With the sudden closure of schools and numerous businesses over the past couple of weeks, homeschooling has become a necessity. For some of you who already have resources together, this is a piece of cake. For others, the question “Where do I even start?!?” is replaying over and over. Regardless of where you currently stand, it’s my hope that you find this comprehensive list of FREE homeschooling resources organized by subject and grade level helpful. 

This list of free homeschooling resources is something I’ve put together for use with my own children. I’m hopeful it can save you a lot of time and money! I’ve personally gone onto each website and am only recommending sites that are truly free to use and that offer high-quality resources.

Cross-Curricular – Free Homeschooling Resources

All Grade Levels

Varsity Tutors has introduced a virtual school day during this time of school closures. They are offering a number of live classes for students of all ages. When you sign in, you will see the available classes as well as their start dates and the levels they are ideally for. Topics include things like Video Game Sound Design, The Science of Pandemics, and Elementary Spanish. There are many topics to choose from. Most classes are 60-90 minutes in length and range in the number of live sessions required to complete the course. Time zones the teachers are in vary, so be sure classes will work with your local time before signing up.

Khan Academy offers many excellent free homeschooling resources for math, arts and humanities, computing, science, and more. They do require that your child signs up using your email, a username and password. Once signed in, your child will enter his/her grade. Resources specific to the grade will then show up. A skill summary is shown as your child works through tasks. When your child signs up, they will use their parent’s email. You will receive an email to approve your child’s account.

CK-12 has resources for many core school subjects including some of the higher level subjects such as algebra and calculus.

Phet has interactive simulations for science and math. This website is designed for students from elementary all the way through university levels. 

PBS Learning Media has numerous resources for students ranging in age from pre-K all the way to grade 12. On their platform, you are able to choose learning materials by subject and grade.

All Grade Levels with Resources in Languages Other than English

Brain Pop is offering free access to their site while schools are closed. They have many great lessons and resources. What I especially love is that they also have sections for ELL Learners as well as resources in French and Spanish for those students taking their schooling in languages other than English.

Brain Pop requires that you indicate the school division you are part of as well as your child’s specific school before you are given access. Once in, you have full access to learning materials for every school subject. Worksheets and quizzes are provided for lessons along with additional reading material on the specific subject being learned about. 

Curriculum Associates offers free printable learning packs for K-12 students in the subject areas of mathematics and reading. Resources are offered in both English and Spanish. Simply indicate your general location upon going to the website. Once done, hit continue and you will see Printable At-Home Activity Packs approximately halfway down the page.

Secondary Students and Older

OpenClassrooms offers hundreds of free courses in coding, business development and more. It is ideal for high school students and older.

Elementary and Middle School

National Geographic Kids also offers a lot of amazing resources that our kids are sure to find interesting. This site is ideal for children between the ages of 6 and 13. They have a homework help section which covers a number of downloadable tips for students working on assignments. To add to this, they also include a section of quizzes.

Scholastic Learn at Home has a variety of reading material and assignments organized by grade level. Choices range from pre-K to grades 6+. Simply scroll to the bottom of the home page, choose the grade level you are looking for, and voila!

Oppia has a number of lessons in various subject areas for students from Kindergarten through 8th grade. Some lessons are of better quality than others, but it’s definitely worth checking out!

Fun Brain offers educational games as well as access to popular books for our kindergarten to grade 8 children to read.

Wonderopolis is a platform in which children get factual answers to questions they have often wondered about.

Elementary

Eduprintables offers free printables to use with students from pre-k to third grade. Some of my favorite printables from their website include sight word games.

Starfall is a great interactive website for kindergarten to third grade students. It includes resources for language arts, math and music.

Have Fun Teaching is a YouTube channel that’s perfect for teaching letters and basic math for early elementary students through fun interactive songs.

KidLit TV has a number of children’s books being read aloud by authors and others. In addition to this, there are links to crafts and other activities.

English Language Arts

All Ages

Have a library card? Try out the Libby app for access to eBooks and audiobooks. 

Elementary and Middle School

Heifer International is offering access to a few free books. Books are separated by elementary and secondary levels. Entering your name and email address gives you access to their resources. They have books available in both English and Spanish.

Paragraph Punch assists students with writing detailed paragraphs online. 

