It seems like everyone around me is “building their home library”. My husband isn’t a big fan of the look of bookshelves. He makes remarks like, “When are you going to get rid of some of these books?”
Owning all your own books is great, as long as you have the room and your spouse likes the “look” of all those books. We have learned to rotate (buy and sell as need arises) curriculum, and to borrow when possible.
The library is a fantastic place to do that. I’ve been calling it “the free book store” for years, but of course it isn’t really free. We pay oodles of taxes to support our library system, not to mention all of the, ahem, Stupid Tax we pay for late fees. (Wondering about Stupid Taxes? Check out Dave Ramsey.)
As homeschoolers, most of us live on one income, or in my case we live on one and a quarter of an income since I work most Saturday & Sunday evenings, if I can get the shifts. We have to make those dollars stretch! But what if the dollars just aren’t there? It has been pretty tight around here lately so I know from which I speak. Here are some ideas to help you stretch those dollars by borrowing:
- Use your local library for literature, yes, but also for curriculum. MANY library systems carry teacher’s books of reproducibles, blackline map books, even full curriculum. I tried out The Writing Road to Reading for two months prior to buying it, because I was able to check it out from the library.
- Use your friends. Okay, not really use your friends, but what if you sat down with a friend and pooled your curriculum? Trade off! If you’re doing different periods of history, swap what you have used, for what she has used!
- Use ideas. The internet if literally FULL of other people’s ideas! You can borrow those, put a whole bunch of them together, and come up with your very own homeschooling methods. borrowed, sure, but all your own in the end.
- Use a rental service. Now, I’m not sure if there is such a service that carries HOMESCHOOL specific curriculum, but I do know that there are many textbook rental places online. We learned the hard way with our 17 year old daughter’s English book for community college. She wasn’t able to sell it back to the school bookstore (they had purchased their quota of used books already) and it took a long time to sell it via the student bulletin board. Enter Bookrenter.com. We now rent all of her books, pay about 25% of what we would to buy them, and we aren’t stuck with them after the quarter is over. I LOVE THAT.
If anyone has a mind to set up a homeschool curriculum rental service online, I’ll be there to sign up for it!
Update: Naomi, my Relevant Conference sponsor, just posted a link in the comments that there IS a site called Homeschool Book Renter! Check it out!
I love this. One more thought about libraries, and curriculum. I have been very successful in using my library as the only source of books for my unit studies. I very rarely have to buy a book for unit studies. I have bought a few over the 2 years I have been doing this, but only because it was a book I thought I would go back to time and again. Our library does interlibrary loans for $2 per book. That's cheaper than any book I can buy and I don't have to find space for it in my library.
(I thought when I read the title that you were going to be talking about weddings.:) )
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Fortunately, my husband has not said anything, yet, about my growing library, but he may if it outgrows its current room. Renting curriculum sounds like a great idea, so I googled it and found a website.
http://www.homeschoolbookrenter.com/
I have not used this service, so I don't know anything about them, but someone has thought of renting curriculum.
So much of curriculum is SO expensive that it is a stumbling block to many homeschoolers. We pulled back from some of this curriculum this year because of the huge expense and have utilized some more cost-effective means.
Great post!
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I also thought this was wedding related.
Great tips especially about the library. For all of our reading books, we use the library and if our system doesn't have it, the inter library loan system is free and we are allowed 6 requests at a time per library card so that works out well.
I have also used paperbackswap.com for the few times I couldn't find a book in the entire state of Maryland. I like their site because I can also off load some books that we no longer need.
Another source for reading books is the thrift store. You won't find complete curricula here but I have found some useful add-ons to our studies.
As a homeschooler, it is so easy to get swept away in whatever method you choose and feel the need to order it all. Most of the time, you never use it all and are frustrated at the waste. I compare prices and make my list, check it twice and then set it aside for approx. 2 weeks while I pray over it so that I am a good steward over our funds and the kids education.
Great post!
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YES! Kiva that's a great idea " I compare prices and make my list, check it twice and then set it aside for approx. 2 weeks while I pray over it so that I am a good steward over our funds and the kids education." Setting it aside for a couple of weeks will definitely help give you perspective and make sure you're not buying in the heat of the moment when you feel like you need to have it all. And I totally forgot about Paperback Swap! I have gotten books through there too and it is a blessing!
Oh! I love the library, and we use it extensively. We use the KONOS curriculum, which utilizes lots of books. Even interlibrary loan is free for us (3-week loan), but sometimes you may not get the book for awhile. It usually works out just fine. Although we have shelves of books, we don't have much time to read those because we are always moving onto something new from the library!
Michelle: We used KONOS for a few years too and yes the library is invaluable for that or any unit studies!
This post makes my heart sing. I'm a homeschooler and public librarian – which, to me, is a perfect union. Thanks for the resounding reminder to use those wonderful cornerstones of democracy, public libraries. And for the link to the homeschool book renter. Sounds like a great idea.
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We use the library as well – both the public library and the local school library. The former has been an invaluable resource since we use a couple of curricula as core references: KONOS and Sonlight (both of which have a strong literary focus). We also are reading the Newbery Medal winners as well as Caldecott books. Some of the earliest award-winning books are not available in our local library so we use the inter-library loan program. We've had books delivered from all parts of Minnesota (for free!) which has been great.
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I have only used inter-library loan once, years ago, but it was really nice to be able to have that access!
LOL! The free bookstore. love it. =p
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