Homeschool and Family Tools

Every student needs some way to keep track of their school work, but homeschooled families particularly need a good organization solution since there isn’t a teacher to help put a curriculum together. Even for families that are only partially homeschooled, the Homework section of Family Tools is a great place for parents and kids alike to organize their homeschool work.

The first thing to note is that parents can add homework for everyone and see every homework item added. This allows them to get a good overview of all the school work that needs to be done. Every task will display the name of the child to which the homework is assigned, and the list can also be filtered to only show one person’s tasks at a time. This helps parents focus on one child at a time when needed.

Children, depending on permissions, can only make assignments for themselves, and will also only see their own homework, which makes a very straightforward view for them. From there, they can see what’s due today, what’s coming in the next week, and even assignments made for future months. There’s also a place for homework with no specific due date.

Besides being organized and filtered by person, each homework task can also be given a subject. This can help a parent and child focus on one subject at a time, just like students that go to a school attend certain classes. Maybe you like to use certain weekdays or certain hours for particular topics. If you use the app’s filters at those times, it will minimize distractions from other subjects.

One advantage to homeschooling is that you’ll likely know well in advance what assignments and projects you want your kids to complete (in contrast to being blindsided by homework a child forgot to mention until the day before it’s due). With Family Tools, you can put these in as soon as plan your curriculum—weeks, or even months, in advance. You can then set future tasks with one or more notifications to remind you and your children to prepare for certain assignments and topics. On the other hand, if you want to hide certain schoolwork until it’s relevant (perhaps to avoid overwhelming a student), you can simply assign it to yourself, set a notification for when you’re ready to reveal it, and then change the assignment.

Having homework on a digital platform is also helpful because it lets parents and children coordinate and organize schoolwork even when everyone isn’t at home. Mom can add a reading assignment from the dentist’s office, and a child can see it on the way home from basketball practice. This even applies to doing homework while on a trip. With a list of assignments on their mobile devices, kids can keep track of what they’ve done and what they need to do, no matter where you go.

Assignments are easy to modify as well; the changes will appear on every device as soon as they’re saved. This includes changes in due date, which are harder to remember without a concrete place to display it.

Not only is the Homework page useful, but Family Tools has other sections that can help just as much with school work . In Notes, you can organize your thoughts and keep them in a separate place from homework tasks. The text’s format is also more flexible, allowing you to bold, underline, and italicize words for emphasis. Plans is another awesome feature, used for linking homework to notes, calendar events, lists, and even other tasks. See our related article for more tips on using Plans for homework.

If you’re in a homeschooling situation, Family Tools may be just what you need to keep track of it all. Let us help you improve your home-centered education.