Local & State Resources
Homeschoolers learn as much outside the home as in it. Here you'll find listings of cultural and educational institutions, government resources, libraries, and bookstores. If you need a tutor, this is the best place for you to find one near you.
Museums
Explore the world of art, science, and history by visiting a museum in Washington. Museum trips can make your lessons come alive and can offer a fun way to spend the day learning.
Zoos & Wildlife
You can read all you want in a book, but there is nothing like seeing the objects of your study up-close and personal when you visit a zoo, nature preserve, aquarium, or wildlife sanctuary. Visit the animal kingdom here in Washington, and you'll find a fun and interesting way to learn more about the natural world.
Botanical Gardens
Share the natural world with your child at these botanical gardens and arboretums. These are wonderful places to go to go birding, work on your nature journals, or simply spend a lovely afternoon outdoors.
Nature Centers
Nature centers are places where you can see the natural and historical world come alive. Browse through these nature centers in Washington and introduce your children to the world outside their door.
Theater, Dance & Music
Visiting and viewing the arts expands your outlook on the world and can an inspiration to both you and your children. Browse through this list of theaters, dance companies, and music offerings in Washington.
Historic Sites
Learn through history by visiting interesting historic sites around the state of Washington. Historic sites let you put a real face on the history that you've read about, making it more exciting for you and your children.
National & State Parks
Continue your child's education as you explore the natural wonder of national and state parks in Washington.
Public Resources
Connect with government and public agencies in Washington that can offer resources and opportunities for learning.
State School Resources
A listing of public school resources, including Washington's Department of Education, school districts, and other useful information.
Libraries
Libraries are an important resource for homeschoolers. Parents and children value librarians for the expertise they share when navigating the vast amounts of information found in today's libraries. Libraries also provide lending materials, educational materials, meeting space for support groups, and more.
Bookstores
Where can you find homeschooling books, curricula, and supplies? Where can you get used books? Here is a list of bookstores around the state of Washington, with a special emphasis on those that are especially helpful for homeschoolers.
Tutors & Teachers
Are you looking for a tutor? Need some help with a particular subject? Here are some resources to help you.
What's Popular
Lewis & Clark National Historic Trail
In 1804, Meriwether Lewis & William Clark began a voyage of discovery with 45 men, a keelboat, two pirogues,and a dog. They departed from Camp Wood located in what was to become Illinois. They traveled over a three-year period through lands that later became 11 states. Most of the trail follows the Missouri & Columbia Rivers. Much has changed in 200 years but trail portions remain intact. At 3700 miles, Lewis & Clark NHT is the second longest of the 23 National Scenic & National Historic Trails....
Northwest Trek Wildlife Park
Located in Eatonville, this 615-acre park has a little bit of everything: lakes, trails, meadows and plenty of animals. Northwest Trek is home to more than 200 North American animals. See bighorn sheep, deer, Roosevelt elk, woodland caribou, mountain goats, bison and more up close from comfortable trams while touring the free-roaming area. Walk forested pathways to view grizzlies, black bears, wolves, bobcats, lynx, cougars, owls, eagles and wetland animals in beautiful natural exhibits. Five m...
Lake Chelan National Recreation Area
Here the beautiful Stehekin Valley, with a portion of fjordlike Lake Chelan, adjoins North Cascades National Park. Lake Chelan National Recreation Area (62,000 acres, 24,800 hectares) rests in a glacially carved trough in the Cascades Range. Lake Chelan is one of the nation's deepest, reaching a depth of 1,500 feet (450 meters). It offers boating, fishing, and lakeshore camping. The average width is less than two miles (3.2 kilometers), but Lake Chelan extends 50 miles (83 kilometers) into the C...
School District Home-Based Instruction Contact Information
A listing by district of the home-based instruction contact, including email and phone numbers.
Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area
The Upper Columbia River is rich in cultural and natural significance. For more than 9000 years, people have gathered along the banks of the river to fish and trade with each other. Missionaries and explorers for the Hudson Bay Company and the Northwest Trading Company mapped the area and developed relationships with the tribes, which lived here. In 1941, damming of the Columbia River as part of the Columbia River Basin project created a 130-mile long lake. Named for President Franklin D. Roosev...
Ebey's Landing National Historical Reserve
Ebey's Landing National Historical Reserve provides a vivid historical record of Pacific Northwest history, including the first exploration of Puget Sound by Captain George Vancouver in 1792; early settlement by Colonel Isaac Ebey, an important figure in Washington Territory; growth and settlement resulting from the Oregon Trail and the Westward migration; the Donation Land Laws (1850-1855); and the continued growth and settlement of the town of Coupeville. There are two state parks within Ebey'...
Ross Lake National Recreation Area
