Braintree KinderCare

My older son attended Kindercare Braintree from age 2 – 5. He started in the «Twos» room and advanced up through Kindergarten over the years. He was too young to start kindergarten in our town last fall so he stayed at Kindercare for private kindergarten. This fall he started kindergarten at our town’s public school and has an excellent foundation knowledge of his letter, numbers, and sight words that was given to him at Kindercare.
My younger son started in infants and is now in toddlers. He loves his teachers and I can tell how much they care for him in the way that they greet him in the morning and the interactions that I observe when I pick him up later in the day.
The center went through a bit of turmoil over a year ago with a former director but the current leadership team is top notch. They have a good handle on communicating with the parents and send weekly emails about events in the upcoming week. There are also occasional special events such as harvest festival parties and summer luaus that help some of the families meet each other.
Kindercare provides breakfast, lunch, and snacks. There’s a published menu so you know what they are serving. During nap time, each child has their own cot (vs. some other centers where I’ve seen that the kids sleep on mats on the floor). For infants, toddlers, and Twos there is a daily status sheet that the teachers fill out throughout the day to let you know when and what your child ate, when they napped and what other things they may have done during the day.
The center offers additional classes during regular hours that you can opt into for your child as well such as cooking and dancing.
The center has great hours that are convenient if you work full time. they are open from 6:30 AM to 6:30 PM. The center is convenient to Rte 93 and to the Braintree and Quincy Adams T stations, which is great if you have to commute into the city to work. You can pay via check or use their online payment system to pay by credit card.

KinderCare in Braintree has proven to be a fine center for my child and has gotten much better over time. My daughter has been attending since she was 2 months old and she is now 13 mos. As a new mom I was very anxious about leaving her when I first went back to work, but after a while I felt comfortable knowing that she was in capable hands. Her teachers are very caring and are very open to feedback. They are also happy to give updates on how she is doing overall and once called us at home to check in after she had been home sick for a day or two.
We receive a weekly newsletter informing us of the goings on at the center and they even started putting together a few Parents’ Night Out programs to allow us caretakers to get a breather! Nice perk. :)
She also is very comfortable there and has made plenty of little friends.
For the needs of my family this center is great and we hope to be able to keep our daughter there for the years to come.

My experience at this center was awful. I went to visit child during the day randomly and they were never doing anything except running around. When I asked the teacher were they going to do an activity later, she said just probably play with leggos on the floor since it’s just too hectic. My child was in the preschool room, which I would think would provide more interactive activities. I have heard other parents in from the same room complaining as well, asking what their child was doing all day, since they do send home daily reports, you don’t get any projects from the day.
On several occasions I went there while they were outside and the children either did not have their coats on or were partially falling off, no hats were on and it was 40 degrees outside. The teachers were very inexperienced and very young, I believe both of which were under 20 years old. I do believe they were having a problem with teacher turnover so they had two young girls running this group of 20 children. I’m sure they had no formal education in terms of early childhood classes. I do not recommend this center at all, unless you are looking for a high priced babysitter.
The one positive note is the director and the associate director were very friendly, which I appreciated, however my child’s educational development was not progressing. My child was in this center for about a month and half and I do not believe he learned anything outside of awful behaviors.
Good luck, but one tip, look for centers where the teachers have training outside of the franchise training, formal education which would include child psychology, childhood development. There should be a lead teacher with the most formalized training and the asst with less but they should be attending some sort of classes, at least if you want your child to learn something even toddlers should have some sort of learning.