Best Online Education for Kids. Online Learning and Schools

The internet is packed with awesome online education sites and resources and over the years we’ve tried many. Some are free, some paid. Some we buy for a month, some we subscribe to for years. When my kids were at the top end of high school they attended school for the first time. An online school. They sat exams as independent candidates using the international network of exam centres. Below we share our favourite online education sites for any age group, from stand-alone websites to the full online school my kids attended. There are many ways today to find online education for kids. You can piece together a full school curriculum yourself (homeschooling) or you can hand over responsibility for your child’s education to an online school. Both are good options. We have done both, culminating in iGCSE passes and now A levels. Kids can continue in online education to 18, or indeed, any age. You can even take an online degree course!

Homeschoolers, world schoolers, and unschoolers have been using these tools for years. As dissatisfaction with the conventional school system grows and kids and parents are finding new ways to live, the online education industry is coming into its own. Welcome to our world!

Best Online Education Sites For Kids

These are the online education sites, games, apps and resources we are happy to recommend. Are they the best? I don’t know.

But they’ve been great for our kids at some point in their education through Kindergarten, Junior (elementary) middle school and high school.

We mention free and paid resources here and we’ve used or experimented with all of these educational courses and series in the years between 6 and 16.

There’s something here for kids of any age.

As I said above, my kids (age around 16 yrs) attended an online school. Lockdown forced us to quit homeschooling. A few face-to-face classes with different humans was a welcome break in the monotony.

We mention a few such online schools in our post on how homeschoolers can sit exams.

Online Learning Programs

Reading Eggs

Reading eggs helps your child learn to read and for older kids, it improves their reading and comprehension.

This online learning program is targeted at children between 2 and 13-years-old and includes phonics. They use this program in schools too.

My kids used this, sometimes just for fun, it’s bright and colourful, up to about 8 years old.

For older kids, you’ll find reading materials on Reading Eggs to improve literacy and understanding. Visit Reading Eggs here

Khan Academy

The beauty of Khan Academy is that it’s free. It’s a vast resource covering many subjects from complete beginner to university level.

You don’t have to sign up, but you can create an account which will track your progress and offer incentives.

There are complete courses in the form of videos and written information. I find it very adult.

The people presenting the videos talk fast and in a very adult way. I’ve actually completed the art history course on here myself, just for fun.

Khan certainly starts at a basic level for all subjects so it does cover what the kids would be doing in school, but I don’t think it’s the best or easiest thing for younger kids to use.

My kids have used this for maths and you can’ indeed, complete full years of the curriculum this way.

We completed a full year of maths in just weeks using Khan at one point.

We find Khan academy a useful online learning aid for just looking things up and checking how they are done. Find Khan Academy Here.

Khan Academy is a non profit established to provide a world class education to everybody, for free. This tool will help you or your kids study for the fun of it or to prep for SATs, GCSEs, A Levels etc.

Khan Academy Kids

This is an exciting development! My kids didn’t use this because it wasn’t around yet, but it’s there on YouTube for you to use. It’s for ages 5 to 8 find it here.

John Green Crash Course World History

John Greene is a joy to watch and he really brings history to life. He presents bite sized chunks of history in short videos perfect as an online learning aid.

They are suitable for kids and my kids have always loved them, but there can be some adult themes.

You can start at the beginning of history and work straight through to modern times or simply search for the topics or eras you’re looking for.

An example of a John Greene History video is above, click play to see what I mean. These have been super useful and entertaining as we’ve worldschooled history.

When the kids were younger we found Horrible Histories TV shows and audio books great fun too.

John Green now covers a plethora of other subjects on his CrashCourse YouTube channel here. It is, of course, free.

Hank Green Crash Course Biology

These are fantastic too! These Biology videos are hosted by John Green’s brother, Hank.

This is suitable for older kids, college students (nursing maybe?) and university. There is a science series for younger kids below.

As a biologist and former professional scientist myself, I fully approve and recommend these videos for online learning.

I want to quickly mention Steve Backshall and his Deadly 60 TV series as another biological learning resource for kids. My kids love these, and some of the science Steve covers, I covered in university. It’s a great starting point for kids interested in the natural world.

Crash Course Kids

Yes, those wonderful people at Crash Course also have a complete series of free videos for kids. Suitable for most school aged kids, high school, middle school, junior school.

Study.com

We’ve just discovered this one and we love it! You do have to pay for this, we’ve signed up for a month while we complete some GCSE science.

I find it incredibly useful because it buys me time and keeps my son engaged in his learning.

