Affordable High School Electives
High school electives give students a chance to explore their interests, learn life skills, and prepare for future careers, all while earning credit for their transcript. Electives are as valuable to a well-rounded education as core subjects like math and literature. However, elective courses can put a strain on a homeschool family’s education budget. Since these courses are more specialized, they often come at a higher cost. Fortunately, there are some affordable options available. Here are a few curriculum companies that offer a wide variety of reasonably priced electives:
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7Sisters Homeschool
7Sisters Homeschool offers several high school electives to choose from. Their courses are presented in PDF textbook format, which helps keep the cost low. To save printing costs, your student can view the PDF on a computer or other device. Most of the courses cost $40 or $45. However, Speech I and Career Exploration are priced even less. You can reuse these PDF texts for other students in your family if they decide to pursue the same electives, allowing you to save even more. 7Sisters courses are taught from a Christian perspective. These are the electives they offer:
- Early Childhood Education
- Financial Literacy from a Christian Perspective
- Health for the Whole Person
- Human Development from a Christian Worldview
- Introduction to Psychology from a Christian Perspective
- Philosophy in Four Questions
- Speech I
- Career Exploration
7Sisters Homeschool offers Freedom Homeschooling readers 50% off their entire curriculum selection, including their electives! Use coupon code 7SistersCousinSarahMay at checkout to get the discount. The coupon code has no expiration date, but customers may only use it once. Also, the coupon code can only be used on carts with a total of $75 or less (before the discount).
Skillshare
Skillshare is an online learning platform that offers thousands of video-based classes. Skillshare has courses in art, crafts, graphic design, photography, film, business, writing, music, web development, entrepreneurship, culinary, sewing, and much more. Experts and industry leaders teach the classes. Students can take an unlimited number of self-paced courses and watch the videos anytime.
Lifepac
Lifepac is a reasonably priced workbook-style curriculum, which is taught from a Christian perspective. Lifepac’s electives vary in price from $75 to $140, depending on the course and where you purchase them. Besides purchasing the courses directly from Lifepac, you can also buy them from other retailers like Rainbow Resource Center and Christian Book. So, shop around to find the best price. These are the electives Lifepac offers:
- Accounting
- Art
- Consumer Math
- Family and Consumer Science
- Foundations for Living
- Health
- Spanish I
- Spanish II
- Speech: Essentials of Communication
Christian Light Education
Christian Light Education (CLE) provides a wide variety of elective courses. Most of these courses use textbooks or a combination of textbooks and workbooks. Others are workbook only. The prices vary widely by course. For example, the one-semester Computer Basics elective costs just $33, whereas the Accounting course’s components total over $300. However, most of the courses are in the $50 to $200 range. That is more than the other options included in this post, but still reasonable, considering some of these electives aren’t offered by many homeschool publishers. CLE’s more expensive courses all include a traditional textbook. To reduce the cost of these courses, you could purchase the textbook used and then sell the book when your student finishes it. Here’s what CLE has to offer:
- Accounting
- Exploring Agriscience
- Automobile Fundamentals
- Auto Upkeep
- Carpentry
- Charting a Course
- Christian Ethics
- Church History I
- Computer Service and Repair
- Consumer Math
- Home Economics I
- Home Economics II
- Horticulture
- Modern Residential Wiring
- Music in Biblical Perspective
- Print Reading for Construction
- Recordkeeping for Christian Stewardship
- Small Engine and Equipment Maintenance
- Small Gas Engines
- Technical Drawing and Sketching
- Exploring Woodworking
Related Posts
More free and affordable homeschool electives:
- Free Homeschool Electives
- Free Life Skills Curriculum
- Affordable Life Skills Curriculum
- Free Foreign Languages Curriculum
Note: This post was originally published on February 5, 2021 and has been updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.
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