As I look back over the years, these are the items that were the most appreciated and long-lasting. If you have a homeschooling family to buy a gift for, you can’t go wrong with any of these.

A school table and chairs. An adjustable table and comfortable school chairs was a gift I greatly appreciated when my kids were young. We still use it to this day, although after we lifted the table to its maximum height, my husband had to put new legs on it for my tallest teenager! I know some homeschoolers use the kitchen table, but having a separate school table allowed us to leave projects or school work out, and this made going back to work easy. When my son was working on a project, seeing it on the table always invited him to finish it too.

A membership to an aquarium, museum, or other venue. Homeschoolers take advantage of local venues to give their kids hands-on and meaningful learning experiences, but this is expensive. Yearly memberships make it more affordable. We would get a membership to a different venue each year and go as often as we could. Our kids learned so much that way, and they met adults who had interesting jobs and could talk to them about science or art, etc. I can’t emphasize what a great gift this would be for a homeschooling family. In addition, many memberships come with reciprocal benefits. For example, by being a member of our local botanical garden here in Georgia, we could get into the Chicago Botanic Garden for free when we visited relatives in that area.

Quality art and craft supplies. All homeschoolers need art and craft supplies whether or not the kids are into art. These items come in handy for science experiments, making posters, dioramas, books, or any kind of graphic that would showcase what a child learned. But all kids should be able to have fun and get creative. Learning about art and drawing techniques are skills that everyone can benefit from, and fostering creativity will help kids problem solve and think for themselves. While individual art supplies aren’t very expensive, buying them continually over the years can add up, so buy sketchbooks, quality pencils, paints, paintbrushes, modeling clay, cloth and sewing supplies….and then just walk up and down the aisles at your local craft shop and look at all the interesting stuff you can add to their collection. You never know what they might be able to create with it!

What are some of the best gifts you’ve received as a homeschooler?