We are REALLY enjoying it! We are using Flowering Baby for 4-5 yr olds. It's available for ages birth to 5 years old. It's co-written by Martha Sanders, a homeschooling mom who wrote the curriculum with a focus on Classical, Charlotte Mason and Unit Study approaches, and Carolyn Schulte who holds a Master's degree in Early Childhood Education, with an emphasis in special needs. Carolyn also taught Kindergarten for 28 years.
We use the Charlotte Mason method via Ambleside Online and while it gives some great suggestions and ideas for Year 0, I needed something with more structure. I am really thrilled with the Flowering Baby curriculum!
Details:
The curriculum is available to buy as a disc from Flowering Baby, LLC or as an instant download from Currclick. It includes a Curriculum Guide and Monthly Themes. The price ranges from $30-$38 or you can buy all 5 for $132.
Martha has graciously offered my readers 10% off if you use the code Blog10 !
How to Begin:
To begin using the curriculum I opened the Curriculum Guide and printed out the summary of supplies and books needed for the month we would be starting.
Then I printed off the first week. I also made notes in the side column of specific supplies I would need to gather for that day.
I did the same for the Monthly Theme.
I then went online and reserved the books from the library that we needed for the first week. The activities listed for the Monthly Theme are not done every day either but spread about 6 days throughout two weeks. So I kept this in mind when gathering books and supplies.
We will be using some of the pre-made Learning Through Stories that are included but I will need to make up a few of my own.
Our First Day of School:
My four year old daughter was resistant to the idea of any serious school this fall, so we decided to wait until she was five and not push it. So after her fifth birthday I invited her into the school room to read some stories and do some activities with me. We followed the suggestions for Day One of January and simply sang the ABC's, practiced writing "m" and looking for things that start with "m". We talked about what New Year's was and looked over our calendar and wrote the date on our white board. We made a big blue triangle on the floor and stood on the corners and the sides so we could count them. We drew a picture using different shades of blue. And we counted to 10 in Spanish and English. We read a story with a "blue"theme. And we also started Teach Your Child To Read in 100 Easy Lessons.
It went SO well! My daughter didn't resist any of it and had a lot of fun. She looked for triangles all week and was so proud of how she knew the sounds of the letters we talked about in the Teach Your Child to Read book. Later we read The Three Billy Goats Gruff. And at the end of the week we had fun acting out the story. I am so excited to continue on.
We are in the middle of moving to a new home so we took last week off to pack. But we will be continuing to use this plan and I'll be adding updates to our preschool curriculum each week on Saturday.
This is such a lovely plan and includes lots of great books and activities without needing tons of extra supplies or the need to print large quantities. I would greatly encourage you to check it out!
*I requested and was given a free copy of the 4-5 yr old Flowering Baby curriculum in trade for my honest review.
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