Lab Supplies for Discover Anatomy & Physiology

For any family looking for a robust anatomy course, hands-on lab assignments are a must—and this involves purchasing supplies.

While most students favorite part of anatomy, is the labs, it’s not essential that students complete all of the labs. We’d recommend your student choose at least 15 of these to complete themselves.

Lab Supplies on a Budget

We understand the budget constraints of many homeschoolers — purchasing curriculum and supplies often for multiple children can be pricey! We recommend your students plan to watch all of the lab videos and complete at least 15 labs for high school credit. So how can you make this work on a tight budget?

First, we’d recommend you choose the labs to complete that only require easily obtainable lab supplies and supplies you can probably find around your house (such as the lab for lesson 2).

We also provide supplemental lab demonstration videos to go along with most of the labs in this course—specifically those that require specialty items that may be cost prohibitive for some families. While we consider this a distant second best to your students completing the labs themselves, we want to give an option to families who want to have their students participate in these labs and write the lab reports but are not able to obtain the necessary supplies.

Access to a Microscope

Quite a few of the labs require the use of a microscope.

If you don’t own a microscope, try to borrow one.

Some local libraries allow you to check out a microscope to use at home.
Check with other homeschool families or local co-ops to see if they have one you could borrow.

If a microscope isn’t available to borrow, and you can’t fit one into your budget, a distant second-best option is to use the demonstration videos provided.

Check out our Home Science Microscope Buying Guide

Where to Buy Homeschool Science Supplies?

We have worked with Cornerstone Educational Supplies to make purchasing lab supplies as affordable as possible for you. You have two options…

1. Purchase a Kit! (coming soon!)

The kit below has nearly all of the speciality items you’ll need, except the microscope (see our microscope buying guide for options).

2. Purchase your supplies a la carte

If you’d prefer to purchase just a few items at a time or you aren’t planning to complete all of the labs for the course, use the links below to purchase your items a la carte from Home Science Tools.

We recommend purchasing your lab supplies 3-4 weeks before your chosen start date to ensure they have plenty of time to get to you and that your dissection specimens are not too old when it’s time to use them.

Canadian Families

Please see this page for a special note on sourcing lab supplies.

Lab Supply List

Below is a list of supplies you’ll need to purchase from a lab supply company and another list of those that can typically be found around the house or at a local store. Alternatively, you can see a list of lab supplies needed listed by lesson on this page.

Household Supplies

Stopwatch or smartphone timer
Large bowl or basin
Ice cubes
Digital thermometer (oral or forehead thermometer recommended)
Towel
Large sheet of paper (e.g. newspaper end rolls, butcher paper, or several sheets taped together)
Pencil and markers or colored pencils
Ruler (optional, for straighter lines)
Clothespin
Chair
Small hand weight or can of soup
Mirror
1 meterstick or yard stick
Calculator
Optional materials for variations such as:
- - Blindfold or something to cover the eyes
  - Space for jumping jacks or light exercise
  - Colored tape or marker (for “go/no-go” or dual-task variations
- Cardboard paper-towel tube (or stethoscope)
- 1 sturdy plastic sports drink bottle with bottle cap (e.g., Gatorade, ~20-28 oz)
- 2 small balloons (5″)
- 1 large balloon (9″ or 12″) or latex glove
- 6 drinking straws
- Scissors or craft knife
- Tape
- Optional: hot glue or modeling clay to seal around straws
- 4 clear cups, pint-sized mason jars, or flasks
- Measuring cup and teaspoon (or graduated cylinder)