Carol Kerney Books

Introduction to Teachers Pay Teachers.

As a teacher and a writer, I use a wonderful website called Teachers Pay Teachers. It’s found at teacherspayteachers.com. It’s a website where teachers upload their favorite classroom activities. You, as a teacher, can find just about anything there to purchase, download, and use. 

Teachers create the TPT resources. That means we can expect the materials to have been tested and revised in real classrooms with real students. TPT products are digital, therefore easy to download for use. 

Teachers Pay Teachers materials are generally quite inexpensive, ranging from $1 (for example, for an original illustration) to perhaps $35-$50 for big bundles of instructional materials. The average price seems to run from $5 to about $25 with most falling in the lower price range. Here’s something pretty cool: TPT producers usually offer you one of their products for free! It seems like they do it, as one author says, “so you can get a taste of my content and style.” It doesn’t get less expensive than that! Free is good!

What Kinds of Instructional Materials Are Available?

What can you find at TPT? The answer is: Just about anything! The products available on the Teachers Pay Teachers website run the gamut from original clip art to instructional materials to complete novels. For example, recently I was preparing to give a workshop at an educational conference. I needed some samples of literature guides. I searched teacherspayteachers.com and found a wealth of teacher-produced literature and study guides. Joyfully I included them as an important part of my presentation.

Here are some random samples of what you can find at Teacherspayteachers.com: fonts, illustrations, worksheets, all sorts of instructional activities, learning games, lesson plans, flash cards, graphic organizers, Internet activities, assessments, and novels used as curriculum. (Even whole novels with study guides are inexpensive because they are digital and downloadable.)

How Do I Find the Instructional Materials I Want to Use?

There are over 7,000,0000 products available on TPT. How can you find the materials that you want to use? Go to teacherspayteachers.com. On the home page you can search for grade level or subject area (social studies or ESL or social-emotional or first day activities, etc.) Or you can search on specific subject matter, such the American Revolution or correct use of commas or multiplication of fractions. You can also search on the type of material you’re seeking, such as biographies or science games or seasonal activities. Or you can search on a producer’s name or on the title of a product, if you know it. You will be surprised how many teacher-produced products turn up, even on so esoteric a topic as “escape rooms!”

What Else Is Cool About TPT?

One of the really fun things is that you can interact with the teachers who created the materials. Their contact info is right there. In my experience, most producers will respond to my questions or comments. And you may very well develop favorite producers.

The illustrations are really cute! Producers work hard to create covers that are appealing and make clear to you what you’ll get if you buy that product. 

You too can go into business on Teachers Pay Teachers and create your own “store.” If you have original instructional materials that you want to share with other homeschool and classroom teachers, the process is quite easy to join the 7,000,000 other teachers who sell their products to the TPT community of educators.

Refunds.

What if you don’t like a product after you buy it? According to the Refunds section on teacherspayteachers.com (as of August 7, 2024), “…all sales on TPT of digital resources are considered final and nonrefundable.” However, there are several exceptions that range from a compromised resource file to misrepresentation, technical limitations, duplicate purchase, and file access status.

Summary.

Homeschool and classroom teachers have access to an enormous number of teacher-created resources at the Teachers Pay Teachers website. These reasonably priced digital materials provide students with tons of lessons and instructional materials in just about any subject area you can imagine.

Carol Kerney is a mother, grandmother, teacher, and writer. Her novels that teach history and include study guides are available as e-books on teacherspayteachers.com and as paperback books on amazon.com, search on “Carol Kerney.”