Screen Time In Homeschool: 7 Beneficial Ways to Use It

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Screen time in homeschool can sometimes be a hotly debated topic.

There are some homeschool families who exclusively use an online curriculum and their children get hours of screen time per day.

Then there are families who have zero screen time in their homeschool.

Neither way is right or wrong. It really is up to your individual circumstances.

However, as homeschool parents, I would say that we tend to like to keep things intentional. When we plan our days for our children, we want what we offer them to be beneficial.

Despite the negative comments that screen time usually gets, there are in fact ways to use it to bring a lot of value into your homeschool.

That’s what this post is all about. I want to share with you some intentional ways to include screentime in your homeschool that will be a blessing to your family.

7 Ways Screen Time in Homeschool Can Be a Good Thing

Back when I was a homeschool kid, screen time wasn’t really much of a thing. The most I used it for was typing up essays in a word document. Heck, the internet barely existed!

Nowadays there are seemingly endless ways in which to use screen time for educational purposes.

My hope is that the ideas below will help to ease your workload and bring even more value to your homeschool days.

#1 Reducing Your Workload: Online Math Curriculum

child using screen time in homeschool ctc math

As mentioned above, back when I was a homeschool kid there was no such thing as online homeschool curriculums.

When I reached high school level math, my mom ended up hiring a retired teacher from our church to tutor me. What I was learning was beyond her skill set and there were no real outside resources to guide her.

Nowadays we’re incredibly blessed to have access to both online math curriculums and free online math tutorials.

CTC Math is a company that offers an online math curriculum they call the Homeschool Family Membership.

I’ve done a full review of their product before, which you can read about here.

They take the workload of teaching your child math off of your shoulders with their online math program.

They cover grades K-12 and teach math thoroughly with videos, interactive questions, and practice worksheets.

My 6-year-old son loved using it to reinforce the math concepts he had already been working on.

He was able to do the lessons independently even though he wasn’t a fluent reader just yet. This is because they have an audio recording of the questions making it great for accessibility purposes.

The interface is simple and straightforward to use with both a teacher and student view.

You’ll be able to check on the progress that your child is making with your very own login. Their test scores are recorded making it great for creating transcripts.

Check out what CTC Math has to offer in their online math curriculum with their free trial.

They also offer a half-price discount that you’ll want to make use of should you decide that you want to go ahead and sign up.

#2 Accessing Ebooks

Not everyone has easy access to a library. In fact, even if you do, it doesn’t guarantee that the books you’re looking for will be available.

Ebooks are a wonderful way of being able to access books that would otherwise be unavailable to your children.

It’s also a really wonderful way to save money. Our library has many ebooks available which has made it much more affordable for us to read our way through countless books!

Reading ebooks is the kind of screen time that I personally don’t mind.

#3 Watching Documentaries & Other Educational Content

One of my favorite ways to reinforce topics that we’re studying is by finding a related video or documentary for my children to watch.

It seems to bring the subject alive and connect the dots for them in a lot of ways.

It’s also a good way to bring balance to your day so that you can get a bit of a break.

Documentaries can be particularly helpful if there’s a sickness in the house. Learning can still happen but everyone can also rest.

#4 Exercise

This seems contrary, right? How do you get the benefit of exercise from using screens?

Simple, tutorials!

My kids have done everything from ballet to martial arts. If you can think of it, I bet there’s a Youtube video out there to teach you how to do it.

Not everyone lives in a place where it’s easy to get outside to exercise. This is especially true for those who live in extremely hot or cold climates.

You can use screen time as a way of offering exercise to your kids without even having to leave the house.

This can also be a helpful way to get all those wiggles out before you start any sit-down school work.

#5 Art Projects

We have had so much fun using online art classes from Yellow Spot Sun!

We’ve been able to explore using different art mediums and historical periods through their online programs.

There are so many art classes available these days, with many being on Youtube.

Make it a once-a-week thing for your kids and gather together to do it as a family. Even I love to take part with my kids!

#6 Music Lessons

Online music classes can often be a much cheaper alternative to in-person or one-on-one lessons.

While this is not going to suit everyone, there is definitely a place for online classes.

Hoffman Academy is a free piano course that my son has done. I actually ended up signing him up for the paid version because it was working so well.

Oftentimes, these kinds of online courses have your child participating in an interactive way. This is so much better for their brains than when they’re just sitting and passively watching screens.