Literacy with the Littles is offering a number of freebies in their online store. These resources are mainly targeted to elementary students, but they do have a few resources for students up to grade 5.

Elementary

Novel Effect is an app you can download. It is designed to play as you read a story aloud that is recognized by the app. It then brings the book to life by adding sound effects at the perfect time! Click here to see a list of books the app will recognize.

Storyline offers a number of great children’s stories being read by screen actors. This site is ideal for students from Kindergarten to 4th grade. Beneath each video of a story being read by a screen actor, there is a link for a teacher’s guide. This guide indicates the suggested grade level for the story. Along with that, you will find suggested procedures for before viewing, during viewing, and post-viewing. It also offers suggestions for a writing activity as well as for cross-curricular extension activities. 

I have found an easy way to navigate Storyline is to go to their library which then gives quick details on the suggested grade levels for each book, so you can sort through them that way.

Learning A-Z is offering full access to their Raz-Kids and Headsprout resources. Raz-Kids has a number of leveled books and quizzes specifically for students from grades K-2. Headsprout is an online reading program designed to adapt to the needs of the reader. Its target audience is students from K-6.

Handwriting Heroes has free videos showing how to form letters correctly. This is ideal for young students learning letter formation. Their iPad app is also free at this time.

Unite for Literacy has a number of free books for primary students to read.

Mathematics

High School and Beyond

Need access to a specific calculator, but don’t have one yet? With more than 1,000 online calculators, Omni Calculator is sure to have what you’re looking for!

All Grade Levels

In need of a math tutor for your child? Math Celebrity offers math tutoring for students anywhere from grade 2 all the way through college level. You simply enter the concept or equation and receive instant tutoring. 

Elementary and Middle School

EdHelper is offering free math workbooks each week for students in grades 1 through 6 while schools are closed.

Science

All Grade Levels

Nasa offers STEM lessons for students of all ages. 

The Concord Consortium offers hundreds of STEM lessons and activities for students of all ages including post-secondary.

Middle School

Defined Learning has a number of STEM projects offered for free for students in grades 3 through 12.

Discovery Mind Blown offers free episodes, how-to videos, and games on a number of exciting science topics for students 8 and older. Their videos and resources are interactive and engaging.

EveryDay Earth offers vivid interactive units regarding Earth’s hydrosphere and how water shapes the land. They also have a unit coming soon on the rock cycle.

Science News for Students is an online magazine written for students aged 9-14.

Bill Nye has a number of resources for trying at-home science demos along with an explanation of the science behind each.

Science Mom is currently offering a science series called Quarentime. It is streamed live on her YouTube channel M-F from 8:00-10:00am. However, videos then remain online so catching up on any episodes missed is easy to do!

Elementary

Camp Invention has a great STEM activity guide complete with at-home instructions for completing the activities.

Facts4Me is offering free access to their safe research site for elementary readers until April 4th, 2020. I love how this site has made it easy for children researching specific topics. This site is ideal for students in grades 1 through 6. For free access, click the red login button and use the following: Username: read Password: read

Mystery Science is offering free science lessons for students from kindergarten through 5th grade. Simply indicate which grade level you are looking for and you will have access to a number of excellent lesson videos and printouts.

Ocean School is offering a number of high-quality video lessons and activities for anyone intrigued by the science of the ocean… so pretty much everyone!

Social Studies

Upper Elementary and Middle School

History for Kids focuses on history of a variety of topics and locations around the world. Worksheets are provided to help out.

Health and Wellness

The Canada Olympic School Program offers resources for students from grade 2 through grade 12. I love that each lesson highlights the topic, type of activity, and value (eg. respect, friendship) being focused on.

Physical Education

All Ages

PEsimplegames is a YouTube channel created by a teacher in Japan as a way to continue to encourage active living for students. This teacher definitely has some fun with this which adds to the appeal.

Elementary

Go Noodle is a great resource to use with our Kindergarten to grade 2 children. It’s sure to get our kids exercising and having a lot of fun!

Little Twisters Yoga currently has all of their yoga programs available for free during this time of school closures.

Have Amazon Echo*? If so, try Mission 2 Move. This program works with Alexa to bring some movement and mindfulness into your day! * (affiliate link)

iMoves aims to get kids moving each and every day. They email parents and teachers movement activities that can be done with their children daily.

