Becoming A Mother
As a mother and educator, I know the importance of high-quality child care and early education. My motherhood journey began when my son was born prematurely in October 2019. Born at 33 weeks, he spent 32 days in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Thankfully he faced no serious health challenges. I stayed home on maternity leave until February 2020. As I was about to return to work, COVID hit the world and everything shut down, which complicated our search for child care.
Working from home, I enrolled my child in the Pittsburgh Public Schools (PPS) Early Childhood Program, which was virtual. They engaged in circle time, storytime, and interactive lessons that lasted about three hours daily. When I returned to work, my son was the only student to attend in person, because many parents were still keeping their children home due to the pandemic. He got to be in a classroom with three attentive teachers who poured into him as if they had a full class. While the PPS Early Childhood Program was a wonderful experience for our son, as an educator,
I knew that he needed social interactions with other children and a full-day schedule. So his father and I began to search for child care centers to enroll him.
Our Dream Child Care Center
We were looking for a welcoming, understanding staff that would maintain effective, efficient communication with parents. We wanted our son to have a day of structured time that included learning and building his social and emotional skills. On top of that, we knew this would be an adjustment because he’d had limited interaction with anyone other than his immediate family. Essentially, this would be his first time away from me for the whole day and in an environment with additional children. We needed a center that was able to support us in this transition.
Unfortunately, the first center we tried was not able to provide these things, and it was not a good fit for our son. We needed a center that understood the importance of being student-centered and caring for the needs of each individual child and family. His father and I decided to remove him and go back to our search to find the right place for our child.
The Perfect Child Care Center
Two weeks after leaving that facility, we found a new center that exceeded our expectations. On his first day at The Learning Loft, he was greeted with hugs and affirmations. His toy was welcomed. I met with the director and his teachers, and they explained the structure of his schedule. The director said although he is only two, they believed that he was ready for Pre-k3. He was still in a pull-up, and they were fine with that. With their partnership, we had him fully potty trained two months after being enrolled. It was like night and day. We knew we’d made the right decision.
The Learning Loft is filled with daily affirmations and genuine love from the staff to my son. They have become an extended support system for our family, and they have helped my son develop in an environment where he feels safe and valued. They are invested in his growth, and it goes beyond the eight-hour day he spends in their care. If we are working on a lesson or skill set at home, they are willing to mirror the same lesson at school. They even allowed us to surprise him at school for his fourth birthday with a party and a life-sized Cocomelon character. He will always have these memories of learning and fun during these foundational years.
Setting The Foundation
Sticking to our values and finding a center that met our expectations was the best decision we could make. Besides the parents, early childhood educators are the first teachers that children count on. They form the foundation of their academic career. This impact can be positive or negative depending on the center and staff. Parents want to have confidence that their children are receiving the proper care and support from educators in this most crucial time of their social and emotional development. For our children to have high-quality care, we need passionate educators who understand the significant impact they have on children and families.
Our children are the next leaders of this world. They deserve childcare providers and early educators who prioritize communication with families and emotional support for the children while modeling a strong work ethic. I believe that early childhood education is one of the most meaningful professions, and I encourage people who have a passion for guiding young children to pursue a career as an educator.