Choosing Child Care | A Child's Place

Selecting the Right Child Care Provider

Your child’s care and education is a big decision, and it’s important that your family take the time to consider the factors that will help you determine the right provider. Click each topic below to see how A Child's Place meets these suggestions.

Hours of Operation: What is your family's work schedule like? What is your commute? Ensure you have enough time to drop your child off in the morning before work and pick your child up after work. Having to rush back and forth without allowances for delays, will create an added stress."

A Child’s Place caters to working parents by opening at 7:00 AM and providing breakfast for children.
Facility Safety & Set Up: A safe, age-appropriate facility is extremely important in caring for your children. Children play and learn differently at different age levels. You will want to look for separated spaces for different age groups and inspect the quantity and age appropriateness of toys for different age groups. Ensure that furnishings are child sized and there are no hazards such as uncovered electrical outlets or cleaning materials accessible to children. Also be sure to look for fire extinguishers, appropriate amount of smoke detectors and emergency evacuation plans."

At A Child’s Place, the safety of your child is of first importance to us. We exceed state requirements for safety and have working fire extinguishers and evacuation plans on-site, as well as regularly test our smoke detectors. In addition, you will find our facility is broken up into age groups by programs, ensuring children engage and learn with children of a similar age group.
Meals & Snacks: Balanced nutrition is an important factor when choosing a childcare center. Consider whether breakfast, lunch and snacks are provided. Will you be able to review a menu? How is the food prepared? And how are food allergies handled?"

You can learn more about our nutritional program here.
Playtime & Exercise: Exercise, exploration and play is incredibly important to our health, development and ability to learn. Children must be able to get fresh air and play to develop socially and emotionally. When evaluating child care providers, ensure the children have the opportunity for supervised play outside everyday. Inspect the play areas to make sure equipment is safe, sturdy, clean, and there is shade available. You may want to ask if children are separated by age groups during play time, as different ages play harder than others and that can affect your child’s experience."

A Child’s Place we have an amazing play area that has just been recently updated. We love taking the children we care for outside, and ensure they are well supervised and take turns by age groups. When weather does not permit outside play, we allow time for exploration and play with the toys inside our facility.
Staff Training & Screening: Having a natural talent and passion for caring for children is excellent, but training and screening are important in ensuring the safety and development of your child. Determine who is on staff. Have they been screened? Do they know CPR and First Aid? What is the level of experience with children within the programs you are considering?"

At a Child’s Place our staff are all certified in CPR, First Aid and Pediatric Head Trauma training. They also receive 15 additional hours of training in their area of expertise. In addition, all staff must pass a background check and drug screen on their date of hire, then they are randomly tested.
Recommendations by others: Referrals are a great way to measure the quality of a child care facility. Ask your friends and co-workers what experiences they have had with different programs or read reviews online.

At a Child’s Place we love to hear from our parents on how we are doing!
Drop-ins by Parents: Limited visiting times should be a red flag. There should be an open door policy to visiting your child during the day. At A Child’s Place we not only welcome your drop-in, but encourage it."

We know when children get surprise visits from their caregivers it enhances their day.
Staff Turnover: A revolving door of staff can have a negative impact on your child and hinder their ability to bond and form trusting relationships.

While we do have part-time and seasonal staff, our full-time, senior staff members have been with A Child’s Place for 10+ years.
Curriculum: From birth through preschool, child care givers should be working with your child to help them develop intellectually, physically, socially and emotionally. You want to ensure that once your child completes preschool they are kindergarten-ready."

At A Child’s Place we use the Creative Curriculum for early childhood educators, which provides innovative, effective resources that empower and inspire our staff as they care for your child. The resources provided by Creative Curriculum are high-quality, integrated resources; responsive, ongoing support; and research-based, research-proven solutions that enable every early childhood educator to open doors to lifelong learning.
Convenient Payment Options: What kind of payments does the child care center accept? Does the center accept credit, debit, or bank drafts. Are there assistance programs or discounts for multiple children?"

At A Child’s Place we try to make paying us as simple as possible. You can set up automated or one-time payments online through a credit/debit card or bank transfer, or pay cash, check, credit/debit, or ACH in the office. Visit our