There are so many online options out there — well-established classical education programs, online-only all subject and enrichment platforms, other homeschool curriculum providers offering online classes.
Why should families choose our classes?
Our courses incorporate instructor-led authentic hands-on activities
How often in homeschool do you get to a physical curriculum program and sigh when you get to a huge set of activities that you must sift through? One advantage of our classes are instructors curate simple weekly or semester projects; students will get a list of materials they need either for an in-class or homework activity they can do to further in-class subject material. Once completed, projects are often shared with the rest of the class so students have the opportunity to share about their creation. This builds confidence and camaraderie as students showcase their work.
Here are some blog articles showcasing our hands-on projects.
Our classes use story to teach the subject matter (AKA the literature approach)
“Literature-based instruction encourages children to think deeply and share their thoughts about a story.”
– Carrie Perles, Seattle pi
This is one of our favorite quotes about literature based learning. The literature approach is a method of learning where students read stories — historical fiction, novels, biographies — to learn about a subject area. Though this approach can take longer, it builds an impenetrable set of knowledge; instead of memorizing dates and figures, students remember places and spaces in history. This approach is fabulous for the younger grades as students are getting their first introduction to the subject matter. Many of our courses use it as it’s interesting and engaging.
Here is a set of our California Out of the Box literature books. Each of these books anchors a different part of the California story.
Our classes develop a sense of students “feeling known”
Do you have a student that likes to be social? Or an only child? Or are you looking for classes for your youngest child? If you are looking for a small group experience where your student can have fun as they learn in a class of several other students, explore our offerings! Our teachers work tirelessly at helping students get to know each other and feel known by others. Our goal is to interweave our classes to the point where students feel they would be missed if they were not there. We do not record classes for this reason; each student brings something valuable to our classes!
A final thought
Some online education platforms have classes that are as short as 30 minutes. We take our role as educators seriously; if a parent is asking us to teach US history or world history to their student, we can only do so if our classes are more than an hour. We want to do a complete job and cover the material as best as we can. With the exception of our Magical Math class (K-3), our classes are generally an hour or more.
With that said—our hour to 75 minute class is not a passive dull video, but rather an interactive environment with review, new material, discussing the story, sharing homework, games, etc. Our instructors seek to make all students feel comfortable and valued!
If you are looking for a place for your student to be creative, feel known, challenged and inspired, explore our history, writing, science, and math classes. If you are looking for support for your responsibilities as a homeschool parent — give our classes a try! Our instructors have all homeschooled their kids; they know how much effort attending to the job of a homeschool teacher is.
Courses and Age Ranges
“I appreciate that he is learning CA History and so much more…Tracy always took the time to add encouraging feedback when she graded the assignments and did a good job keeping the kids engaged and learning. It was a great class and I would recommend it to everyone.“