Music

Musiclab is completely free to use. Upon choosing a specific music lab to work in, be sure to click on the question mark at the top right of the lab. This will provide instructions for the program.

Fine Arts

High School and Beyond

Is your high school student interested in filmmaking? If so, you will definitely want to check out Moviola. They offer a number of free courses covering any topic needed for creating a film!

All Grade Levels

LZM Studio offers a number of drawing lessons on YouTube. The videos are suited for ages 7 to 107!

Elementary and Middle School

Felt with Love Designs offers a number of free patterns and tutorials to teach children basic sewing.

Technology 

Middle School/High School

Mouse Open Projects works with Scratch to get your child coding online for free. This is ideal for students in grades 5 and higher.

Elementary/Middle

Nitro Type is a free resource for practicing typing. It also allows our children to race against their friends virtually, adding some extra motivation!

Typing Club offers a number of lessons designed to teach children typing skills.

Learn a New Language

All Ages

DuoLingo offers basic language lessons in a number of languages. What I truly appreciate is that you also get to choose what you want the focus of your learning to be. 

Elementary

Basho and Friends is offering their immersive Spanish classes for children for free during the school closures. Spanish is taught using a lot of music that helps to keep children engaged. This is a great way to have your children introduced to Spanish over the next few months.

Movie Time!

All Grade Levels

ReelEducation offers free films and lesson plans that help teach our children empathy for others. They aim to raise awareness and promote inclusion.

Homeschool Hideout has a blog post featuring a list of more than 150 educational shows to watch on Netflix. What makes it especially great is that it’s even organized by educational category. I know not all of the shows are available in each country, but it’s still a great list worth checking out!

Virtual Field Trips

Eduprintables has a list of zoos, museums and aquariums offering free virtual tours. 

Wow Travel Agency offers virtual field trips to a number of  great locations including Ireland, Disney World, Jamaica, and more. To add to the fun, they even have a downloadable virtual passport and passport stamps.

Google Earth is offering virtual tours of 31 national parks across the United States.

Farm Food 360 offers virtual field trips for a number of Canadian farm and food tours.

Author/Illustrator Visits

Children’s author/illustrator Oliver Jeffers is doing a daily read aloud at noon daily via Instagram Live. 

Children’s author/illustrator Mac Barnett is also offering read alouds via Instagram Live. He posts when his next read aloud will be on his Instagram page.

Ben Clanton, the author/illustrator of the Narwhal & Jelly books, posts the occasional drawing class for children on his Facebook page.

Author and illustrator, Arree Chung, is offering a free creativity camp focusing on writing, drawing, and storytelling.

Author/illustrator Mo Willems is offering a YouTube series called Lunch Doodles with Mo Willems. 

Graphic novel author and illustrator, Jarrett J. Krosoczka, is currently offering daily drawing lessons via his YouTube channel.

Specialized Resources for Homeschooling

Organization, Reading, and Writing Support

My personal favorite free resource to assist students with reading, writing and the organization of assignments is Microsoft OneNote. I’ve written step by step blog posts about using the app’s immersive reader and creating voice to text and audio files within the app.

Deaf and Hard of Hearing

Deafverse was created specifically for deaf students in grades 6 and higher. It is a choose your own adventure game. The focus is on American Sign Language, self-advocacy, and deaf culture.

The YouTube channel, Did You Know That? offers a number of factual learning videos in American Sign Language.

For Students with Minimal Communication Skills

Spark from Nawmal is currently allowing a free 2-week trial of their app. What’s so great about this app? It was designed specifically for individuals with minimal communication skills to practice self-expression, communication and creativity through virtual characters.

Resources for Parents

Enilda Clinic offers a number of video resources for parents regarding child behavior and development. Through her videos, she supports parents with things such as managing their child’s behavior, sleep routines, autism, and more.

Y Literacy, one of my own websites, offers guidance on helping your child with reading comprehension and more.

Game Time!

Picture This Games is a spin on the memory card game we all played as a child. This app allows your child to play with a grandparent or relative from across the table or across the country. The app allows for the cards to be modified with your own photos or family history.

In Summary

There are a number of free homeschooling resources available for students of all ages. I hope this comprehensive list of ultimate free homeschooling resources is useful for you! If you have any favorite free homeschooling resources that you use with your children, be sure to share it in the comments below!