5 great home learning resources for kids

If you’re looking for ways to keep your kids stimulated and learning, during the lockdown, I found a bunch of seriously cool websites to help you do so without, you know, needing a blackboard and teaching abilities. Because, let’s be honest, some of us (me, I’m looking at me) might find homeschooling a tad bit challenging and when you couple that with working from home vibes AND the fact that you need to keep your family well-fed and possibly entertained for the next 21 days. Let’s just say I welcome all the help that I can get!

Herewith, find a list of really cool online portals that make “home-teaching” a lot less painful.

Vodacom e-school 

Friends, Vodacom has such a rad website filled to the brim with content that is fully CAPS aligned. I’m talking workbooks, video tutorials and even posters, to help make home learning easy. Your child can pause and rewind the videos (I mean, so helpful, right?) and there are interactive quizes at the end of the topics, to help mentally solidify the information they’ve just learnt. Thinking that this is super amazing and it can’t get more amazinger? But wait, there’s more: Vodacom customers don’t pay for data or content when they are using the Vodacom e-school portal. Legit.

Khan Academy

I was so pleased to learn about global nonprofit, Khan Academy. This online learning portal offers free, world-class education, for basically anyone, anywhere. What’s more, the site is zero-rated, which means you don’t need data to access it. My kinda website. All content on the website has been developed and created by a group of experts and if you’re looking to help your kid increase their math and science skills, this is the place to be!

Department of Basic Education

South Africa’s Department of Education have made their workbooks and study guides available online, to help bridge the gap between a 21-day holiday and getting exam ready. It is especially important for matric students to continue to brush up on school work. I found the Grade R and Grade 1 Rainbow workbooks especially helpful. They are colorful and interesting, helping me to keep both my small ones entertained (and thinking) for long periods of time! I also love that I can get my Grade R learner to go over her school work, at home. 

Audible

Get your hands on free audio books through online reading site, Audible. You can download books to your phone or tablet, which is perfect for those moments when you need some quiet time but don’t want to use a screen to get your kids to calm down. The books are separated into six categories: “Littlest Listeners,” “Elementary,” “Tween,” “Teen,” “Literary Classics” and “Folk & Fairy Tales for All.”

E-Classroom 

If you’re not totally opposed to spend some bucks for quality e-learning tools, then you need to check out E-Classroom. The website offers support resources for Grades R to Grade 12 at only R65 per year, per grade! The website is super easy to navigate and offers worksheets, mock exams and revision papers and even video tutorials.

Happy homeschooling!