Have you ever wanted to know how to make worksheets and other resources to sell online? I first found a complete marketing website. You may have heard of it. I found Teachers Pay Teachers when I was in the darkest season of my life. I was an eighth-grade ELA teacher by day and a mom to three little kids by night. I had two of my boys twelve months and eleven days apart as a young mom going to school to be a teacher, and I ended up in deep postpartum depression. I was in survival mode, so when I found this fantastic website where I could pay a few dollars to have my lesson plans and activities done for me, I was all for it! 

Soon enough, I realized that I, too, could make worksheets and activities to sell. The first month I started creating resources; my goal was to pay for my Netflix bill. Seven years later, I had made more than a million dollars with my online teacher business, and it all started with me figuring out how to make worksheets for TPT.

I am here to share my experience, tips, and advice with you, so it doesn’t take you this long to build a sustainable business for you and your family. The beauty of creating resources and worksheets to sell online is that you can use a predesigned platform like TPT or Etsy, or you can blaze your own trail and start your own WooCommerce Storefront. The possibilities are endless!

There is room for everyone on the playground, so let’s start creating!

How to Make Worksheets on PowerPoint

Let me save you hours of frustration as you learn how to make creative worksheets and resources for your online business.

Stop using Microsoft Word!

When I found out how to make worksheets in PowerPoint, creating resources for my TPT store became so much easier. PowerPoint gives you a completely blank, customizable canvas to work with, while Word makes you fit into its boundaries and formatting.

When you brush up on your PowerPoint skills, you’ll want to get very familiar with using text boxes, and shapes, inserting pictures (clipart and stock photos), font kerning, and exporting your document as a PDF. I love seeing how each teacherpreneur uses these same elements to create their unique worksheets and resources to serve their audience! The eyedropper tool to color your text and shapes is awesome because you can use the exact color you want. And don’t forget to play around with the shape effects that will help your resources stand out from the crowd.

How to Make Printable Worksheets

Now it’s time to decide: Is your resource going to be printable or digital? If you choose to make your activities printable, you’ll want to secure your resources using Adobe Pro. If you don’t secure them, your customers can change them, lift off the clipart (which goes against the clip artists’ terms of use), and what you’ve worked so hard on isn’t safe. 

Think about a chef, for example. He doesn’t give away his secret recipe to just anyone – he creates a delectable meal to serve to his customers that satisfies them and leaves them wanting more, so they’ll return to his restaurant time and time again.

The worksheets and products you create and spend your limited time and energy on are your secret recipe. Without securing your documents, you’re giving away that secret recipe instead of thinking like a business owner who wants their customers to keep coming back for more. So as you learn how to make pdf worksheets for TPT and start creating your own, remember to do it the right way the first time. It pays off in the end!

How To Make Worksheets Digital

It is mindblowing how, in just a few months of 2021, digital resources exploded! They came out of necessity, and since the digital craze in 2021, we have seen education continue to move in the digital direction. So if you have worksheets you’ve already created for your classroom and you want to make them digital, or if you want to know how to make digital worksheets, the process isn’t too hard. The biggest hurdle is deciding where to house them.

There are many digital product options – Boom Cards are digital task cards, Seesaw is a digital platform with a ton of interactive capabilities, TPT has a digital activities creator, and Google files are very popular. This is not a comprehensive list, so if you have other options that are working well for you, please share your favorite way to make worksheets digital in the comments below! I still recommend starting your product creation in PowerPoint.

One of the fun aspects of creating digital resources is that they can be made in color since the educators who purchase from you don’t have to print anything! Another vital thing to think about is how many platforms tend to use a landscape orientation versus a portrait layout. When you make digital resources, think about how you can use the landscape page setup to your advantage.

This isn’t necessary, but it will give you the most real estate as you’re creating resources. Especially if you’re looking for how to create worksheets in Google Docs and Slides – Since the computer screen is landscape, students will find it easier to see everything when your resources match that orientation.

When you export your digital worksheets from PowerPoint, save them as PNG or JPG files instead of PDFs. That way, you can insert them as the background of whatever platform you’re putting your resources on. The larger you make the dimensions, the more crisp the image will be. You can then add text, text boxes, shapes, and anything else you create in the platform you use to make it interactive. I love the way teachers are thinking outside the box and coming up with creative ideas for how to make worksheets more engaging.

Start Creating Resources for TPT Today!

I coach hundreds of teachers every week, and one of the biggest hurdles they face in their journey to become a successful CEO Teacher® is mindset.

STOP worrying about making everything perfect – perfection is not the goal here. The goal is to use your passion for education and expertise to create resources that serve teachers, parents, and students and move the needle forward in your business so you can live the life you love. Take action now, and gain clarity later.

I understand that you want to learn how to make beautiful worksheets and resources (and I teach you how in the CEO Teacher® Membership), but if you don’t put in the work and put yourself out there, you’ll stay stuck where you are right now. And I don’t want you to stay stuck; I want to see you grow and flourish and be as successful as you want to be!

If you are wondering how to start or expand your online business as a teacher, I’ve got you covered! Join the CEO Teacher® Membership and get started making your biggest dreams and goals a reality. I created it with you in mind, so everything is teacher-focused, the marketing, the examples, the lessons. I teach you how to build your business from the ground up and set yourself up for success with the one stop shop, and I cannot wait to see you on the inside.