Looking for a Daycare.

Personally I prefer the business type ones because the kids are with lots of other children their own age and that kind of interaction is really important for kids getting close to school age. For a newborn I would call around to a couple different places. Some do learning activities with each age group. As far as prices, they vary according to the daycare. I've heard good things about the CDC (child development center) but they are kind of expensive (about $8.00 per hour per child). Look in your phone book or on yellowpages.com for daycares and call a few. And dont be afraid to ask them as many questions as you need to. Hope this is helpful. Good luck with your little bundle of joy.

Actually CDC is one of the cheaper daycares here in Kalamazoo, both my children go to the one over by Borgess Hospital. They absolutely love it and the girls that are in charge are wonderful. If anything they have made my life easier and put my worries at ease. Unless you go with a home daycare then those are the cheapest about 25.00 a day. I found that stay at home daycares there is no boss to complain to if you don't like certain things going on at the home daycare. Good luck

There are a ton of decent daycars. It just depends on how much you want to pay. What I did when first looking for a day care was I went to the Kindercare website and they have a FAQ section. they have a form you can print off with all kinds of questions to ask as you are calling around. (obviously, some of them are geared to making them look good, but you can pick which questions are important to you to ask). Also, I HIGHLY suggest that you make an appt to visit several daycares. You need to know what the environment is really like and what kind of condition the place is in. Some places will tell you to just drop by anytime. This is nice as you know you are really seeing what normally goes on.

One other thing to consider is the location of the day care. You might want to only look at places that are convenient to you.

Your first step should be to call Child Care Resources! It is a free service and they give you a list of referrals to licensed child care. They e-mailed me a list of options within hours of calling their office, it was great! They even sent helpful brochures and information for making my selection easier!