“Upper West Side Dual Language Daycare is a bilingual child care center.” That’s the summary of the Website, which lists some locations for the daycare. Does it offer what it says it will? On the face of it, there doesn’t seem to be much of a difference between the daycare offerings offered by Upper West Side dual language daycare and those of other such childcare facilities in the area. Or, does it?
The website does not specifically define any of its features. “The daycare offers several programs that enhance learning for children with special needs,” it states. It goes on to say that the daycare centers offer a “unique” and “extended” child friendly atmosphere. “bilingual” children, as well as “preschoolers,” are also commonly offered. Again, that vague wording leaves me a little fuzzy.
I’m no expert in child development or educational matters, but I do know how to weed out daycare centers offering only preschool services from those offering only child friendly activities. I have even published such lists online myself. (They’re available through a related link.) In my experience, the majority of daycare centers that offer only preschool services, either via a website or brochure, tend to offer very limited educational activities.
One reason for that is that they don’t have preschool offers. They tend to focus on early childhood education or kindergarten. That’s fine if you have two preschool children and want to work with them on basic skills and growth – it’s much less appealing if you have three or four preschoolers. That’s a big disadvantage, I believe.
A second disadvantage is that many of these centers tend to be very small. A large, multi-age child daycare center with an excellent quality dual language program might be able to attract a few adults – upper management and parents of older children. But, typically, such facilities are not designed to serve more than two children at a time. That makes them very crowded.
It’s also very hard to find someone who has worked at a childcare facility (especially a language daycare) who is willing to talk about good experiences there. It’s not that they’re necessarily bad – language education, after all, is an ongoing process – just that there are so few of them. And it’s hard to know how they compare to the other places in the area.