Are you looking to better organize your homeschool next year? Did you know there are over a dozen online homeschool planner options available? Do you wish someone would just tell you which planner is the best online homeschool planner for you?
A couple years ago while analyzing which online homeschool planner would work best for our family, I analyzed 9 popular online homeschool planners available at the time. Since then several of those planners have come and gone. Others have updated their planners to the added benefit of their users.
Recently I have received several inquiries about new planners and how they compare to ones I’ve already reviewed. Thus, today I am sharing all that I’ve learned recently about the latest in online homeschool planners.
Not all planners are equal and neither does one planner fit every family. Click To TweetThe Online Homeschool Planners Analyzed
Listed in no particular order, here are the 9 online homeschool planners included in this comparison.
- Homeschool Minder
- Lessontrek
- Homeschool Manager
- Scholaric
- Homeschool Planet
- Homeschooling Records
- Homeschool Skedtrack
- Well-Planned Day Online
- Homeschool Tracker
Other Planners You May Want to Consider
Due to time, presentation, and customer service (or lack thereof), not all online planners were interviewed or reviewed for this year’s comparison. Those not included but possibly worth consideration are:
- Homeschool Inc. Planner
- Homeschool Day Book
- Homeschool Solutions Software
- Edu-Track Home School PC
- Homeschool Reporting Online
Note: If you want a digital planner that is NOT online, you may want to consider one of the following options.
- Homeschool Helper App (for iPad only)
- Five J’s Gradebook+ Gradebook and Record Keeping Spreadsheet
- My Free Downloadable Excel Lesson Planner
Best Online Homeschool Planner Comparison
Ready to learn which online homeschool planner is best for you and your family? Search for the features you most desire in an online homeschool planner in the chart below to determine which planner would best fit you.
Bonus Features Worth Considering
In preparation for this article, I personally contacted each of the planning companies mentioned above. The five planners below, not only responded to my invitation to provide personal feedback on their product, they also shared a few features about their planner that make them stand out from the rest.
Homeschool Planet
In addition to the features mentioned above, Homeschool Planet provides many extra features including:
- Automatic calculation of final grade, optionally weighted by different, customizable categories (e.g., homework, test, project, etc.)
- Track and report class hours
- “Daily Digest” emails with today’s and/or this week’s assignments sent to teacher and students
- To-do lists
- Shopping lists
- Reading Lists
- Daily Bible Verse and/or Daily Quote
- Daily weather
- Instant messaging to family members (e.g., text shopping list to husband automatically)
- Lookup widget (for research on the Internet)
- Create, save, share, and re-use lesson plans
- Purchase publisher-created or publisher-approved lesson plans from our Lesson Plan Marketplace.
- Automatic assignment generator makes creating lesson plans a snap.
- Assignment reminders sent by text or email.
- Automatic rescheduling assistant automatically checks for overdue assignments and missing grades, and gives easy way to automatically adjust schedule, with several rescheduling options.
- Comprehensive, customizable reporting capabilities
- Color versus Economy printing
- Build school year around vacations and holidays, and reschedule around those automatically.
- 18 beautiful background themes, more on the way!
- Apple iCAL integration
- Integration with any standard web-calendaring software
- Virtually unlimited class scheduling flexibility
- Search generally, or by class/activity, assignment, or resource
Homeschooling Records
In addition to the features mentioned above, Homeschooling Records offer an allowance tracker for each student, a grocery shopping list that sorts items by aisles (the aisles can also be rearranged in the list before printing to match how you shop), and a home school related news page.
Homeschool Reporting Online
Homeschool Reporting Online did not feel the need to be included as it best serves homeschoolers in group settings. That said, Homeschool Reporting Online is a home based business that started back in 2002. Whether you are an individual family needing a convenient record keeping solution, an umbrella school, homeschool co-op or support group desiring to reduce administrative overhead, Homeschool Reporting Online offers online software solutions. They are committed to providing and enhancing their services to meet the needs of their members. For families, they offer:
- Highly affordable annual subscription: $20 per family
- Record grades, track attendance, record lesson plans, standardized test scores, portfolio activities and immunization records
- Flexible record keeping can accommodate various homeschool styles
- Generate student transcripts immediately
- No software to install. Access and update your records, at any time, from any online computer
- Offsite electronic storage and backup of important student records
Check out their site learn about additional record keeping benefits Homeschool Reporting Online can provide for your umbrella school, homeschool organization or homeschool co-op.
Lessontrek
This is the one planner that appeared to make the most improvements during the past two years. As I learned through a personal interview, the creators are constantly trying to improve their product. As they like to say, “we have the best grade book out there.” Some of their key features include:
- Gradebook
- Transcripts
- Easy-to-use drag and drop workflow
- Intuitive user-interface and user-experience
- Weighted grades (that actually work)
- Color-coded subjects
- Color-coded print-offs
- Grade week
Use the code 15CC to get$45 off your first year of Lessontrek.
Scholaric
Additional features of Scholaric besides the ones mentioned above include:
- Hours and core hours tracking/reporting
- Weighted grading
- Export to spreadsheet
- Leading creator of lesson sequences (Lesson 1, Lesson 2, Lesson 3…).
- Transcripts are in beta
Which online homeschool planner is best for you?
