Friday, July 18, 2008

Buying Curriculmn online

This is listed in my website but thought I would add it here too.
http://www.frugalcountrymom.com/frugalhomeschool.html

Enjoy

Curriculum When buying curriculum for the year find out which one you want first by asking other homeschoolers, checking out a book fairs, looking online or ordering a catalog from the vendor. Once you find the ones you want look around at the used book swap sites online and the used book fairs that homeschool groups usually have each year.

Check out my San Antonio Home schoolers page above for ideas on the yearly Curriculum fairs for my area or at least get some ideas.

If you would like a "Card Pack" from "The Home School Connection" they will send you it via snail mail to your home address for free. In it you will find tons of homeschool related products. "Click Here" to fill out the form. To look at vedors on line go to their website at
http://www.nrm-inc.com/homeschool/homeschool.htm

If you buy it new plan to use it for your other younger kids someday that would make a good investment or plan to sell it to get some of your money back. When buying from auctions make sure you know the orginal price before you start bidding, this way you wont over pay for used books. Start early looking for these to get ahead of the Aug/Sept school rush.

Tips:
Buy it used from friends, book swaps, flea markets, thrift stores, library book sales
Have a book swap day with your homeschool group
Share with another mom that has the same age children as yourself
Form a coop or at least just a class and pitch in and buy the book/subject
Do you have connections with a public school teacher. Each year they get sample books to go over to see if they want to buy it for their class. If they don't then ask them for it.
Try finding your stuff on ebay: Just keep in mind how much it orginally cost so you wont get into a bidding war with another mom-have a set amount you will spend on it, bid at the last few min of the sale to grab it, keep in mind the cost of shipping, If you dont win ebay will email you other items similar to the one you lost, or look at the persons other items listed he/she might have the same item again up for bid at another day!

Yahoo groups used book- Join these to help you find used books
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/homeschoolingonashoestring_usedbooks/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HOMESCHL-USED-BOOKS/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/UsedHomeSchoolBooks/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HomeschoolBookSource/

Main websites for book exchanges and used books
Veggie group Love it! –Look under swap- http://www.vegsource.com/homeschool/
Home School Classifieds- http://homeschoolclassifieds.com/
The Swap-small fee to insert - http://theswap.com/
Homeschool Bid -Just like Ebay- http://www.homeschoolbid.com/
This little Piggy stas home online auction https://www.thislittlepiggystayshome.com/
Well trained mind forum http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/index.php

Regular sites for clearance sales
Christine book love their catalog http://www.christianbook.com/

If your in the San Antonio area try
San Antonio online garage http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sanantonioonlinegaragesale/
San Antonio free cycle http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sanantoniofreecycle/
San Antonio freely given http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SAHFG/
San Antonio Educational Book Swap http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SAEducationalBookSwap

If your looking for something specific in a subject like history, math, English you can try my Haven Homeschool group link pages where I will be adding on through time. You don’t have to join the group to access the links
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/havenhomeschoolgroup/links

Create your own curriculum that can be down with help from the library and other resources on line check out my unit studies and printable pages.

Sam

2 comments:

MIgirls said...

Thanks for this list of websites to visit! I'm a new reader of your blog. My dh actually told me about your site...he found you on a "chicken list" and mentioned you homeschooled, had frugal in your "name" and raised chickens...and your first post that we read was about making strawberry jam which I had just made (for the first time) a few days earlier.
I've enjoyed looking around! Nice to "meet" you!

Brandon Checketts said...

When you are done with your books you can use BookScouter.com to see what your book is worth and find out who is paying the most for it. Even if you don't sell it to one of the companies there, it will help you get an idea of what your books are worth for selling them to others.