Quest for a New Daycare: Success!

Between yesterday and today, Kaleb and I have now toured 4 daycare centers, all chosen by excellent word-of-mouth recommendations.

1. Malena's Mini School on Pine Forest Road
2. Childcare Network on Langley Avenue
3. KinderWorld on Toni St.
4. one other center that I will not name on this public blog

The first two were nearly a tie in my mind. Both have an excellent curriculum for their students; both were clean and seemed to be organized and run well; all the people at both facilities were wonderfully nice to me and, more importantly, to Kaleb.  He was eager to run off and join the classes immediately!

#3 was a large facility.  I was only able to talk to one person, and several of my questions went unanswered.  The place seemed clean, but none of the teachers seemed interested when Kaleb and I walked into the rooms, and none made any move to speak to either of us....or even to smile.   In general, I'm not as fond of daycares that put several classes into one huge room, and section off the "classrooms" with bookshelves and tables.  It's incredibly noisy and leads to a greater chaotic feel.  It was this that ruled out #3.

The 4th (unnamed) facility we did not even walk into, I'll admit.  When we pulled up to the front of the house-turned-daycare, my first impression was that it was teeny-tiny.  Before I even turned off the car, something caught the corner of my eye.  In the back lot of the business next door -- which had several empty flat-bed trailers in it -- was a child, maybe 2 years old.  There was a daycare employee climbing the fence to retrieve him.  I want to believe that this was an isolated incident that has never happened before and will never happen again.....but I'm not willing to take the risk.  If the child went unobserved long enough to end up on the wrong side of the fence, I can say I'm definitely not taking my son to daycare there.



Once the choice was down to the first two, I was better able to compare them side-by-side.  #2 had a semi-open-room feel, but was really more like several large rooms, each of which might only have children of 2 different ages.  They had many facility pets (guinea pigs, rabbits, and fish) that fascinated Kaleb.  The class sizes seemed a little large, and I discovered that Kaleb would end up in a class of mostly-younger kids.  Even though I didn't choose Childcare Network, I would still say that it is an excellent facility and very much worth a look for any Pensacola parents looking for a daycare or pre-k for their kids!

In the end, I chose to enroll Kaleb at Malena's Mini School on Pine Forest Road.  Maybe they got an unfair advantage by being the first place we toured and the only one we toured yesterday, but I didn't see anything there that didn't impress me!  A dedicated room for each age group, teachers who were immediately friendly to Kaleb (and me), and Kaleb's ready willingness to leave my side and join in with other kids we met during our tour eventually made up my mind for me.  I'll only be paying $5 per week more than where we've been, and I feel confident that Kaleb can remain there until it's time for him to go to school.  During our tour, we got to meet Malena herself, and she clearly loves the facility and the children and is proud to list the high standards and achievements of the school.

I fell confident that I've made the right choice for Kaleb, and he's already excited to be getting to begin school there next week!

=======================================

Update, January 15, 2012

It's the day before Kaleb starts his new school, and we're getting ready.

Read all about it by clicking here!