Tutoring in Denver, Colorado
Kolu is software. Nobody from Kolu will drive to your house in Denver, and we have no office there. If you want a person, this page says how we would look for one. If the question is which skill is missing, we can help with that part.
Denver Public Schools covers the whole city, and many families do not enroll at the nearest school by default. The district runs SchoolChoice, one application on which a family ranks the schools it wants, and district-run, innovation and charter schools all appear on the same form. A child still has a place by address, either at a boundary school or, in some neighborhoods, somewhere within an enrollment zone of several schools. Kindergarten, sixth grade and ninth grade are the usual years to fill it in. The suburbs belong to other districts, including Jeffco, Cherry Creek and Aurora.
State tests Denver students take
| Grade | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reading and writing | CMAS | CMAS | CMAS | CMAS | CMAS | CMAS | PSAT | PSAT | SAT | Not tested |
| Math | CMAS | CMAS | CMAS | CMAS | CMAS | CMAS | PSAT | PSAT | SAT | Not tested |
| Science | Not tested | Not tested | CMAS Science | Not tested | Not tested | CMAS Science | Not tested | Not tested | CMAS Science | Not tested |
- CMAS (Colorado Measures of Academic Success): reading and writing, math, grades 3 through 8
- CMAS Science (Colorado Measures of Academic Success, science): science, grades 5, 8 and 11
- PSAT: reading and writing, math, grades 9 and 10
- SAT: reading and writing, math, grade 11
Colorado has no exit exam, but graduation rules are set district by district from a state menu, and the SAT a junior takes at school in April is on that menu. Ask the high school which options it accepts and what score it wants before junior spring.
Testing dates and graduation rules for the whole state are on a separate page. Colorado guide
Kolu finds the missing skill and goes back to it
It starts with a skill check, a short test that gets harder or easier depending on the last answer. The result is a map of the subject broken into skills with their prerequisites drawn in, each one marked as solid, still being learned, or a gap.
After that, each session is a handful of activities picked for that student, usually something due for review, a gap to repair and one new skill. When an answer is wrong, Kolu looks at which earlier skill the mistake points to and goes back to it. Here is what that looks like for a sixth grader who can't divide fractions.
The problem on the page
3/4 ÷ 2/5
Dividing fractions
Grade 6
Multiplying fractions
Grade 5 · rests on the one below
Equivalent fractions
Grade 4 · usually where it started
Multiplication facts
Grade 3
Kolu does not call a skill mastered after one right answer. That takes correct work on different kinds of problems on different days, and a skill that fades gets brought back.
Kolu is not test prep for CMAS. It has no bank of released questions. It teaches the skills the test draws on, and it will not do tonight's homework.
It runs in a browser, so it works the same in Lakewood, Aurora, Englewood, Arvada, Littleton and Glendale as it does in Denver.
When to hire a person instead
Some students need a person, and software is the wrong purchase for them. That includes a child who shuts down when the work gets hard, a student with a learning disability who needs someone trained in it, and anyone with an exam in ten days.
In Denver, ask the school first. Teachers know who tutors, and a counselor at Denver Public Schools can tell you what the district already offers at no cost. After that, try students at University of Denver, Metropolitan State University of Denver, University of Colorado Denver or Regis University, who took these courses recently and usually charge less than an agency.
Whoever you hire, ask one question before the first session: how will you find out what my child doesn't know? If the answer is that they will go over the homework, keep looking.
Free for one subject, $15 a month for 5
Kolu is free for one subject at a time, with one full skill check every 30 days and up to 4 sessions a day. Plus is $15 a month, or $120 for a year, and covers 5 subjects at once with unlimited skill checks. A learner under 13 needs a parent or guardian to set up the account.