Short on Time? 40 Ways to Homeschool on the Run

Reading Time: 3 min 14 sec

Have you ever felt like you spend way too much time in the car running the kids from activity to activity?  There are seasons throughout the year where no matter how you slice it, time in the car seems to grow exponentially. Doctors’ visits, milk runs, trips to the library, vacations, soccer practice, church, field trips, swim practice, Starbucks runs (just being real), you get the point. There is A LOT of driving.  

I am a big proponent of allowing space for great conversations and even silence on road trips. However, there are times when you need to pull a Mary Poppins and grab an activity out of the bag.  What I love about car schooling, is that pretty much any subject can be learned in the car.  Chemistry? Memorize the Periodic Table. Math? Memorize the Multiplication Tables. 

 What I love about car schooling is that you have limited distractions, and you get to spend concentrated time fostering your child’s imagination.  You get the opportunity of exposing them to a wide variety of literature, music, history, science; all from the comfort of your own car. In this article, we are going to talk about our top 40 resources for homeschooling on the run.

The top resources are broken into four categories: 

Car Games & Activities

Here are six individual and group games that are great for family road trips! Ages 4 & Up

1. Geoboard                             Math
2. Rory’s Story Cubes           Language Arts                 
3. Math Dice Jr.                        Math
4. Rush Hour                            Logic
5. Brain Builders                      Logic
6. Magna-Tiles                         STEM

* Story Cubes is an amazing game that encourages children to tell a story using the story prompts on the dice.  This is a game, that even the driver can play.  Just have one designated person to roll the dice and call out the results. 

Music

Music is great for those times when you are running errands and the constant stops prevent you from really engaging in an audiobook.

My children have learned SO MUCH from listening to great music into their time in the car. We have not only listened to a variety of styles (classical, jazz, big band, country etc.) but we have also memorized multiplication facts, state capitols, and the periodic table.

The Classical Kids collection is AMAZING! Each cd tells the story of a famous composer set to music. We have listened to these CDs hundreds of times for years.  They have really fostered a love of classical music in my children. LOVE!

I would encourage you to browse your local library’s audio collection (or Spotify) but in the meantime, here are some of our favorite audio CDs. Ages Three & Up

7.  Kids Meet Composers                                                  

8.  Classical Kids-Mozart’s Magnificent Voyage         

9.  Classical Kids-Mozart’s Magic Fantasy                         

10.  Classical Kids-Tchaikovsky Discovers America

11. Classical Kids-Beethoven Lives Upstairs                      

12. Classical Kids-Mr. Bach Comes to Call                          

13. Classical Kid’s ChristmasBeethoven’s Wig Series 1                                   

14. Beethoven’s Wig 2, More Sing Along Symphonies 

15. Brain Beats                                                                                                                       16. Brain Beats #2

17. Multiplication Rock

18. Beth Manner’s Fun French for Kids

19. Beth Manner’s Magic French for Kids

Here are some of my FAVORITE resources:

20. Extreme Dot to Dot Around the World   8+                                                                      

21. Rosie Revere’s Big Project Book for Engineers                     Andrea Beaty

22. Impressionist Coloring Book                                              Patience Coster
23. Draw Europe                                                                     Kristin Draeger
24. Draw the USA                                                                   Kristin Draeger
25. Draw. Write. Now. Series                                     Marie Hablitzel and Kim Stitzer
26. Paint By Sticker Kids: Zoo Animals
27. Etch A Sketch
28.  Silly Putty

Audio Books 

Audiobooks are an amazing way to expose your children to great literary content while saving your voice. Woohoo!

Helpful tip: When choosing titles, take your child’s personality and the books recommended ages into consideration.  When you remove the task of deciphering the words, children can comprehend more advanced forms of writing.   

Ages 4 & Up

29. Amelia Bedelia Series                                   Peggy Parish                                                   30. Madeline Series                                        Ludwig Bemelmans                                                31. The Paddington Bear Series                        Michael Bond

32. Mercy Watson Series                                  Kate DiCamillo                                                      33. The Wind in the Willows                          Kenneth Grahame

34. Betsy and Tacy                                         Maud Hart Lovelace

35. Henry Huggins Series                                   Beverly Cleary

36. The Melendy Series                                  Elizabeth Enright

37. The Boxcar Children series                   Gertrude Chandler Warner

38.  Pollyanna                                               Eleanor H. Porter

39. Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIHM             Robert C. O’Brien

40. Little Men                                              Louisa May Alcott

What about you? What are your favorite ways to take advantage of travel time? Please feel free to leave me a Comment and don’t forget to follow Most Important Work on Pinterest!

 Want to dive in deeper? Check out these 2 Bonus Resources:

1. Give Your Child the World Jamie C. Martin
2. Read A-Loud Family Sarah Mackenzie