If he gets stuck on a topic he can search Study.com for a short, simple lesson which will quickly explain it for him.

It’s much quicker and easier to use this than to trawl YouTube for explanatory videos. Also we learn more this way than by just Googling for correct answers.

This one is highly recommended by us. As you can see from the video above, there is a good amount of content at all levels.

The video above is just from the highschool section. I believe these courses also earn high school credits but I’m not very familiar with the US system. Find it here.

StudyLadder

This is one we used for years. It was fun enough to keep the kids interested and it came in versions for Australia, the UK and US where accents, idioms and spelling varied.

Again, this is quite “school at home” and structured but you can do as much or as little as you like. You will need to sign up.

This school-type structure makes a parent’s job easier, in all honesty. If you’re new to homeschooling, Studyladder gives you an instant, easy platform and way to homeschool as a complete novice, from day 1.

Study Ladder includes games, videos and printable worksheets for your kids from age 4 to 12.

It is mapped to your curriculum.

IXL Maths and English

IXL maths is a conventional online learning tool that provides a structured learning program for any age of school child.

We used this up to about 8 years old at home but it does work for kids From Year 1 to Year 13.

Take a look at their website here. You will need to sign up. This one is more ” school at home”.

Brain Pop

I love Brain Pop. It’s loads of fun and my kids would sit and watch videos for hours giving me some much-needed free time!

You have to pay for this one. You can get a free trial of just a few videos and I suspect you will be hooked.

If you visit their site, here, you should be able to watch the free video of the day.

Topics we enjoyed on Brain Pop included biology, zoology, chemistry, and history, it covers so much and is super child-friendly.

YouTube

You can find just about anything on YouTube. From learning about permaculture to how to make money blogging, to basic maths, it’s on YouTube, just search.

We always watch Chemistry experiments on YouTube or look at microscope images when we don’t have that equipment at home.

When my kids progressed to an online school for years 10 and 11, this is exactly how their teachers demonstrated science.

I mention several YouTube channels that are great online learning tools above, but here is a list again.

• John Green Crash Course
• Crash Course Kids
• Khan Academy
• ASAP Science
• National Geographic
• The History Channel
• Ted Ed
• VSauce
• Deadly 60
• SciShow
• Epipheo
• Dirt Girl
• Nat Geo Kids
• Brain Scoop
• The Science Mom (I like this lady, she’s like me!)

I’m working on a full list of educational YouTube channels, with links, that will be out in the next day or two. Watch your mailbox!

Open University

There are a lot of free Open Learn courses on Open University and my kids have completed several from the age of about 12.

They particularly enjoyed the zoology series based around David Attenborough’s ” Life of…” books and films.

If you’re willing to pay for formal qualifications, you can do that too.

You can even study for a degree or vocational qualifications via the Open University. See the list of free online course at the link above.

Online Tutors

Another educational route in online education, involves paying for private or small group online tutors.

We have done this for iGCSE maths revision and courses, plus interest-based sessions with experts.

My son has taken online classes in Greek mythology, creating a business plan, budgeting, and aspects of history not covered in his iGCSE and A level courses, for instance.

To find online tutors we normally use Outschool.

This one is great for kids and you’ll find a private tutor or small group class for just about any topic. Classes can be one-off, stand-alone sessions, or full school curriculum courses over many weeks.

Time zones shouldn’t be an issue, we use a British tutor in Australia. Outschool classes can even just be social or for fun.

Another option for finding online tutors is Wyzant. Through this platform, you can also find local, in-person tutors, along with the online option.

This online learning platform includes special needs, music, sports, and language tutors along with the usual school subjects and test prep. Our Wyzant link can give you $45 of credits against tutoring if you sign up.

Online Schools

As I said at the top of the page, my kids attended an online school when we were unable to travel during lockdown.

We thought that online school was a great option at that time. It gave the kids some structure while we were twiddling our thumbs during the lockdown years and took a lot of the weight of responsibility off my shoulders.

The accredited school we used worked for Asia-Pacific time zones, and as we were based in Australia at that time, this was vital. The school was British, based in the UK and also operated on GMT with separate classes and teachers. Towards the end of the lockdown period, right before my elder son was due to sit his iGCSEs the school experienced severe staffing difficulties and could no longer provide a maths teacher for our time zone.

He was forced to attend the UK classes during this critical period. His classes could be at 10pm. After this period the school fully withdrew their Asia and Australia classes. This is why I don’t give you the name here.

