Day Cares (Learning Centers - Schools)

Over the past few weeks Mike and I have been visiting/touring some schools mostly and daycare places for Peanut. It's amazing how soon you have to start looking into these places.

We have had some struggles with some....especially around the price and if they will accept G-Diapers or not.

1st Place: It was a Montessori school. I liked it until I saw the others, now it's not even on our list. We didn't like the teachers, they didn't really interact with us or anything.

2nd Place: a School from infant all the way up to a private kindergarten, although most kids left after the Pre-K program. AWESOME! top of our list. Some key things we liked were: Kids move up into different rooms on their own development, Onsite chef, clean, friendly staff, all the staff has 4 year degrees. We stopped by today and showed them the G-Diaper and they said it shouldn't be a problem.! YEAH!!
The bad part about this place is it's $340 per week (Which we are willing to pay) but the waiting list is pretty long and we might not be able to get in...more discussion needed on this one.

3rd Place: AWESOME! Another school. We loved it, it was a lot like the 2nd place, and then Mike and I saw the rates and almost had a heartattack!! It was $484 a week, which rounds out to be about $25,000 a year for an infant. While nice, way way out of our price range. so they are on the bottom of our list and only a last resort.

4th Place: Another school. We liked it, not as much as the first one, but it was still a great place. It was a lot like the other schools that we went to, and it was nice and clean, safe and I would feel totally comfortable leaving our little one there. I didn't like that I needed to bring in my own sheets etc for the little one. I saw some sort of sketchy things, but nothing awful. We have a friend who put their children there when it first opened (5 years ago or so) and they loved it, but they weren't in the Infant room. This one is comparable to the 3rd and 5th places price wise.

5th Place: Learning Center - HATED It! It wasn't bad - not like I wouldn't put my child in there, but compared to the others. This one doesn't have 4 year degree teachers, or even 2 year degree teachers, which is fine, but it's the same price as #4. Also when we walked into the infant room I could smell smoke on one of the teachers and she informed us when asked about the smoking policy that they could smoke on their breaks. which none of the other schools have that. and because we are so concerned about 3rd hand smoke this was a big deal for us.So it completely turned me off. The 2nd thing we really didn't like about them was the fact when asked about the cleaning she informed us that the teachers clean on Mondays & Wednesdays while the children are still there. (None of the other places do this) so not only will the people not be watching the children as closely as they would if they weren't cleaning but the children will also be exposed to the cleaning chemicals. So I wasn't to happy about that. Most of the other places clean after the kids leave, or have professionals come in. This one is part of a franchise, and there are a few in our area, so we are visiting another one just to see if it's just the one we went to or all of them.

6th Place: I totally love this place! It's the right price (almost 100 less than the 2nd place). They are a Spanish/English school. All the teachers has masters in education, they use sign language with the children. There is no waiting list, it's on my way to work and close to the house in case we change jobs. They will use the G-Diapers, so we don't have to worry there. It's more like the 2nd and 4th place saw. They don't have a set curriculum like the other places ,but they still have a curriculum and she said that most kids are speaking spanish by the time they get to the preschool rooms. They show flash cards to the infants so they can learn while they are there plus the tummy time and all that. Mike and I just visited this place today so we haven't talked much about it, but right now it's on the top of my list.

So we have one more place to go and then we are going to make our decision....then off to selecting a pediatrician.