Homeschool Books and Supplies for Pre-School in 2020: What We Use

If you’re new to homeschooling, you can also sign up for an educator account at Barnes & Noble. It’s free – you just tell them on the application that you teach homeschool. It gives you 20% off of your purchases. This link tells about it: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/h/bn-educators

Here is the list of the curricula, textbooks, workbooks, and online trainings we use for our preschool kids.

Some of the links in this post are my affiliate links. It won’t cost you any extra if you buy from them but I get a small referral fee for recommending to my friends. (And of course, I recommend what I use, so you know I like this stuff anyway!)

What Your Pre-Schooler Needs to Learn in Homeschool

For pres-school, you can get by with very little in terms of books and curriculum. You need something to address each skill you want your toddler/little kid to learn.

Here are the main skills you want your preschooler to learn. If this seems like a lot, just keep in mind, this is over a long period of time (from about 9 months to 5 years old). There’s no need to rush! They should just enjoy learning and a lot of it should feel like playing!

During the preschool/ pre-k years, they should:

learn their letters, numbers, shapes, and colors
learn what sounds each letter makes
learn to recognize their sight words
learn to count to 10
learn basic skills like sitting still for a few minutes at a time, eating lunch at lunchtime, washing hands, using the bathroom
learn emotional skills like sharing, taking turns, using their words when upset, etc.
learn fine motor skills like cutting with scissors, coloring with crayons and markers, holding a pencil to trace, putting shapes in the right holes, using a spoon to scoop, etc.

Pre-K / Pre-School Homeschool Books & Supplies

Here are the most basic homeschool books, workbooks, and videos I use to teach my preschoolers. While there are other things I use as extras and just to make things more fun, you could give an above-average education to your little one with these 3 things.

1. Preschool Prep 10-DVD Set

Preschool Prep is how I taught all my kids to read. Plus, their colors, numbers, alphabet, vowels, phonics, and sight words. This amazing company has a DVD for everything. Their style is unlike any other curriculum I’ve ever used. It’s fast, effective, and so fun. In fact, my big kids STILL love to watch along when our pre-schoolers are watching them!

We purchased this box set 12 years ago and have been using it for every child ever since. I’m not making any claims about what it will do for your child (because every child is different), but for our kids it gets them ready for kindergarten in about 2 months. For our son, Truett, it was 30 days. For Seven and Prynne it was about 2 months. With Fox, we’ve been a lot more relaxed on the schedule but he still demands to watch them every day and knows all of his colors, numbers, shapes, alphabet, and most sight words. He’s 2.

The 10-DVD Preschool Prep Collection contains:

Meet the Letters
Meet the Numbers
Meet the Shapes
Meet the Colors
Meet the Sight Words 1, 2, and 3
Meet the Phonics: Letter Sounds
Meet the Phonics: Blends
Meet the Phonics: Digraphs

Do you really need the Preschool Prep DVDs to homeschool your toddler / pre-schooler? Yes. I wouldn’t do it without them. It’s the fastest way to teach your kids to read and the other pre-school skills. The DVDs are so inexpensive and they work incredibly well. It’s absolutely worth the purchase.

2. Pre-k workbooks: Your pre-schooler only needs one big fat pre-k workbook. I like to get a big workbook that has everything in it, like one of these.

3. Handwriting practice: I also get my pre-schoolers a small handwriting workbook. It’s good to take with you on the go since it’s skinny and portable. These are great for school work while waiting at a doctor’s appointment, in the DMV waiting room, on a long car ride, etc. Here are a few handwriting workbooks I like for preschool:

Carson Dellosa – Pre-Handwriting Practice
Carson Dellosa – Trace with Me: Tracing Letters Activity Book (for Toddlers, Grade PK-2nd, 128 Pages, Ages 3+)

Pre-School Supplies That Are Not Absolutely Necessary But Super Helpful

Reading, math, social studies, science: Abcmouse.com

ABCmouse has a guided path. All kids have to do is just log in every day and it tells them what lesson to do next. It’s all in order. You can log in to the parent area and print out their reports if you want to. The computer grades and records everything; you just have to print it out!