Hi! I'm Elly, mother of three and owner of Compass Kids. In 2020, I was 5 years into my career in corporate Sales & Marketing and had just had my first baby. As I became more invested in her full-time child care program, I fell in love with Early Childhood Development. I wanted to move back to my home town and start my own early learning program - one where I could combine the Reggio Emilia approach and the aspects of nature-based outdoor learning that I loved, but where I could also keep it Christ-centered.
During COVID, I was still working my field sales role, but there was a week of time where I couldn't be in-person to make any sales calls. That week, I wrote a whole business plan for my ideal school - from the building materials and employment costs, to the classroom setup and competitive market research. I felt so passionate about starting it; but, in my state, to be a Director, you need a Masters in Early Childhood Education. So, never to be discouraged, I started taking classes. I continued my job in Sales & Marketing, but worked through Indiana Wesleyan University to become a licensed teacher and then to ultimately get my Masters of Early Childhood Education. Within the degree, my research focuses were on outdoor class design and screen-free approaches to Early Learning.
By May 2024, when I earned my degree, I had had two more children and was now almost 10 years into my professional career (still working full-time). Only, by this point, I had become increasingly passionate about homeschooling, and no longer had any of my own kids in any full-time childcare programs. I was (and am) privileged to be able to work from home; and, with the cost of childcare and real estate having significantly increased during my time in school, I no longer felt the same call to start my own program.
But, one night in June, I was shopping for gifts for my daughter's birthday, and I began looking for Bible story characters for our TonieBox. After digging around and coming up dry, I reached out to other moms and family I knew and realized there was a need here. I decided to make one myself! And Compass Kids was born.... well, not quite. :)
Compass Kids came along because, not only was there a lack of Biblical audio stories and toys, but there also didn't seem to be many activities designed to go along with a lot of the audio stories and players that are out there.
The more invested I became in crafting the stories and producing the audio, the more clearly I could see an opportunity to incorporate some of my favorite principles of early childhood development (and some of our family's favorite activities) by designing sensory boxes to correspond with the audio content. After all, my own kids have found consistent engagement, enrichment, and satisfaction in open-ended activities: on a typical work day, I would set up a space for them to work and explore, while I would get my own work done. Moreover, I knew that children learned best when they could connect new information to real-life experiences, familiar materials, and past memories. So it made perfect sense for me to design sensory activities, STEM kits, and other resources to go along with these stories I was writing.
I started Compass Kids in August, and by the end of the month, my first set of stories were complete. It was my weekend hobby. Creating the 3D models, designing the boxes, building the website, writing the curriculum - all of my passions and past experience collided in the details.
Now, in November 2024, I've only just launched the first line. But I have 10 themes of stories in the works, to help children learn about different facets of God's character, and to help them interact with the Bible stories in a way that is accessible and impactful. I want it to be easy, natural, and FUN to investigate and explore with your children to help them come to a deeper understanding of what the Word of God says about them. That's my mission, and that's why Compass Kids is here.