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Introducing the Clara James Learning Membership: Practical Ideas to Help Your Child at Home
Parents sometimes say that they'd like to help their child but their not sure how.
Or they're scared they'll just confuse them further:
And quite often, the answer doesn't need to be another worksheet, or a tutor.
It might be a game.
Having something explained so that you can explain it yourself.
Five minutes practising a skill without it feeling like practice.
A picture that gets a child talking when a blank sheet of paper produced absolutely nothing.
Or simply being reassured that it's okay to approach something differently.
That's the idea behind the new Clara James Learning Membership.
I wanted to create something genuinely useful
I've run a membership before, and I learned quite a lot from it — including what I don't want this one to become!
I don't want parents to sign up and suddenly find themselves with an enormous library of things they're supposed to work through.
Most families don't need another to-do list.
And I don't want to promise exactly the same thing every week or every month simply because it makes the membership easier to describe.
Different subjects need different approaches.
More importantly, different children need different approaches.
So this membership is going to be deliberately varied.
How will it work?
Each month we'll focus on a different area of maths or English.
Depending on the topic, you might receive games and downloadable resources, short activities to try together, practical ideas you can use at home or live online workshops.
The important part isn't the format.
It's that everything has a purpose.
To help you help your child build their knowledge and confidence.
Sometimes that might mean ten minutes around the kitchen table.
Sometimes we might meet online.
Sometimes you might discover one game your child loves and decide to play it repeatedly.
That would be great!
We're not trying to race through resources just so we can say we've completed them.
We're starting with creative writing
For October, we're beginning with two live creative-writing workshops.
I love creative writing because there isn't one right answer.
Two children can look at exactly the same picture and create completely different characters, settings and stories from it.
We'll use images and questions to get the ideas flowing and then gradually develop them.
Our first workshop will begin with The Forgotten Suitcase.
An old suitcase has been left beneath an autumn tree.
Who left it?
What's inside?
How long has it been there?
And perhaps most importantly...
Are you going to open it?
Later in October we'll move into something slightly more mysterious with The House at the End of the Lane.
Who lives there?
Why is the house there?
What might be waiting behind the door?
It can be mysterious, funny, magical or spooky. Halloween gives us the inspiration, but nobody has to write something terrifying!
The idea is to give children a starting point and then let their imaginations take us somewhere completely different.
What age is it for?
I deliberately don't want to put a strict age on every activity.
A younger child might look at the mysterious house and tell us about the funny witch and her seventeen cats who live inside.
An older child might use exactly the same image to explore atmosphere, tension and gothic description.
Same starting point.
Completely different outcome.
That's very much the Clara James way of doing things.
We start with the child in front of us.
What happens after October?
We'll move on to a different focus.
One month might be times tables, with games and short activities designed to make regular practice a little more enjoyable.
Another might involve English.
Another might work better as a workshop.
I'm deliberately not creating a rigid formula that says every month must contain X worksheets, X videos and X activities.
I want to be able to ask:
What's the best way to help with this particular thing?
And build the month around the answer.
Join us as one of our first members
I'm opening the first 20 founding membership places for £5 per month.
If you're one of those first 20 members, you'll keep your £5 monthly price for as long as you remain a member, even when the price increases for new members.
Your two October creative-writing workshops are included.
If you don't want to join the membership, that's absolutely fine too. The workshops can also be booked individually for £7.50 each.
But if you'd like to join us from the beginning and see where we take this...
I'd love to have you with us.
[JOIN THE CLARA JAMES LEARNING MEMBERSHIP ]
And if you're wondering whether it would suit your child, please get in touch and ask.
