All the kids paperwork and artwork from homeschool driving you crazy? Here’s a simple and free solution to keeping everything organize digitally – and you don’t even need a scanner to use it!
Here’s how to easily keep your homeschool paperwork organized. You can use this same process to apply to any paperwork you want to easily and digitally keep track of, without a complicated process. All you need is a smartphone and a Google account.
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You may either want to keep schoolwork organized for your own records, or you may have a charter or virtual school you turn work into for your kiddos. In either case, once you set this up, all your work will be in one, convenient folder for you to use later.
This is a super easy way to keep any kind of paperwork organized. One thing I’ve found is that if a process isn’t very simple, I’m more likely to procrastinate or not use it at all. I could use my printer’s scanner to scan all my kids’ work in, but it involves a lot of steps that may not get done in the course of a busy day (or month…).
What I love about this solution is it takes me seconds to scan my kids work in and I have it right where I need it to reference later. I also use this exact same process to save my kiddos artwork digitally.
(Rather not use your phone to scan paperwork? We also LOVE this compact, mobile Brother scanner.)
First, you’ll need a Google account and the Google Drive app installed on your phone or device.
Inside Drive, create a folder where you want schoolwork to be scanned into.
On your phone, you’ll need to create a widget to create a shortcut so you can scan directly to a Drive folder. I’ll be showing you how to set this up on an Android phone.
Hold down on your screen until a menu pops up. Your options may look slightly different than mine, but most Androids should have a “Widget” option. Tap on that.
Then scroll down until you get to Drive, and select the Drive Scan widget.
Next, your phone should prompt you to select a destination for your files – this is where you’ll want them to be stored. Since you should have already created a Drive folder earlier on. Navigate to this folder, and tap select.
Now we’re all set up! Let me show you how easy it is to use every day.
Tap the shortcut on your phone you want to use.
You can see I have one set up for School Work and one for Kids Artwork. Each goes to its own folder.
Take a photo of whatever paperwork you want scanned in. I’ve found this works best if you do it in a well-lit place.
Your paperwork may scan in perfectly as-is, but you can use the next screen to make any adjustments to the coloring. You can also crop, rotate, or add more pages to the file.
Tap Save when you’re done making adjustments.
And that’s it!
Your phone will upload that file directly into your Drive folder. It usually takes me less than 30 seconds to scan in all of my kids’ schoolwork for the day. I usually either do this as they finish up, or all at once at the end of the school day.
The great thing is that this isn’t just limited to schoolwork on paper. You can also scan whiteboards, workbooks, or anywhere your kiddo does schoolwork.
Other Helpful Homeschool Organization Tools
Digital organization is important, but where do you keep those papers in the meantime? This hanging file organizer is a great way to hold upcoming assignments or to store papers you want to scan later. I love that it has removable folders!
And where do you keep pencils, pens, markers, and all those other bits and bobs that end up thrown at the bottom of the closet or fall behind the shelf? (Ask me how I know!) This rolling cart is a great way to contain all those supplies AND keep them organized. Plus, it’s easy to move it wherever it needs to be.
