In Search for a good Playschool :

Finding a good playschool in my area has become a big challenge. I have been constantly talking to some of the young moms in my apartment complex to get any information. So this was the outcome of those very dramatically long conversations..which i am restricting to one liners. I have listed some of the playschools in my area that the children from our apartment complex visited :

Daffodils :One mom told me that "children looked petrified in this place"..

Mothercare : Some parents in my flat premises decided to pull out their kids from this place due to unhygienic standards.

Littleones : So far only one mother had done a survey of that place and she was not impressed...
Blue Bells, KK Nagar : As quoted by a parent "Good place but they are now promoting their Saligrammam branch, thereby admissions for valasai kids are closed"
Siksha Shishya Bhavan or Shishya Siksha Bhavan : Except for the confusion in the name, this place was voted as the best amongst the worst.
So finally i decided to visit some of the play schools. Personally, I thought SSB can do better than what they are carrying out, they have the potential but for some reason not offering their fullest services. I had decided not to admit Arav here anyways.

Blue Bells, Saligramman: "Not as good as KK Nagar". I went to BB,S to check out what is not good..The children had already left the place, but from what i heard, there are 70 kids in that house everyday. There were toys that looked hazardous and had no developmental meaning. The place smelt of phenyl.

Apple kids, Vadapalani: Relatively new..so new that they had started to accept registration fees even before setting up the infrastructure.From what i figured, this play school was like any commercialised branded product in the market. They have standardised curriculum, training methods given to teachers and materials for children. They follow a mix of the traditional and the montessori, and they have extensive publicity and media coverage. They accept children from 1.8 onwards...

Eurokids, Ashok Nagar: A very popular play school with many centres within chennai. This centre started just this year by an IIT alumnus. When I visited this center, I almost liked it! They were professional and the materials were impressive. They had a splash pool in the premises for the water activities..which caught my eye the instant i entered. They had outdoor toys outdoors ! The centre had adequate space outside for the children to play. The activity rooms were all air conditioned. However, some rooms looked real small for a group of 20 children. Children need space and the room that I saw for play group (1.8 to 2.5) was disappointing. I also saw a pile of used diapers in one corner which kind of put me off...but yeah i thought this was much better that what i had seen earlier.