Larkspur Language Lessons

Lars came to the session on time, and was very patient with my son. He took the time to listen and gave helpful tips on becoming a better player. I would recommend him!

Wonderful guy who gives a well rounded lesson!

Excellent class and a good teacher.

James and I worked together for 4 months at an elementary school tutoring 3-5 graders in math and english. James is professional, intelligent, and creative. It was a pleasure working with him. He cares very much for the youth in our community.
We've stayed in touch via email and are developing a friendship I hope lasts a life time. He is good people.

james is a good voice instructor with many years of experience to share with you to get you to be the best singer you can be.

James is an excellent instructor that has tremendous amount of patience with the most difficult students. He is also very skillful in academics especially English and language arts. He has the unquie ability to break the assignment or steps down for the student to learn on his/her individual level! A great pleasure to work beside him !

Lynn is great teacher who cares about her students. She’s really vested in seeing her students succeed and takes pride in their accomplishments. My daughter loves her lessons, and is always excited to tell me about something new she learned that day.

Lynn is nice, respectful, patient and professional. My son has been learning Violin from Lynn for about 6 months now and helps with any questions he has and provides her tips to do it better. I highly recommend taking lessons with Lynn.

I've been taking lessons for about a month now and I think Lin Is a great teacher. she gives constructive feedback and tells me exactly what I need to work on, why its important to know, how to improve that technique, and then she shows me herself how to do it. she also tells me what I am doing well. I'm enjoying learning from Lin, she is a really nice person to talk to, she is very friendly but firm also expects you to meet her expectations.

In the past two years, Laurel has helped me develop my reading and writing skills significantly as well as build graduate level vocabularies. She is very patient and sensitive to my needs, and she always makes our lessons fun! If you need help with the MCAT, GRE, LSAT, or any other graduate school entrance exams, I am sure Laurel will help you nail them and achieve your dreams!

Laurel was a great instructor for my parents who are studying ESL. They both enjoyed the conversation and learned a lot.

I took a series of online creative writing lessons with Mrs. Taylor. She is one of the kindest and most intelligent persons I have worked with. She helped me find my writing style and patiently and carefully taught me about every aspect of creative writing. She told me not only about grammar and story structure, but also motivated and encouraged me to write a short story. From my first lesson with her, I knew that she is a gifted teacher, as she is knowledgeable and informed. Before taking lessons with her, I was writing in my journal, but now I have written my first piece. She provided meaningful and relevant ideas to help me find the flow of my story. Because of the excellent and exceptional way that she teaches, I have decided to continue with my creative writing.

5 stars' teacher

We just had our first lesson and we hit a few bumps but my daughter has never had music instruction before so we're giving it another go next week to see if things go more smoothly. 3 stars above says meets expectations, and though it didn't, I just hesitate to give someone 2 stars based on one lesson.
Here are some details from class:
My daughter (K) just turned 5 but is pretty mature for her age and has expressed an interest in learning the piano so we signed up for individual lessons with Lella. At the start of class I mentioned again (I had noted it at booking time as well) that K has had zero experience with music instruction. Immediately Lella sat with K on the piano bench and started explaining treble clef sign, bass clef sign and what hands they relate to. Lella also has a thick accent as I was trying to follow along with her explanations with a little difficulty. She even asked if K speaks Chinese and I said "no" so she said "you're Indian right?" My daughter would look around from time to time while Lella was explaining at which point Lella would just keep seeing "Pay attention sweetie!" Then she asked my daughter to write the numbers 1-5 in a book and when she said she didn't know how to write the number 2, Lella laughed and said "you know, but you forgot right" so I spoke up and explained "no she has not been taught to write her numbers yet, but she can read/recognize them" to which Lella seemed very surprised, so I felt the need to say, "she's still in preschool. But if you write them she'll be able to tell you what they are." So then Lella switched to counts, explaining about the values of different notes. She asked my daughter if she had questions, to which my daughter said "I think I understand what you're saying, if it's just a circle that means four, but if it's a circle with a line..." And before she could finish her thought Lella said "no that's not a line, it's a stem". At another point when Lella asked if she had any questions, my daughter slowly said "yes... what's velour?" And when Lella looked confused I had to step in and explain that Lella was saying "value", the amount of counts for a note. By the end of the half hour lesson, Lella had reached her explanation of middle C, which she described to my daughter saying "this is middle C because it's in the middle, there are two black keys, then on the left is C. Can you find another one?" When K didn't respond right away, she repeated herself, and again another time. So I said "she really has had no previous music experience, I think you need to even explain to her that those are called keys, like there are black keys, white keys..." And Lella just looked at me confused.
At the end of the lesson I agreed to buy the theory book so we can practice that at home, and Lella asked if I can sit in on the next lesson to help explain things to my daughter, because she "doesn't really focus". I agreed to sit in on the lesson, for my own benefit so I can help her with HW since I also don't have music experience. But I also mentioned to Lella that her accent is quite strong and I think my daughter was having trouble understanding her, and Lella seemed surprised by that comment.
I don't know... it says on Lella's profile that she has worked with young kids but I can't really see how the class was any different from how she would teach me, an adult with no prior music experience.
Oh! I forgot to mention something so basic - when we met Lella she thought I was someone else so I re-introduced myself and introduced my daughter. Then as we were saying goodbye at the end of class I realized Lella had never introduced herself to my daughter, so I asked "oh, what would you like K to call you, Ms. Li, or Lella? Ms. Lella?" She said Lella was fine so I turned to K and said "Tell Lella bye K." It just hit me, I mean that's something about creating a relationship with a young student. Speaking to them directly, making that connection. Lella was really smiley which gave the impression she was friendly but she never really made a connection with K who is the student, not me.

Lella quickly recognized what I needed to practice and brought me a great book that helped me get back to where I was very quickly.

Diane instructs our 13 y.o. son in French once a week. He loves his weekly French lesson with Diane! Diane is a super teacher, and she has great rapport with our son. We strongly recommend Diane, if you want to take French lessons!

Diane is awesome! She meets you at whatever level you are at and truly cares about getting you to your language goals!

Специалистом мы очень довольны. Виктория интересно преподносит материал, наша дочка с удовольствием занимается. Репетитор пунктуальная и ответственная, к дочери относится доброжелательно. Дочь изучает английский язык для увеличения своих языковых навыков и каждый раз рассказывает эмоционально о занятиях, ей очень нравится заниматься с репетитором. Педагог проявила себя с лучшей стороны, у меня к ней нет нареканий, она подходит нам и личностными, и профессиональными качествами.

Translation via Google: We are very satisfied with the specialist. Victoria is interesting in presenting the material, our daughter is pleased to do. The tutor is punctual and responsible, she treats her daughter kindly. The daughter learns English to increase her language skills and every time she tells emotionally about classes, she likes to do with the tutor. The teacher showed herself on the best side, I have no complaints against her, she is suitable for us both personal and professional qualities.

Victoria is very professional. She provided excellent materials. Also, she has an excellent command of English and was able to discern nuance and detail. I highly recommend her for any level.

I really enjoy my lessons with Victoria. She is a great tutor. She knows your needs, and you will learn quickly! I look forward to our next class with Victoria.