Ross Lake National Recreation Area is the most assessible part of the North Cascades National Park Service Complex. Ross Lake National Recreation Area (118,000 acres, 47,200 hectares) is the corridor for scenic Washington State Route 20, the North Cascades Highway, and includes three reservoirs: 12,000-acre (4,800-hectare) Ross Lake, 910-acre (364-hectare) Diablo Lake, and 210-acre (84-hectare) Gorge Lake -- water gateways to more remote areas. Ringed by mountains, it offers many outdoor recreat...
Whitman Mission National Historic Site
This site commemorates the courage of Marcus and Narcissa Whitman, the role the Whitmans played in establishing the Oregon Trail, and the challenges encountered when two different cultures meet. In 1836, before the wagon trains, a small intrepid group of Presbyterian missionaries traveled with the annual fur trapper’s caravan into “Oregon Country.” Missionaries Narcissa Whitman and Eliza Spalding became the first white women to travel across the continent. Differences in culture led to growing t...
Olympic National Park
Glacier capped mountains, wild Pacific coast and magnificent stands of old-growth forests, including temperate rain forests -- at Olympic National Park, you can find all three. About 95% of the park is designated wilderness, which further protects these diverse and spectacular ecosystems. Olympic is also known for its biological diversity. Isolated for eons by glacial ice, and later the waters of Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the Olympic Peninsula has developed its own distinct arr...
San Juan Island National Historical Park
Orca whales and bald eagles abound here, as do more than 200 species of birds navigating the Pacific flyway. But the park was created in 1966 based upon an idea: that individuals and nations can solve their problems peacefully without resorting to violence. For it was here in 1859 that the United States and Great Britain nearly went to war over a pig shot by an American farmer. Actually, it was a bit more complicated than that. Pressures had been building between the two nations over possession ...
North Cascades National Park
Long before North Cascades National Park Service Complex was established in 1968, this area was a home. It was the home to many Native American tribes and a trade gateway between the Plateau tribes to the east and the Coast Salish tribes to the west. Native Americans have been in these mountains for over 8,000 years. More recent settlers came in the nineteenth century to establish homesteads in places like the Stehekin Valley, or to mine elusive minerals – like gold, or to trap furbearing animal...
Seattle Aquarium
Activate all your senses and surround yourself by the Sound. The Seattle Aquarium features exciting new exhibits for you to see, touch and explore. Grab a guide and gain an even more meaningful marine experience. And don't forget to check back often because our exhibits are changing faster than a brine shrimp sheds his shell and growing quicker than a kelp forest. Offers educational programs and special events.
Washington State Board of Education
Website for the Washington State Board of Education.
Woodland Park Zoological Gardens
Learn about the animal world at the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle. Highlights include an African Village and Savanna, Discovery Barn, Bug World, and Tropical Rain Forest. Offers educational programs and special exhibits.
Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium
With the broad blue expanse of Puget Sound as a backdrop, Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium is not only one of the top zoos in the country, it is amongst the most beautiful. Nestled on the 29 acres inside the 700-acre Tacoma, Wash park, this zoo & aquarium brings you eye to eye with beluga whales, playful pachyderms, curious polar bear cubs, intriguing sharks, and brilliant reptiles.
Resources
These Rare Lands
If a picture's worth 1,000 words, this book--with its hundreds of breathtaking photos of America's National Parks--is a well-stocked bookstore. Accompanied by the words of poet laureate Mark Strand, These Rare Lands is a perfect coffee-table book for anyone who has enjoyed the wonders of nature's wildest places. From a storm over Sequoia National Park in California to the otherworldly stalactites and stalagmites of New Mexico's Carlsbad Caverns and an Atlantic sunset in Maine's Acadia, this is a book that draws you back again and again. Photographer Stan Jorstad's obvious love of nature comes through in the thoughtful approach he takes to his life's work, contained in the pages of These Rare Lands.
Educational Travel on a Shoestring : Frugal Family Fun and Learning Away from Home
Educational Travel on a Shoestring shows parents how they can help their children learn–and have a blast–while traveling. From researching destinations to sharing activities that both teach and entertain, this priceless guide offers practical information for parents who want to have more fun with their kids, build closer family ties, and enjoy richer educational experiences–all without spending a fortune.
America's Spectacular National Parks
The concept of the national park is an American contribution to world civilization, and it remains a defining characteristic of our country. From the rocky shore of Maine's Acadia to the barren crater and lush rain forest of Hawaii's Haleakala, America's national beauty is celebrated and preserved in its national parks. This book retells the history of each park, describes its most important features and wildlife, and reproduces its gorgeous scenery in full-color photographs that will enthrall armchair travelers and entice others to lace up their hiking boots and reach for their sporting gear. Organized by region of the country, it includes well-known parks like the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, and Glacier as well as lesser-known destinations like Shenandoah, Biscayne, and Kenai Fjords.
National Geographic Guide to the National Parks of the United States, Fourth Edition