This school was very expensive, we paid per term and per subject. I liked that we didn’t have to pay for the full school range of topics, we could choose the classes the kids wanted to take, and only sit those exams. This is totally in line with the UK’s education system, which is internationally recognised.

The classes my kids took included English, English Literature, Maths, (Advanced and Basic), Biology, Chemistry, Geography and History.

One of the features of online school that I particularly liked, was that I could listen to, and watch the classes along with the kids. My kids often had their cameras turned off, so the teachers didn’t know I was there. I learned a lot about online schools and qualified teachers!

Some of the teachers were great. They did their job well and connected with the kids. Some just turned up in body and read from a script. Some were indescribably bad!

The teachers sometimes struggled with what they were required to teach. They seemed to know nothing about what they were being asked to teach, as per the set curriculum. Fairly often we had to put up with stand-in teachers. These people knew nothing at all about what they were reading to the kids. They couldn neither explain nor answer questions. When you’re paying a lot of money and trusting your kids’ education to 3rd parties this is a big deal.

I was able to fill the gaps left by the teachers in any subject myself, find YouTube videos to help them, and occasionally we payed for tutors to provide what the teachers couldn’t. Our experience of tutors has been generally much better than that of paid teachers in the online field.

So while we thought online school was a good option at the time, the one we used was heavily flawed and expensive. I suspect that regular schools may be the same today. In that scenario, the parents won’t know what’s going on.

Now I’ve told of our experiences with online schools, let’s get onto a few mentions. I’ve heard that free online schools do exist, but most are paid. None of the schools below are the one we used.

Online school are not homeschooling. Your kids are attending a school, just without the bricks and mortar. Our experience leads us to think that online school cannot work with a full-time travel lifestyle. Timetables are prohibitive. While recordings of lessons were available at the school we attended, they were totally non-engaging and the kids just zoned out. If your kids were very eager to learn and enjoyed the topic it could work.

Schools of Distance Education exist in Australia. These are also not compatible with international travel.

The Bina School

The bina school uses a lower case b and is just known as “bina”. The information bina gave me is as follows. We have not used bina ourselves. Our readers can receive a discount, 2nd month free. If you sign up to follow this website we can share that discount code with you. You’ll need to sign up for our “worldschoolers” newsletter, not our main subscribers newsletter.

The link to sign up for that discount is here.

This newsletter will give you information on worldschooling, homeschooling, and travel. If you’d prefer it to only include educational topics, let me know, I can set up a separate list. Worldschooling involves travel, to me the two are one and the same.

“bina is a global accredited online school with live classes, tiny groups of 7 students, educating 4-12 year olds everywhere.

bina families get an engaging and joyful academic experience led by world-class educators. Our classes are tiny, which allows each child to get the care and attention they deserve from their teachers. School days are designed with precision education in mind, meaning that we meet kids exactly where they’re at in their learning journey. By focusing on social-emotional learning and multiculturalism, we enable kids to broaden their worldview from the comfort of their home or on the go, seamlessly integrating bina into all their family adventures.

Multi-cultural and worldschooling families are our key target audience — here’s a list of key benefits you can get with bina:

 Access to a global education, kids in 7 different countries all learning together in one classroom.

 A curriculum that’s designed with global kids in mind.

 The ability to move anywhere in the world and still have consistency in ed.

School days in different time zones.

The ability to combine access to the best education with the benefits of travel.

 A network of families around the world to visit and learn from.

 We’re an accredited program! After you graduate, have access to any secondary education option you want.”

The bina website is here.

Don’t forget to sign up for your discount code!

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We hope you found our list of free and paid online learning programs, videos and resources useful. These are how our kids got their schooling in the early days, alongside homeschool workbooks, reading, textbooks, movies covering curriculum topics, TV documentaries and revision aids.

Their biggest teacher was the world and what was around them. Natural curiosity took care of the rest.

They are older teens now and it all worked out just fine. They took, and are taking, exams. We have loads of other content on our website relating to homeschooling, unschooling or worldschooling. You can see our ultimate worldschooling guide and curriculum here. Otherwise, check out the related posts below or head here to look at homeschool workbooks. Workbooks are cheap, easy and can be fun if you make them such. With all of this learning available for free, tell me, why do we need schools at all? Our full post on how to homeschool as travellers, is here. We hope you find our post on the best online education sites for kids useful.

Always check that your chosen learning path is legal in your state, country, or territory.

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We also suggest you take a look at this company to get a quote for all kinds of the more tricky adventure or extended travel insurance.

Try Stayz / VRBO for an alternative way to find rentals on homes/apartments/condos in any country!