There are plenty of companies out there that provide online courses, and some of them deliver their courses through live webinars for that personal touch. However, not many of them are made up of subject experts to do all the teaching, and hardly any of the courses they offer are designed by the person teaching the class.
Dreaming Spires ticks all those boxes: live, online courses designed and delivered by the subject experts themselves.
All tutors at Dreaming Spires are hand-picked by the CEO, Dr. Patrick, for their knowledge and proven teaching skills.
Additionally, they all have years of experience as home educators, giving you the confidence that they understand the opportunities and challenges you face as you navigate the many pathways to excellent education.
Dreaming Spires is also unique due to the method we use: an organic, student-led approach codified by the Victorian educator Charlotte Mason, which has proven effective for the past 120 years. It's a student-empowering method of inquiry and exploration where our tutors unpack ways of thinking, create relationships with the reading, and set up students for a lifetime of loving to learn.
To read more about this method, see this page.
How exactly does Dreaming Spires work?
At Dreaming Spires, we apply the Charlotte Mason method through weekly one-hour webinars taught live online, using high-quality and stimulating books, and assigning fairly simple written tasks that build on a student’s own understanding and experience.
The commitment is usually around four hours per week, and our courses last a full academic year, or 30 weeks.
Some courses have add-on extension options which provide an additional 1/2-hour each week of live tuition, plus more tutor feedback, all for less than $7/£5 per week. These may take the form of extra writing intensives (as with the English classes) or a lab (such as with many of the sciences).
What's a typical webinar like?
During our webinars, the tutors talk and use a Powerpoint for visual aids while the students type their responses in a chat box. We rarely use webcams -- they can be distracting, embarrassing, and glitchy. At first, typing in the chat box may feel awkward, but students soon learn that spelling and punctuation are no big deal in terms of getting their meaning across. As long as their ideas are clear enough, that’s what matters.
Our overall approach at Dreaming Spires is a great leveler. We’ve had disabled students, those who travel the world, gifted youngsters taking classes usually designed for older teens, and even some attending from hospital beds, and no one is the wiser about anyone's personal situation if they don't want to share it. Everyone feels welcome.
The ultimate outcome for your child depends on your goals. Dreaming Spires is able to satisfy requirements and objectives for both the US college-bound system (our courses count as high school credits for transcripts) and the UK exam system.
Our overall approach at Dreaming Spires is a great leveler. We’ve had disabled students, those who travel the world, gifted youngsters taking classes usually designed for older teens, and even some attending from hospital beds, and no one is the wiser about anyone's personal situation if they don't want to share it. Everyone feels welcome.
The ultimate outcome for your child depends on your goals. Dreaming Spires is able to satisfy requirements and objectives for both the US college-bound system (our courses count as high school credits for transcripts) and the UK exam system.