What a difficult time it must be to be a new parent.
As if trying to adjust to your new life isn’t difficult enough, you also need to think about so many crazy things that are going on in our world and the Kenosha community here in 2020.
All of those things are also making the decision on what daycare to go to a little more difficult. Many people are choosing to keep their children home early on in life but others are making the decision to continue on with daycare. Now more than ever, the choice of what daycare to send your child is critical. Here are our tips for what to look for during COVID-19.
Uncleanliness
Scan the rooms throughout the daycare to see how clean each room is. In particular, pay attention to the food preparation areas and anywhere food is served. If there is clutter everywhere as well as spills and crumbs from food and milk throughout the daycare, it could indicate that the preschool doesn’t maintain a clean environment for children during the day.
But it doesn’t stop there. You should ask a ton of questions about the cleaning schedule, who does the cleaning, and what protocols they are following during this time. Ask these questions BEFORE your tour so you can see if they are really following those rules, or if it is all just talk.
Lots Of Children
How many children are in attendance during the time of the tour? The important thing to be aware of is the child-to-caregiver ratio. Are there too many children in the preschool or child care facility and not enough staff? Is the staff overwhelmed and unable to provide the proper amount of attention to each child?
You do not want your child to be ignored or not receive the necessary care during the day. This is also important given what is going on with COVID-19 at this time. An overwhelmed teacher might not be able to properly keep up on cleaning or be able to identify problems fast enough.
Bored Children
Look closely at the faces of the children and students in attendance. Do the children seem happy and engaged? If the children appear bored or discontent it could be that the curriculum and the routine of the daycare are not beneficial to children or entertaining or educational.
You want your children to spend their day somewhere that will foster their growth and development. You can read more about the Cornerstone Curriculum here.
Daycare Security
What are the security measures in place at the daycare? Are the front doors locked or is the entryway to the main care area locked or unreachable by outsiders? In today’s day and age, security is of the utmost importance and you need to ensure the daycare you choose has all of the necessary protocol and measures in place for your child.
Making sure that people that should not be there are not allowed in is also critical for keeping everyone healthy and being sure that extra germs aren’t being introduced into the environment.
Negative Online Reviews
You can search the daycare’s website or social media profiles online and see if there is a high number of negative reviews or very few positive reviews. Online reviews are becoming a reliable source of information concerning whether a business or child care service offers good quality or not.
Even if the review is older, you can make some assumptions about how they are taking care of things now. For example, if parents have been complaining about cleanliness since 2018, you can assume that place isn’t taking the proper steps in today’s day-in-age either.
All in all, the things that you are looking for when you take a tour or are evaluating a daycare haven’t changed much. However, you do need to have a more detailed eye and pay attention to more of the details than you have had to do before.
Make sure you ask every question that you can and ultimately if you don’t feel completely comfortable, continue your search somewhere else!
