How is the teaching in your school this year? Are students engaged? Are they genuinely excited to walk into class each week? Do your mentors leave feeling like something meaningful happened — or do they drag themselves home wondering why it felt so hard?
If any of those answers give you pause, the problem may not be who you have teaching. It may be whether those teachers have been trained.
Nobody Is Born Knowing How to Teach
No one comes into the world with a fully developed set of teaching skills. Experience helps — but experience alone is not enough. What separates a capable teacher from a truly effective mentor isn’t time in the classroom. It’s intentional, ongoing training.
The best teachers are mentors in the fullest sense of the word. They see each student as an individual. They recognize potential that isn’t always obvious. And they draw out that potential through a whole repertoire of skills — skills that don’t develop on their own. They have to be learned, practiced, and refined over time.
That is true whether someone is brand new to teaching or has been at it for twenty years.
Our Story
Genevieve and I both began our homeschool co-op journeys in schools that sent mentors to training workshops every summer. Those trainings were expensive and they weren’t quick. And they made an enormous difference.
Each summer we came home with new understanding — about how students learn, about how to hold a room, about how to adjust when something wasn’t working. Then during the school year, we put it into practice. The next summer, we came back and learned more. That cycle repeated year after year. We are both still teaching in our schools today, and we are both still participating in mentor training. Not because we have to — because we know it makes us better.
The schools we were part of understood this too. Mentor training was a meaningful line item in the budget. Yes, it made membership fees higher. It was worth it. Schools that consistently invest in training their mentors flourish. And here’s something we have seen over and over again: a brand-new mentor with some training will consistently outperform an experienced teacher with none. No mentor ever outgrows the need for it.
The Dull Ax Problem
In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey tells the story of a man working frantically to cut down a tree with a dull ax. Someone walks by and points out the ax. “Why don’t you stop and sharpen it?” they ask. The man replies that he doesn’t have time — he needs to keep cutting.
He spends hours doing work that a sharp ax would have finished in minutes.
Mentor training is how you sharpen the ax. Not so your mentors can work faster — so they can work more effectively. A mentor with sharp skills transforms a class. Students feel it. Parents notice it. The whole school benefits.
It’s Not Just for the Teachers
Here’s something we’ve both seen that often surprises leaders: training matters for all the parents in your school, not just the mentors teaching the classes.
When parents understand how learning works — when they have some grounding in good mentoring principles — they show up differently. They support their children more effectively at home. Their students participate more meaningfully in class. The quality of the entire school rises. It is a genuinely virtuous cycle.
We Know Training Isn’t Cheap. We Built Something Better.
We understand why many schools have pulled back from intensive annual training. The workshops that many co-ops relied on for years — we’re talking $450 per mentor for a three-day event — were a significant investment. When curriculum became available without a mandatory training component, training started sliding down the priority list.
We get it. Budgets are real. Schedules are real.
But the problem didn’t go away when the training did. The need for well-equipped, well-supported mentors is exactly the same as it ever was. And honestly? Your school deserves that.
That’s why we host The Art of Teaching every June — a full-day training event designed to be accessible, practical, and genuinely energizing for mentors and parents alike. And during the school year, we offer the C2 Mentor Lab: weekly 30-minute sessions for mentors who want ongoing support while they’re in the thick of it.
Join Us This June
We are genuinely excited about this year’s lineup.
The Art of Teaching is a full-day virtual event on June 18, 2026.
Morning
9:00 – 9:30 AM — Welcome, introductions, and giveaways to kick off the day
9:30 – 11:30 AM — Keynote Workshop: The Art of Storytelling with Jim Weiss In this two-hour hands-on workshop, Jim will help you structure any story, build a “tool belt” of storytelling techniques, and double the impact of what you teach. There’s also dedicated time to ask Jim your own questions.
11:30 AM – 12:30 PM — Virtual Curriculum Marketplace Browse curriculum, flip through materials, and ask creators questions directly — all during the lunch break.
Afternoon (all recordings included for every registrant)
12:35 – 1:55 PM — choose one:
- Heart Education with Mindi Eldredge (The Mindful Heart) — how to more fully cultivate the heart, mind, body, and spirit through a heart-based approach to co-op education
- Debate in the Classroom with Juliet Bellinger (Building Steam!) — an interactive workshop on debate simulations that helps students build arguments, express ideas clearly, and become stronger thinkers and communicators
2:00 – 3:20 PM — choose one:
- Teaching with Themes with Heather Martinson (Celebration Education) — using themes to create immersive, memorable experiences for your younger learners
- Principle-Based Education for the Artist Generation with Hannah Alita & Stephanie Hunt (The Adventuring Scholar) — Hannah and Stephanie believe in “lecture last resort.” Their session puts that philosophy into practice, giving you tools to create immersive classroom experiences — activities, simulations, and real-world engagement — that connect students to the material in a lasting way. You’ll leave with the enthusiasm to build classes where learning truly comes to life.
3:20 – 3:30 PM — Debrief, thank yous, and closing giveaways
Evening
6:00 – 7:00 PM — Family Storytelling with Jim Weiss Bring the whole family. Jim returns for a magical evening of live storytelling — the kind that captivates kids and teens and inspires a genuine love of stories and learning.
Tickets (Early Bird pricing through May 15):
- Adult & Mentor Day ($65) — includes the full morning with Jim Weiss, your choice of afternoon breakout sessions, access to all afternoon session recordings (both options from each time slot), hands-on workshop materials, and entry to the virtual marketplace
- Family Evening ($30) — includes the evening storytelling session with Jim Weiss, the evening session recording, and entry to the virtual marketplace
- Full Day Bundle ($80) — everything above
Questions? Reach us at hello@curriculumsquare.com
