The Cheapest Homeschool Planner You Will Ever Love

This article is by Sherry K. Hayes of Large Family Mothering.

Planners should be like fingerprints; no two should be alike. But printed planners, and most printable planners, don’t leave much room for personalization, and they are often very, very expensive, both in money and time spent looking for just the “right” one!

Believe it or not, it is possible to create a beautiful, extremely personal, planner for under a dollar. Seem far-fetched? Let me show you how…

First of all, you will need to gather up some basic school and office supplies. I am using a 50 cent composition book that I found at a school supply sale, and then embellishing it with some scrapbooking papers that I received as a gift last Christmas (here is a YouTube tutorial explaining how to cover the composition book).

Next, you need to decide what sorts of pages you will need to create for the interior. Here are some ideas:

• A calendar that covers the whole year. I have printed mine from Donna Young, cut it out, pasted it in, and then decorated the page.

• A calendar page(s) for each month

• Some pages for planning/recording a week at a glance

• Some pages for general notes, planning recording, etc.

• Pages for tracking hours spent for, say, transcripts for an older child

• Pages for keeping track of online passwords and phone numbers and addresses

• Blog planning pages

• A way to track what each child is doing (for this one I made my own photo corners and placed index cards in them)

I also took a manila envelope and created a pocket on the inside page, added a ribbon as a bookmark, and some sticky flags covered in clear tape as tabs.

Here is the notation system I use when I write in my planners:

You can get the pdf and print it out for yourself here.

And there you have it—a planner that is 1) tailored to my needs, 2) easy to put together, and 3) CHEAP!

Need more encouragement and inspiration? Just click over to my blog, Large Family Mothering, where I share all about homeschooling my 15 children to the glory of God!

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Sherry Hayes

Sherry K. Hayes loves the Lord Jesus Christ, her husband, and all of their 15 children! She has been homeschooling for more than 25 years, has seen the “graduation” of eight of her children, and continues to enjoy the remaining 7 as they live and love together at the foot of the Rocky Mountains in scenic Colorado. You can read more about her family and her children on her blog, Large Family Mothering.

Latest posts by Sherry Hayes (see all)

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• Notebooking Homeschool High School Science - June 2, 2017
• 3 Dirt-Cheap Nutrition Boosters Children Can Love - November 4, 2015
• The One Textbook Your Kids Will Never Put Down - January 12, 2015
• How to Save Your Food Budget from the Feast or Famine Cycle - November 10, 2014