ABOUT

Welcome to the Clara James Approach. The home of resources that will encourage fun, confidence, & knowledge in your child's Math and English.

Hi,

I'm Dawn,

Founder of the Clara James Group

The Clara James Approach is an online group with the goal of supporting parents in bringing confidence, knowledge, and enthusiasm to their child’s learning of both Math and English.

I believe that learning can be fun and by building confidence and enthusiasm to a child’s learning the knowledge will inevitably follow.

However, finding the ideas and resources to achieve this can be a challenge.

Do you ever feel

Heartbroken that your child is upset because they haven’t understood something at school, and you don’t know how to explain it to them?

You want to support your child’s education, but where do you start?

You want to support your child’s education, but when you sit down together it ends in tears or tantrums. (Maybe not just yours…) So, it just gets put off until tomorrow.

Maybe you’ve taken the decision to home educate your child, but the resources you have found are so dull. Your child would rather watch paint dry than do another worksheet and you feel the same!

Possibly it’s not your child you’re working with. Maybe you’re a childminder, nanny, tutor, and you need resources to keep them entertained when they get home from school, and you really want to restrict screen time without it ending in more heartache…

Sometimes trying to help our children can seem like mission impossible!

If so, you’re only human! I think just about every parent has felt like this at some point or another.

Here’s the truth…

Being a parent is hard work.

Being a parent who wants to support their child in doing well with their education is like walking through a mine field! It’s like an emotional rollercoaster. There is laughter, tears, raised voices, frustration, more laughter, and tears…

I think every parent feels like this at some point.

But as a parent, we want what’s best for our children. We want to help them. We want them to achieve, to learn as much as they can, to be inspired. But at the same time, we want them to enjoy it. We want them to look back at having enjoyed the times that we spent together. With fond memories of learning and how we went about it. Maybe want we want is the impossible?

It’s not impossible and here’s how we can help.

I am here to help you succeed and enjoy the journey with your child. Here’s how:

• You will find inspiration in our blogs.

• Our Courses

• The Clara James Approach membership group: In the group you will find an abundance of games and varied resources based on primary Math and English.

• We can also help you as a tutor. To find out more click here.

MY STORY

Clara James Tutoring started one Sunday evening in 2012, but the journey to get here had started many years before…

This isn’t a page put together by a marketing department.

It’s an open and honest story about who we are, how we do things and why. Sometimes life doesn’t go the way you envisage. By the age of 24, instead of being a paramedic, I was married with 3 young children under 4.

We moved up to Scarborough in North Yorkshire when we were expecting Angel, our youngest daughter. On one occasion when we came back down here to visit friends it struck me what others in my year group at school had done with their lives. I decided I wanted to do something more with mine.

When we returned to Scarborough, I went into the playgroup which Clara, my oldest daughter attended and asked if I could work there as a volunteer whilst I studied for my diploma in preschool practice.

Thankfully she said yes.

Within a couple of months I was offered the paid role of SENCo (Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator) and was asked to also assist with the planning, policies and procedures for the setting. Over the coming years, I completed the diploma. Then I continued and did a degree in childcare and education through the Open University. As my daughter started secondary school, I questioned whether she might be slightly dyslexic. Verbally she was very astute, but her written work looked like it had been created by a much younger child.

At the time Clara was a very quiet child. The school instantly dismissed the idea.

Back then, I think dyslexia was an excuse for being lazy.

She wasn’t giving the teachers any problems and because she was so quiet it was easier to brush the idea off.

At the time I didn’t have the confidence to fight my corner. So, I decided that if they wouldn’t help her, I would do what I could to help her myself.

Over the coming years I finished my degree but also studied numerous other courses on learning styles, learning difficulties and anything I could get my hands on.

I also worked in mainstream schools, creches, a residential unit for children with autism. In addition, I worked as an NVQ assessor in early years and as a childminder.

But one of the main things that became apparent was that we are all different. We all learn differently. It is far harder to embrace what we are being taught, if we are not relaxed and open to learning.

Furthermore: if we do something once, we create a memory. So, for example, if we do a worksheet, that information is lodged somewhere in our mind. If we complete a second worksheet, we are reinforcing that knowledge. But our brain still only has one place to go to find the information that it needs.

However, if we do a range of different activities, we are creating more memories within our brain. Therefore, when that information is needed, our brain has more places to go to where it can find the knowledge that it is seeking.

When my marriage finally ended, I lost the house. This meant I also lost the childminding business I had built up. I took a job at a local optician just to pay the bills.

I quickly learned that this was not a job for me long term and I returned to college to study the PTTLS course. This meant I could work with adults in a classroom setting.

Whilst on this course, a friend I made suggested that I had a go at tutoring.

At first my idea was that it would be nothing more than to complement the job at the opticians.

I wasn’t sure what was expected of a tutor, even though by this stage I had about 12 years’ experience working in education.

WHEN I STARTED CLARA JAMES TUTORING (2012), IT WAS BUILT UPON THE FOLLOWING VALUES:

• Lessons needed to be varied, enjoyable, relevant.

• We are all individual and learn differently, and

• As a parent what would I expect from a tutor?

Clara is my oldest daughter; Jamie is my son. The logo is an angel holding a book, Angel is my youngest daughter.

Now we not only offer 1 to 1 tutoring, we also have a range of mini courses and have a membership group (the Clara James Approach) offering resources for parents to use themselves at home.

In addition, we offer help in becoming a tutor through the Clara James Brand Associate Opportunity and the Clara James Tutoring Franchise.

FEEDBACK WE'VE HAD

Thomas (year 11)

Fantastic help. Dawn offers excellent academic support with a bright, cheerful attitude. Dawn is flexible and will work with you through a wide variety of topics or particular areas that you struggle in. Encourages fun and creative learning.

Matthew (year 8)

Dawn always has a smile on her face and is never in a bad mood. Patient and kind, she helps you with whatever you are struggling with academically and explains it very clearly. You can’t go one minute with Dawn without having fun. She always encourages me with creative and exciting learning every week.

Rei (year 10)

Three things I like about working with Dawn:

Dawn is very relaxed and patient.

She is open minded and gives options as what to focus on in each session.

The games are mixed up and fun to help me learn.

Max (year 7)

Dawn makes the games fun for Math and English and this helps me to remember things more easily.

Dawn is very welcoming and patient, and she is always well prepared for each lesson.

Christina

From the perspective of a parent of two reluctant learners.

Dawn has provided much needed impartial support in helping my children to focus and learn how to learn. She has established trust from my children so that they feel comfortable taking risks, eg: reading aloud, attempting spellings or math problems.

Dawn has been amazing with our Son.

His confidence in math has grown, and his results have reflected this.

Want to get involved?

Do you want more inspiration, help, guidance in supporting your child’s Math and English?

It’s what I’m here for. Join our membership to access…

  • All our short courses including those on taking the pain and tears out of your child’s homework, introducing dyslexia, creating confident learners. There are also our creative courses “The Beach”, “The Tree” “The Jungle”.

  • Many resources to support you in helping your child gain both confidence and knowledge with both their Math and English. These include subjects such as negative numbers, homophones, times-tables and phonics.

  • The growing Facebook group where you can find inspiration and have your questions answered.

  • The monthly live Q&A call where I will talk you through any questions you have on working something out or offer you new ideas on how you can present a subject to your child.

  • Every month new resources are added.

  • + So much more …all the help you could need to get where you want.

© Copyright 2022 The Clara James Approach