Links

Our church:

Faith Baptist Church



Resources For the Home:

Above Rubies

Heavenly Homemakers

Money Saving Mom

Abiding Radio


Resources For the Homeschool:

The Homegrown Preschooler

The Read Aloud Revival (Sarah Mackenzie)

The Teaching Mama

Why Be Crazy Enough to Homeschool? (article)


Resources for Health:

Plexus Worldwide





2 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi Katrina! I love that I have found your BLOG! I was recommended to check it our from my good friend Kaitlyn whom met you at a ladies conference! She shared with me your home school curriculum you are using. Did you purchase just the hard copy book - A year of playing skillfully or did you purchase the whole bundle from their website? I'm very interested! I currently have a almost 5 year old, a 3.5 year old and 3 month old :) My oldest is in our local Christian School in which we know her teacher very well, though home schooling is stirring very much so in mine and my husbands hearts! Would love to know how you got started! Thanks so much! God bless you for sharing your beautiful journey with all of us mommies/parents! :) Happy Thanksgiving!

Rachel Gilleo

Katrina Marie said...

Hello Rachel! I’m so glad you left a comment on this page telling me you are reading the blog! Thank you! I have been terribly negligent of posting the past several weeks due to an overflowing schedule and sickness that hit my family recently. I do hope to get back to it more regularly very soon! To answer your question, I purchased the hard copy book “A Year of Playing Skillfully” at a homeschool convention along with the package of homemade blank books that can go along with the curriculum for making your own books as you go along. Water beads were given to me as a complimentary gift. I did not purchase the whole bundle. Later, I also received the book The Homegrown Preschooler (THP) as a birthday gift, which was the authors’ first publication before creating the actual AYOPS curriculum. I found THP to be very interesting and containing great concepts and reasoning for why they recommend teaching the way they do. I highly recommend it, though you certainly don’t have to read that first to begin with their curriculum. It is definitely optional. While there is an e-book version of the Year of Playing Skillfully program, I strongly urge parents to purchase the hard copy curriculum because of how easy it is to reference, the printouts that come with it, and the beautiful photos that make the curriculum come alive! My kids love to page through the binder and ask to do different activities based on the pictures! In this curriculum, they recommend building a sensory table, a plexiglass easel, and a light table. All the instructions for these, however, are in THP, so if you want to build these things you will definitely need that manual too. We built our own version of a sensory table, but have not built the other two things. Instead, we use windows or other mediums for light/easel ideas. So it’s not necessary to build the tools they recommend but could be helpful if you were so inclined. :) I love this program for many reasons, but especially for the seasonal themes each month that are easy to incorporate, the wonderful hands-on learning especially in art and sensory projects, and how they don’t do much “workbook work", which can be difficult for children at these early ages. We choose to do our own math books because the children like them and are thriving with them. I also do a separate language arts program with them out of personal choice. However, I am not a fan of workbook work, so I appreciate the many other ideas in this program that provide hands-on learning instead. My children have thoroughly enjoyed this program as have I! I would love to share more with you if you have further questions or would care to correspond. My email address is purefragrance99@gmail.com Blessings to you and yours!