areas of the homeschool including: Lesson Plans, Progress Reports, Teacher's Journal, Attendance, Assignment Sheets, Transcripts, and more. Includes tools to organize student data, unit studies, report cards, etc. $$$$ ($5 demo CD available)