August 2023 by Nancy Velasquez
Unfortunately, we had a very negative experience at this daycare. Things started out well and I loved the teachers, at first. However, after a few months, my son started having some potty accidents at school and then the teachers would mention that he was having a hard time keeping his hands to himself and bumping into other students. Obviously, this was disappointing to me, and I tried working on these issues at home with my child. However, it was NOT communicated to me that his behavior was a serious issue OR that it was out of the ordinary.A few months later, there were some changes -- my son got a new teacher and we also had a new baby at home. All of a sudden, he started hating daycare and his potty issues got worse, so much so that they required medical intervention. He started crying hysterically whenever I'd drop him off at daycare. He said he hated his school and his teachers. I couldn't understand what was going on, and figured that it was because of all of the changes going on. I tried to talk to the daycare about the fact that he was suddenly complaining a lot, but they just seemed surprised and not concerned. They did mention that he was having a hard time listening to his teachers and that he was bumping into other students, having some aggression, and being disruptive, but I figured he just needed a few weeks to get back to "normal". I thought the daycare would understand what he was going through.I finally realized his behavior was actually a bigger issue after an incident report and the director telling me in person, "We are all just FRUSTRATED with him." This statement was really surprising to me. Then, the director informed me that they had been putting my child in timeout, multiple times throughout the day, and that he was even being put into the director's office for timeout. I did not know that his behavior had become so serious or out of the ordinary. I wish they had been more honest with me earlier about his behavior and how they were responding to him, and that what they were doing was not working.My son was telling me at home, "I'm just a bad kid. Nobody likes me. I don't have friends." This is obviously heartbreaking to hear from a three-year-old. I pulled my son out of the school after this conversation with the director.This experience deeply affected his self-esteem. Luckily, he went to a daycare afterwards that tried to understand him better. For example, whereas at Children's International School, they told me that he was "out of control and purposefully bumping into other students," and painting him in a very negative light -- the second daycare observed that he seemed to be struggling with sensory issues and that he was looking for input from his environment to tell where he was in space... hence the bumping. If we had known about his sensory issues, we could have started occupational therapy WAY back.In the future, I hope that Children's International School can better communicate with parents so that we can provide intervention EARLIER. I also hope they can get better training on identifying students with special needs earlier on. I believe his experience at Children's International School did set him back a bit -- we are still working on improving his self-esteem. I regret not knowing earlier and not getting him the help that he needed earlier on.
October 2022 by Marlyn R.
I love CIS and am so happy to have found this gem of a preschool for my two kids. Both attended CIS from age 2 to start of kindergarten - actually the first two years of my second, before he could attend, I absolutely couldn't wait to switch him to CIS and out of his daycare. If your reading and have not toured yet - book a tour now. It is such a homey environment, Ms Gayle the director is wonderful and the lead teacher in every classroom are great. Their love of kids truly shows. I couldn't be more grateful to have had my kids under their care. Many staff members have been there for years and they really care about making it a nurturing and loving environment for the kids. There were weekly newsletters with photos of the children and summaries of their activities. Their approach is very student led but engaging, with a focus on the natural environment which I loved. The school composts, they have the kids grow vegetables like tomatoes, there is a focus on drinking water from their water bottles - not just cycling through juice and milk boxes. They do a lot of creative projects with reusing recyclable materials. Pre covid there were a lot of opportunities to be involved and participate like guest reader, or guest presenter. They also did field trips. It was a bummer my youngest did as much of that parent engagement but I thought they handled covid well.At each of my kids graduation, they gave us a binder full of photos and artwork over the past three years - it was such a heartwarming gift and both of my kids (and me) enjoy looking back at their years at CIS.
