Questions to ask Daycare

Spockles

Can you please help me come up with a list of questions to ask potential daycares? Or point me to online resources that would be helpful. I'm totally clueless with how to go about looking for daycare. I need to find temporary daycare for DS while I do a clinical for school.

Thanks!!

may5706bride

https://www.saferchild.org/askthe.htm

are they cpr/first aid trained

teacher to child ratio 

what are the meals/snacks

how much tv a week

"discipline" do they do time outs etc

sick policy

early/late pick up...as extra fees

do they charge more if LO is not potty trained (not sure how old your baby is)

ask for a schedule/calendar of events so you know whats going on every day 

 

 

 

 

may5706bride

just saw the siggy (so cute!) cross of potty training question off the list 

brideinOC

Are you looking at in home or a center?  We looked at in home ones and two women allowed us right into the home while the kids were there right off of the bat.  The last one (that we went with) asked to meet with us when she didn't have kids there before she allowed us to come when the kids were there.  I'd never considered that and what a safe, comforting thing to do.  Other than that, ask about child:adult ratio.

In MD, there's a website that you plug in your zipcode and it spits out all of the daycares within a certain radius.  I was shocked at how many never even returned my calls. 

Spockles

brideinOC:

Are you looking at in home or a center?  We looked at in home ones and two women allowed us right into the home while the kids were there right off of the bat.  The last one (that we went with) asked to meet with us when she didn't have kids there before she allowed us to come when the kids were there.  I'd never considered that and what a safe, comforting thing to do.  Other than that, ask about child:adult ratio.

In MD, there's a website that you plug in your zipcode and it spits out all of the daycares within a certain radius.  I was shocked at how many never even returned my calls. 

We prefer a center.

kittylove

The list above is a great list but I have one/two to add. Things like how long teacher have been there and teacher education are proven to make a huge difference in quality of care. You also don't want a place with high teacher turn over because that can be very hard for you child. Good luck finding a reasonably priced quality center, they are out there but can be hard to find.

superned

I used to work in child care resource and referral, and this is the one I would recommend: https://www.childcareaware.org/.

You can enter your location and it will give you the number for your local resource and referral agency.  They can give you a ton of information as well as referrals to different programs that match your list of criteria.  In most locations the service is either free or the fee is minimal and based on a sliding fee scale.

 

Spockles

Thank you so much everyone!