Ask us anything.
We answer plainly.

A homeschool planner that lays out your whole year in one evening and expects you to change it. When a day goes sideways, move a lesson and the rest of the year shifts around it. At the end, you can print the record your portfolio review asks for.

Yes. We hold on to your year for you, so we need to know whose it is. Use an email address and a password, or the Continue with Google button if that's easier. We send one email to confirm the address. Confirming it signs you in on the device where you opened it and on the one you started from.

In your account. Your device keeps a copy so the planner opens instantly and works without signal, but the copy in your account is the real one. Lose the phone, drop the laptop in the creek, clear your browser. Sign in somewhere else and your year is right there.

You can keep your own copy too. Setup → Save a copy of my year gives you one file with everything in it: every lesson, every checkmark, every trip. Email it to yourself or drop it in iCloud. You don't need it to keep your year safe, but it's yours and it takes ten seconds.

Yes, and they stay in step. Check off Tuesday's math on the kitchen iPad and it's already checked when you open your phone in the car. Sign in on as many devices as you like. There's no device limit and no "primary" one. Signing out takes your year off that device, which is what you want on a borrowed computer.

iPhone: open marginplanner.com in Safari, tap the share button, then “Add to Home Screen.” Android: open it in Chrome, tap the ⋮ menu, then “Install app.” From then on it opens full-screen with its own icon and no address bar.

The first time you open the icon, it may ask you to sign in again. An installed app gets its own storage, separate from the browser you installed it from. Sign in once and your year comes right down. Nothing is lost and there's nothing to carry across.

Yes, after the first visit. Margin keeps a copy of itself and your year on the device, so it opens at a co-op building with no bars, in the car, or at a cabin. Everything works: adding trips, checking off lessons, moving things. Your changes go up to your account as soon as you have signal again. A dead connection never locks you out of the planner and never loses an afternoon of checkmarks.

That's the whole point. Press Rebuild schedule. Margin takes what you've actually checked off, carries the rest forward, and lays out the rest of the year again. Lessons you did early stay done. A missed lesson moves to the next day that has room for it. You don't retype anything and nothing is lost.

Drag it. On a laptop, pick it up and drop it on another day. On a phone or iPad, press and hold for a moment, then drag. A quick tap still just scrolls the page. Every move pops up a note naming the lesson and the day, with an Undo. One mis-tap shouldn't be something you can't take back.

Add them on the Days Off tab whenever you like. You don't have to plan them at setup, and a day off can be for one child or the whole family. Time off that's still ahead of you just gets absorbed. The rest of the year spreads back out and you never have to decide anything. Only work you've already missed brings up a choice, and then Margin asks what you want to do with it instead of guessing.

Yes, and they work differently on purpose. A field trip counts toward your required days and has no bookwork. Give it times and you keep the school time around it, so a one o'clock start still leaves you the morning. Leave the times blank and it takes the whole day. A trip can be for one child or for everyone, and the family has its own color so you can spot a family day at a glance.

Co-op takes the whole day by default, so no bookwork lands on it. Outside the co-op's own term, that weekday goes back to a regular school day with a full load. You don't have to ask. It just happens.

Yes. Each child has their own co-op term, off weeks, meeting day, hours and co-op name. Check one child on their own to see or change theirs. A child outside their own term just has a normal school day while their sibling is at co-op.

As many as you teach, at no extra cost. One price covers your whole household no matter how many children are in it. Each child gets their own subjects, curriculum, lesson counts and days of the week. Read-alouds and field trips can belong to several children at once, so you're not entering the same book three times.

Two things, both from the Report tab.

The record — days completed against your required number, hours, and every subject for every child with the curriculum used, lessons finished and grades if you gave any, plus field trips, activities and time off. You can print the whole year or any single month, with or without a day-by-day register.

The month packet — the month on a page, then a page per week with every day written out, then the events and the books. It prints with empty boxes on purpose, because it's meant to be written on. Print it for the whole family or one child, for a month, a week or a single day.

Whether it satisfies your state is up to your state. But it has what reviews usually ask for: attendance, hours, subjects, curriculum and progress. And you never lose the ability to print. See the question about canceling below.

Yes, for the lessons you want to grade. Check off a lesson and a grade box appears beside it. Type a score like 18/20 or 90, or leave it empty. Most families only grade tests and quizzes.

To mark which lesson is the test, rename it to what it really is, like “Chapter 3 Test.” Only that one lesson changes.

The Report tab then shows an average grade and a letter for each subject you graded. If you never grade, you never see a grade column.

Each child also has a grade, like 3rd or K, picked from a list under Setup. It goes on the printed record and moves up one when you start a new year.

Yes. When you add a subject, type the lesson you're on in the Starting at box. Say the book has 120 lessons and you're on lesson 41. Margin plans 41 through 120 and counts the first 40 as done before this year. Leave the box empty and it starts at lesson 1.

Usually not. When you add a subject, pick the subject and then search for the book by its name or the company that makes it, like Saxon. Picking a book fills in its lessons and minutes.

If your book isn't there, add it once along with its company. Its name, company, subject, lesson count and minutes go on the shared list so the next family finds it filled in. Nothing about you goes with it. When families enter different lesson counts, the list uses the one most families entered.

Yes. The co-op calendar, the field trip list, the summer list and the book list each have a Read a photo instead button. Take a picture or pick one, and Margin types in what it can read. For a calendar it keeps only the lines with dates.

The photo is read on your own device and never sent anywhere. Reading a photo is never perfect, so look over the lines before you add them. Nothing is added until you say so.

Yes. Above the calendar, tap Day. You get one day on its own page with each child's lessons, co-op and field trips. The arrows move a day at a time, and Back to today does just what it says.