Now in its fourth edition, the National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America is the ultimate birder’s field guide. Sturdy, portable, and easy-to-use, it features the most complete information available on every bird species known to North America. This revised edition features 250 completely updated range maps, new plumage and species classification information, specially commissioned full-color illustrations, and a superb new index that allows birders in the field to quickly identify a species.

The National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America, Fourth Edition will continue to be a bestseller among the fastest-growing sector in the U.S. travel market—the nearly 25 million people who travel each year specifically to observe wild birds.

America's National Parks: The Spectacular Forces That Shaped Our Treasured Lands
From stunning mountain ranges to arid expanses of desert, America has been blessed with an incredibly diverse land -- and the vision to protect it for our and future generations to enjoy. These lands are ours to view, wander, learn from, and revel in. America's National Parks captures all that is great about all fifty-six parks in the national park system. It also gives interesting, easy-to-understand background on the geological and ecological forces that continue to make each national park so worthy of protection.

Nature lovers will be captivated by gorgeous photos of landforms, flora, and fauna. Families will appreciate the information that is sure to enhance vacations at the parks. And visitors to any of the country's national parks will forever treasure this book as a memento of past visits and an inspiration for future ones.

Unlike any other book published on national parks, America's National Parks is a must-have for anyone who relishes America's natural wonders and wants to learn more about the powerful forces that created them.

America's National Parks for Dummies, Second Edition
What makes a trip to a national park so wonderful? For starters, America's national park system is more diverse than any park system in the world. You can stroll the seashore at Olympic National Park in Washington or Cape Cod National Seashore in Massachusetts, climb craggy mountains in Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming, or go underground into the world's largest cave system at Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky. You can marvel at the largest canyon on Earth (Grand Canyon National Park), hike among the planet's largest collection or rock arches (Arches National Park), explore the lowest and hottest place in the Western Hemisphere (Death Valley National Park), or wander a realm of forests and misty mountains (Great Smoky Mountains National Park).

And these are just a few of your park options.

