Outschool for Curious Minds and Busy Parents

Almost a year ago, we discovered Outschool and since then, it has become a regular part of our weekly activities. Outschool is a marketplace of live online classes for kids ages 3-18. With mass school closures designed to slow the spread of COVID-19, Outschool’s utility, ease of use, and awesome teachers will likely now get a chance to shine, while helping lots of families. The online class provider just announced it is now offering $100 in free classes to families (in need) whose children attend public schools. I’m thrilled that more kids and parents can now get exposure to an experience that we’ve found to be extremely valuable and fun. 

How Outschool Works: (video examples)

Parents can create a new account by visiting Outschool.com. After browsing through their catalog of offerings, which can be filtered by age range, interests, day of week, etc., parents/kids can select the classes they want to virtually attend. In the past many months, we’ve taken drawing, reading, crafts, and math classes. Currently, we are taking a 16 week online math class with teacher Lyndsay Capshaw. My daughter loves it! The site offers a lot of conveniences and features that are especially great for busy parents. You will receive emails detailing all the class info. You can even get set up to receive your class schedules through their Calendar Integration feature. I find the classes to be reasonably priced, and the payment processing is always amazingly fast and secure. I’m very impressed with how much easier the whole experience has become over the past many months. For those parents who need a reminder for everything, you will also receive reminders about your upcoming classes, a few days before it takes place and also, shortly before. 

The classes are delivered online in a fun, user friendly environment. My daughter very much enjoys interacting with her teachers and especially the other students. She was shy at first, but now she loves to raise her hand and talk in the video.  In her recurring math class, we enjoy seeing the same kids week after week. Most join from their homes, some join while on the road. And some have joined while they are on vacation. It’s so great that you can continue to attend from anywhere! I use their Zoom application at work, and it works like many other video conferencing tools, but better :-). Parents, just give yourself 5-10 minutes of time before each class starts to ensure everything is working. 

Last but not least, a note about the teachers...Kudos to these very creative, hard working teaching pros! As you’ll see on the site, they come up with brilliant ideas to engage kids on traditional and non-traditional topics (Hands-On Engineering for Kids: The Airplane and Origins of April Fools, Fractions Are a Piece of Cake, Pokemon Drawing, etc etc). It is delightful to see a broad, growing range of classes and most importantly, engaged teachers. For our math class, Lyndsay gives it her best every time and knows how to present the topics as well as keep the students interested (and coming back for more!). We look forward to it every Sunday (yes, you can find weekend classes, too!) and we think you will, also. Give it a try!

Lastly - kudos to the Outschool team. The free, live online classes will likely be a great entry-way for lots of families to give it a try. The company, which is based in San Francisco (we’ve been to one of their meet-ups), is also involved with collecting donations for those who want to help fund their new, free online class program during the corona virus crisis.