Harmony Farm Preschool

Living in the back of beyond doesn’t often come with perks.  I say this in the nicest possible way.  I am a mother of two children under the age of 8 and we have lived in Queen Creek (or, as our area has now been renamed – San Tan Valley) since early 2005 when my oldest daughter was almost three years old.

Back then, we basically lived at the bottom of the San Tan Mountains with nothing nearby other than a Fry’s grocery store and a Blockbuster, so what we were going to be doing about preschool was a bit of a dilemma that I wasn’t sure we’d be able to solve.  There were plenty of home based preschools around but without a recommendation and even knowing what to look for I was overwhelmed, especially having just given birth to my youngest, 3 months before and being knee deep in boxes from our move.  We tried out a commercial preschool that we were hopeful about but it just didn’t fit our needs.  We signed up for the preschool program at the YMCA but we were often not able to be enrolled all the time because you have to sign up each month over there, so some months we had no preschool at all.  It was a frustrating first year of preschool for us.

And then I saw an ad in our local resident paper that felt like had dropped in from heaven!  It spoke of days spent on a farm, interacting with animals, collecting eggs, planting pumpkin patches, a classroom with a kid-sized mini-town with houses in the shapes of a firehouse, store and veterinarian’s office.  It intrigued me in with its promise of small group size and an environment ripe for learning with maximum of  twelve to two teacher ratio.

If I could have designed a preschool perfect for my daughter, this was it.  I picked up the phone and called the number to find out if I was just too late because I was sure I had missed the deadline for signup weeks before – all you new moms know that you never read a paper when it first comes out, right?  This paper was at least two or three weeks old.

Owner, Heidi Harlow explained to me that this was a new preschool, opening for the first time in September 2006.  She was taking applications and was having an open house in a few weeks.  I was overjoyed to learn that I was not too late and was excited to attend the open house.  She answered every question I had and when I expressed my trepidation about leaving my precious child in someone else’s care, she told me that this was one of the very reasons she had dreamed of Harmony Farm – her daughter was due to start preschool and she too was having trouble finding something that worked for her.

During the course of our conversation and at the open house, I learned that Heidi had been a school teacher for several years and also had lots of experience with both gifted and children with special needs.  My daughter instantly hit it off with Heidi and her daughter, and the two other teachers and I was sold.  Harmony Farm was our preschool home.

Set in the middle of the rural part of Queen Creek, Harmony Farm has a HUGE area for the kids to run around in outside.  At that time, they were gong to be taking delivery of a calf and were going to be bottle feeding him that fall.  They also had goats that were being milked and chickens to collect eggs from.  They had a couple of miniature ponies then as well.  My daughter couldn’t wait to get started!

We were not disappointed.  From day one, my daughter was excited to go to school.  Naturally interested in anything and everything to do with animals, my daughter soaked up everything she was being taught like a sponge.  The kids were taught about size relationships by being given an apple cut into graduated sizes and then instructed to feed the animal the appropriate size of apple in relation to it’s size.  It was pure genius.  The popular preschool program “Zoo-Phonics” is used there which is also all animal based.  By the end of the year my daughter was reading 5 word sentences.  I was impressed!

Harmony Farm gave my daughter all the tools and more that she needed to start Kindergarten and she was challenged appropriately based on her ability.  I loved the way all the teachers interacted with the kids and the kids all adored Heidi’s no-nonsense approach and humorous way of dealing with the challenging times.  She used just the right mix of firmness and gentle persuasion that we moms aspire to, but can’t always get quite right!

I kept in touch with Harmony Farm as my daughter navigated Kindergarten and even asked Heidi’s advice on a couple of issues that come up during the school year.  I learned that changes were being made to the program to achieve state certification due to the unique physical layout of a preschool. With it being on a farm, the state was having problems with figuring out how to certify such a program, and gave Heidi oodles of obstacles and points to comply with that all state certified daycares and preschools must go through.  I admit I got a little nervous when the school appeared on a local TV news spot about preschools without certification.  And while Heidi did an excellent job of explaining that she was in the process of becoming certified, I was worried the program was doomed and I’d be again on the lookout for a suitable program for my son, who’d be starting soon.

I needn’t have been concerned.  Through dogged perseverance that is Heidi’s specialty, Harmony Farm became state certified and the program was preserved!  My son is now enrolled and I couldn’t be happier.  The only thing that could improve it is if more kids were in attendance – right now it seems like everyone is cutting costs by not enrolling their children in a preschool program and so in my son’s class there are only 3 other children.  It’s such a shame because it’s a great program and everyone is missing out!  The current TA’s are great and my son loves them both.  This is my son’s second year at Harmony Farm and he is thrilled to go there every time.  Every day (he attends the two day program but they have several different choices) he comes home with beautiful artwork, colored farm pictures, his name spelled out in kidney beans and hand prints made out of chocolate pudding, to name a few.  His most cherished activity is the shaving foam all over the table that they get to draw and write their names in!

Each year the school puts together holiday stockings for the soldiers who are away from their families and helps the kids understand their sacrifices.  They also participate in another community service activity, where the children do chores in exchange for money that is then donated to an organization that provides self sustaining help to families in need – goats for milk, seeds for crops, chickens for their eggs and so on.  The children learn all about helping others and gladly give up their earned money to help the people in the community, while at the same time learning where our commodities come from.  The children leave Harmony Farm ready for Kindergarten and with a solid understanding of teamwork and community.  They can even recite the Pledge of Allegiance!  Every holiday is celebrated with some kind of activity – Halloween dress up parades, Easter egg hunts, you name it.  The kids have nothing but fun fun fun!

I could go on and on, but I think I have said enough.  If you live in the back of beyond like I do (it’s not quite so “out there” any more – we have 2 Wal-Marts, a Target, Kohls and some fast food places now!),  you can’t go wrong by checking out Harmony Farm.  Find out more information at www.harmonyfarmpreschool.com.