America's National Parks For Dummies gives you guidance to decide which park is for you, when to go, and what to see when you reach your destination. This guide will help you plan the best trip imaginable, whether you are

  • An inexperienced traveler looking for guidance in determining whether to take a trip to a national park and how to plan for it
  • An experienced traveler who has yet to explore the national park system and wants expert advice when you finally get a chance to enjoy one
  • Any traveler who doesn't like big, thick travel guides that list every single hotel, restaurant, or attraction, but instead looks for a book that focuses on the places that will provide the best or most unique park experience

America's National Parks For Dummies is user-friendly and organized in a logical fashion. Each park is broken down in a chapter that delves into the nitty-gritty of trip planning and highlights, including tips for

  • Planning your trip by touching on the diversity of the park system, explaining some of your vacation options, and telling you when parks are the most (and least) crowded
  • Ironing out the details by describing how you get to the parks and how to find your way around after you arrive
  • Exploring America's national parks by giving you the lowdown on 15 of the best parks, detailing things like each park's wild kingdom, the best spots for memorable photographs, and a few safety issues

The pages of this book resemble a great long-distance hike – you never know what's around the next bend in the trail. So throw on a backpack, take a swig of water, and get ready to explore the national parks!

Great Lodges of the National Parks: The Companion Book to the PBS Television Series
Stand amid soaring Douglas fir in the great hall of Glacier Park Lodge or sit in the setting sun and gaze into the Grand Canyon at El Tovar. This beautiful gift book will transport you to the majestic lodges of our national parks to relive the glory of past vacations or plan adventures anew. This book and the PBS television series of the same title (to air in spring 2002) take armchair travelers into these architectural wonders and explore the surrounding natural beauty of our national parks. Lodges, wildlife, and stunning vistas are showcased in 175 full-color and black-and-white photographs, along with historical documents from the PBS series. In his introduction, Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, offers a call to preserve this national heritage, and a portion of the proceeds from the sale of this book go toward the rehabilitation of these magnificent buildings.
The National Parks of America
For tourists, family campers, and serious lovers of the outdoors, here is a big, beautiful, color-illustrated book that describes more than 50 national parks, sites, and seashores that stretch from Cape Hatteras on the Atlantic coast to the Grand Canyon in Arizona, Yosemite in California, Haleakala in Hawaii, and Glacier Bay in Alaska. More than 400 breathtaking photographs capture the beauty and atmosphere of each site, and 54 color maps show each park's location and major features. Visitor information panels give important details on access points, accommodations, and recreational activities such as hiking, rafting, birdwatching, and fishing. Here is a wonderful volume that will inspire plans for trips and evoke marvelous memories of past experiences in America's great outdoors.
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But What About Socialization? Answering the Perpetual Home Schooling Question: A Review of the Literature
This book by Dr. Susan A. McDowell  uses research, statistics, and the experiences of homeschooling families to answer questions and counter myths about homeschooling and socialization. Read through a discussion of the multiple meanings of socia...
The Well-Ordered Home: Organizing Techniques for Inviting Serenity into Your Life
Organizing the home is one of those desirable and beneficial activities that remain elusive for many. This practical guide explains the many benefits - physical, emotional, and spiritual - of an organized home and shows how to attain them. Breaking d...
A Twaddle-Free Education: An Introduction to Charlotte Mason's Timeless Educational Ideas
Are you disappointed with dumbed-down reading material (“twaddle”) written for children? Do you wish for your children to feast their hearts and minds on noble ideas, fine art, and great literature? Are you hoping your children gain an appreciation o...
Parenting With Grace: Catholic Parent's Guide to Raising Almost Perfect Kids
Gary Popcak and his wife Lisa show that God offers every Catholic parent guidance and the opportunity to take a truly Catholic approach to parenthood. In this book, they discuss parenting strategies, phases children go through, the essential differen...
Upside-Down Brilliance: The Visual Spatial Learner
Dr. Linda Silverman coined the term "visual-spatial learner" to describe the special and unique gifts of people who learn best through seeing and with images. This guide is a great resource as you support your homeschooling visual learner in discover...