Learning Palace

Bring your report card in and you get $ 2 in kid bucks! This is a great store for teaching supplies, educational toys, games and books. We always head here for workbooks to do over the summer. They have a great selection to compare and contrast until you find the best fit.
My kids are now old enough to choose their own core books and request to come here specifically for the selection. If you haven’t been, it is worth checking out.

Come mid-​June it is pretty standard to start hearing Alice Cooper’s «Schools Out» being played as schools kick of their summer vacation. While many teachers and students joyfully hum a few bars of this song each year, I was never able to join them because I found the end of the year to be quite sad. Instead of rejoicing about the summer months ahead, I found myself dreading the unknown of summer. So to keep myself occupied, each year on the last day of school my fierce elementary school self would come home with a report card in hand, ready to start negotiating handing it over in exchange for a trip to Learning Palace.
Not being able to argue with the child who wanted to learn, I found myself at Learning Palace in no time. Joyfully passing the entire wall of Playmobil toys and train track play area, my visits led me to the glorious workbook aisle. It was here where I spent a ridiculous amount of time looking through workbook after workbook to see what struck my fancy. After thoughtful investigation I managed to find the crispest copy of a vocabulary, math, and science workbook for the respected grade I would be entering that fall. Additionally, being the sly child that I was, I knew that dropping a subtle reminder that my summer would be spend doing academic actives (instead being reckless and potentially breaking a limb) usually bought me a brand spankin new #2 pencil and a pack of stickers as well.
For as long as I have been coming to Learning Palace, not much has changed. In fact I think to the location of the train track table may be the most major modification. Throughout the years the staff has remained super kind and the store has kept up on a pretty good selection of: workbooks, teacher books (classroom management, bulletin board ideas, working with different learning disabilities, etc…), craft/​art/​school supplies, simple musical instruments, science kits, teacher stuff (lesson planners, bells, hall passes, stereotypical apples, etc…), classroom posters, presentation boards, educational toys and games, stickers, and so on and so on. Depending on what you are looking at the prices can be a little redonkulous and while the flash of a teacher ID can get you 10% off your purchase, sometimes it is worth looking elsewhere. Ultimately however, it is not hard to walk away with lots of treasures.
Now that I am embarking on my journey as an educator, I am no longer in the market for *just* workbooks. So just as soon as I get my cue from Alice Cooper, I will know that it is safe to start crushing summer spirits and will yet again turn to Learning Palace to help me begin planning for the next school year!