KinderCare Education/Kindergarten

[linda_loo]

I'm curious if anyone has any parenting or teaching experience with KinderCare's kindergarten (and preschool) programs. Employee, student, parent... whatever. I am in a frantic search for daycare and have heard mixed things about KinderCare, particularly about their classes. If we choose this center, we would certainly be taking advantage of their preschool-type classes. We would also consider sending dd to kindergarten there.

Anything you can tell me about their educational/kindergarten services will be appreciated.

[missy329]

Well, I did work there from 1990-1995. But, I had the after school group mostly or the infants. I did have the 2 year olds for one year. I will say that things have changed a great deal in the 10+ years since I worked there. When I started I had no real "teaching" experience. I had an AA in liberal arts and had worked in my church nursery. We did have to take a lot of continuing education courses while I worked there. They did have a program that we followed for our lessons. I do know that now there are a lot more courses the teachers must take and there is major accreditation they try to acheive. The center I worked at did not have a kindergarten program. Sorry I don't have more info for you.
Are you looking for a preschool (a few hours a day) or a day care (all day)? Those are just my personal definitions, btw. I felt that Kinder Care was more of a day care. We are currently looking for a preschool for our soon-to-be 3 year old and I am not looking at Kinder Care. Just my personal opinion.

[jh124]

Linda -

My DS is much younger than your child (still in the infant room) but from what I have seen from my KinderCare experience, it depends on your center/director/teachers. Due to a one-time maintanence issue, we have had to put DS in another center, and it was much different from his current center. The room, teachers, and daily expectations were different from our current center. I would feel comfortable with the preschool program at our current center, because I see them in action when I'm at the center. The other center? Eh, I'm not sure.

Can you drop in and watch a time or two? Bring DC and see what the chemistry is like?

ETA: From my being at the center during different times of the day (and I have to walk by the preschool room - no kindergarten at our center) during some times of the day they do "preschool stuff" (letters, numbers, reading) and other times it's more "daycare stuff" (crafts, naps, singing.) They should be able to provide you a daily schedule.

[AmandaLeigh]

Hi am am not a parent but do work a lot with children (former behavioral therapist now a teacher). In my previous job, while I was in college, I ran one of the hand rolled pretzels stores. Every year we did a visit to the local kinder care to teacj the children to make pretzels. The center I visited was awesome - clean, organized, lots of activities for the students. However, I'm sure that has as much to do with the director as it does with the chain.

[cr8zyforaf]

I think it varies from center to center. My cousin had his daughter in one and he raves about it - his center participated in Hooked on Phonics - which was one on one sessions with someone who taught this (it was extra money per month) and he said she was way ahead of most of the other children in her kindergarten class.

I would visit the centers you are looking at and pay close attention. Just because they have a program, doesn't mean they are following it. We looked at a center for DD that was accredited as a 'preschool' instead of just a ‘daycare’ but found after talking with the teachers and other parents that it wasn't being followed for the most part and wasn't worth the extra $500 a month (than we are paying now) and that our center did offer and follow more of a program than the other center.

It totally depends on the director and teachers, IMO.

[EJH]

Linda,

I haven't heard great things about KinderCare from folks that have taught there. There are actually three teachers at DD's current center that left KC to come to ours.

That said, I think things definitely vary within the "brand" -- that things depend very much on how centers are run day to day by the Executive Director, and other senior staff.

If you would like, I'm happy to ask DD's teachers why they decided to make the switch.

Erin