Two ways, both under Setup → Your calendar.

Google — connect your account and Margin makes a calendar called Margin and fills it in. It can only ever touch that one calendar. The permission Google grants can't reach anything else. Small edits you make on the Google side are yours and stay put, and disconnecting leaves your calendar exactly as it is.

Apple, Skylight, or anything else — turn on the feed and you get an address to paste in. Everything you picked shows up and stays up to date. On a Skylight, add it in the Skylight app as a subscribed calendar.

Either way, you choose what goes on: field trips, activities, co-op, learning days, and bookwork if you want it. Bookwork is off unless you turn it on. Even then it's only the day’s subject names. Never a lesson number and never a record of what you finished. You can subscribe to one kind by itself, so co-op can go on the calendar you share and bookwork on yours.

Nothing until you say so. Reaching your required days doesn't end the year.

When you're done, press Complete my school year on the Report tab. The year becomes read-only. You can still open it, print it and save a copy.

When you're ready for the next one, press Start next year. There's no rush. Most families take a month or two off first. Setup is shorter than the first time. Your children move up a grade, and you can change any of them. Days off, co-op and books start fresh. If you're continuing a book, put in the lesson you're starting on.

They stay on the Report tab under Past years. Last year opens just like it did when you were using it. Older years you can print.

We keep every year for as long as your account is open. A year takes up very little room, so there's no reason to throw one away.

If you finished a year by mistake, you can reopen it. Margin asks you twice first, because changing an old year can throw off a new one you've already planned.

Yes, on the Books tab. Tap Scan the barcode and point your phone at the back cover. The title and author fill in for you.

Coming home with a library stack? Tap Scan them in and scan the whole pile. Margin counts them and lists the titles.

The camera picture stays on your phone. The only thing sent is the book’s ISBN (the number under the barcode) so we can look up the title. That number says nothing about your family.

Yes. Put in how many books you checked out and the day they're due back, or scan them. The due date shows on your calendar, and a note pops up at the top when they're due tomorrow or late. Renewed adds four weeks. Returned takes them off.

Yes, on the Assignments tab. Give it a start day and a due day. It shows up on every school day until it's due, so a little gets done each day. It doesn't take any minutes from the day, so your lessons stay put.

The due day has a box for the grade. Once you type a grade in, the reminders stop.

Yes. The Chores tab has a chart for each child. Chores can have a picture for little ones who can't read yet. You can put them on the calendar too, and a chore that wasn't checked off drops off the calendar once its day is over.

Yes. Share a link shows one child’s day, week, or the dates you pick. It includes co-op and activities with their times and addresses. They can read it and print it, but they can't change anything.

You lock it with a password, and it stops working after the last day you chose. Send the password separately from the link. Once a link is sent you can't call it back, so only share it with people you trust.

Yes. When you add or edit a subject, choose how the book numbers its lessons: straight through, even units, or uneven units. Tell Margin how many lessons are in each unit and every lesson will read the way it does in the book, like 2.4 or Unit 3 Lesson 1.

Yes, at no extra cost. Under Setup, add a second parent by their email. They get an invite, make their own account with their own password, and see the same planner you do.

You choose what they can do:
Can only look — they see everything and can print, but can't change anything.
Can change the calendar — they check things off, move lessons, and add field trips and days off. They can't change the children, the subjects or the year.
Full access — everything you can do, except the plan you pay for and who's invited.

You can change what they can do, or take them off, anytime.

$8 a month, or $80 a year — the year works out to two months free. One price covers the whole household no matter how many children you teach. There's nothing extra to buy and no higher tier to get pushed into.

The first 14 days are free with everything unlocked. You need a card to start, but nothing is charged until the trial ends. Cancel before then and you won't be billed at all. If you do nothing, your subscription starts at the price you picked when the 14 days are up. It's one trial per family.

You keep your records either way. The planner still opens, your year is on the screen, the months turn, and printing and saving a copy both still work. What stops is planning ahead. The planner goes read-only until the subscription is back. Nothing is deleted and nothing is taken away from you.

Canceling always takes effect at the end of the period you've paid for, never the same day, and you can undo it right up to the last day. If a payment just fails, a bar at the top tells you and the button there replaces the card. Usually that's a reissued Visa, not a decision to leave. You'll find both on your account page.

Write to us within 30 days and we'll refund it. A renewal you didn't expect, a year you meant to cancel and forgot, a second charge that shouldn't have happened. Tell us and the money goes back. We'd rather give it back than keep it from someone who didn't mean to spend it.

What we don't refund is months you've already used. That's what the free trial is for: 14 days with everything unlocked, so you can see whether Margin fits your family before you pay anything. If the law where you live gives you a stronger right to a refund, that law wins. The long version is in section 8 of the terms.

You, and anyone you choose to share it with. Nobody at Margin reads a family's planner as a matter of course, and your children's schedule is never sold, never shared and never handed to an AI — not to train one, not to summarize your week, not for anything. That one isn't a policy we might change later.

There are no ads in Margin, no ad trackers and no Google Analytics. Even the fonts come from marginplanner.com instead of Google, so nobody outside finds out when you open your planner. Margin never asks for a child's last name, birth date, address or photo, and a child can be “my oldest” if you'd rather.

A few things leave on purpose, and only when you use them. The calendar feed above sends only the parts you picked. A curriculum you add goes on the shared list by its name and lesson count. Nothing about you goes with it. A book you scan sends only its ISBN so we can find the title. And a link you share carries one child’s days to the person you send it to. That one never passes through us. The privacy policy says all of this the long way.