The Learning Experience - Lemont — Local services in Lemont Township

While our time at The Learning Experience has not been long, it has certainly been sweet. The school has exceeded our expectations in many ways. First of all, a school should be aesthetically pleasing in order for students to enjoy their environment. From the "ABC, 123" blocks outside inviting your kids in, to the colorful hallway, kids feel like they are going to a fun loving school, rather than an institution. Their meal plans are hands down better than your dinner plans! My kids rave about the food and actually eat it. It makes me want to step my game up at home.

Aside from the exquisite nutrition and inviting nature, their teachers are also on par with being caring and empathetic. Miss Sam cares for the well-being of my child. She let us know that we can email her the night before a "handle with care" alert to make her aware that our child might need a little extra care. Guess what, you don't even have to explain why! My daughter is still in the process of potty training, and I have her teachers to thank for helping us along the road. The directors are also very accommodating and communicative. They are kind. Kindness matters in a world where we have forgotten what it means to interact with people outside of the internet. Yes, this is a franchise, so before you judge, know that each building has its own owner. And as most franchises go, not every owner cares or even visits the building. But not this school! You'll see the owner and interact with him. He frequently sits up front to oversee everything. And an owner who cares, breeds teachers who care.

As a parent, you send a piece of your heart out into the world, and you can only trust and pray that establishment you are sending them to handles that piece with the same fragility you're used to. Again, in this short period of time so far I feel great about my decision. Now, this doesn't go without saying my kids don't have rough days, because even as adults we struggle to wake up and go to work. But what I do know is that so far the teachers have made me feel assured that even when they are having rough times, they will help to turn their day around. Most importantly, they have individuals there that have backgrounds in therapy, and sensory regulation. Which, if you're a mom with kids who struggle to regulate their emotions, you know how important just having someone say that to you is. They rarely, if at all do time-outs. They don't yell or punish without purpose. They focus on re-direction of the child and trying to get to the root of the problem. And if the teacher in the room doesn't have the answer, they call on a teacher that can help (personally witnessed as I was picking up my kid and he was having a meltdown).

They have an APP as well. You get pictures of your kids throughout the day and they actually tell you what the kids are doing. Not only do they show you what the kids are doing though, they have a thing called "Car Talk", so you aren't stuck asking your kids the general question of "How was school today?" (which we all know doesn't work ha!). They follow a pretty solid curriculum on the daily and use LEAP technology. The older kids have a computer in the room which is pretty cool.

I've interacted with a lot of teachers/daycares and I've used my gut feeling to guide me. This time it guided me to The Learning Experience, and so far I'm glad I trust my...

Let me just start by saying. If your kid doesn’t want to go to daycare, you should look into it. Kids don’t say no to all day fun with their friends. There’s a reason why your kid just stops wanting to go to daycare. My child constantly complained that he was put in time out and sent to the toddlers class. They flip flop teachers to accommodate them so they can be in a class with their own children and take care of them all day. While all the kids get A granola bar for breakfast, the teacher’s son gets banana, strawberries and orange smiles. This daycare has no sick policy. Kids are constantly sick and contagious. Boogers are always running down their noses and teachers don’t care to whip them. Also for teachers, idk how many times I walked in on a teacher coughing her brains out. If you are sick stay home! Diaper changes are clearly a struggle for them. They say they do it all the time and they put it in the app but it’s not actually getting done. My child came home with a red butt every other day because the BM was sitting in the pull up for longer than it should have. Also they use anyone’s pull ups during the day. While I’m here spending extra money on Honest pull ups my child is coming home with someone else’s pull up. So who’s using mine? Cleaning and bleaching the toys happens once a month. The restrooms are disgusting. The kitchen is dirty, all the food is microwaved. They don’t have verity of foods they eat the same thing every other day. They only interact with your children when it’s time to take pictures for the app. Other than that I walked in to pick up my child early plenty of times and the teachers are on the other end of the room on their phones. They don’t wash their hands after the playground or take off their shoes to clean the wood chips out. The indoor playground is only for older kids. I have not once seen my child play in there. They have 18-20 year olds working as teachers. They hire anyone and everyone. No one is actually a teacher there. Preppers teacher told me she studied to be a cook not a teacher. So when the cook was out on vacation she stepped into the kitchen to cook. All the kids were having that week was salads. They lie on the app all the time. They say your kid ate everything they served but that’s not true. Every day I picked up my child he was starving. They have one full meal a day at 11am. All the other meals are crackers or granola bars. So if your kid is there from 8am till 6pm your child is only eating once all day. Their “breakfast” is at 6am. They have 6 kids total coming at that time all ages. That way they don’t cook breakfast for all the kids later. Bringing 32 pull ups on the first of the month and being asked to bring more on the 15th is a little sketchy as my child is only there for 3 days a week. The teachers change their own kids with your things so they save money on their own pull ups. The beds are named but they let kids sleep on anyone’s bed. They don’t use sheets for the beds either. Staff is not friendly no one greets you when you first walk into the daycare. The girls at the front are too busy talking about the party they were at during the weekend to even greet you. It’s actually very uncomfortable. Overall I would not recommend this daycare to anyone who cares about...

This is the worst school ever , the teachers are nice , but the owners are Honorable I do not recommend this place at all.

The place seems nice and clean , but the atmosphere is very cold and business like . We had our kids there for 3 years , until my daughter started hating going there. It became more difficult to get her to school. Later on we have noticed she had some issues with couple of her teachers. They would pick on her and every few days they would call and wanting me to pick up my daughter from school because she didn't listen or she did something wrong .

All the things that normal kids do , they are kids. It got so bad that they would call every single day and wanted me to pick her up for the silliest thing. I met with the owners many times who I trusted to be professional and in their opinion my daughter was the most Honorable kid in school . And according to them my daughter needs to be in special school for bad kids , at that time she was 3.

I don't know about you guys but , any 2-3 year old can and will drive you crazy at times .

My daughter is started to get really bad self esteem issues , she would come to me and say " Mommy I know Im terrible person " , " Im bad person " or " I'm a looser " I could not understand why a child would be saying this , this was really hard thing to hear from your 3 year old. These remark did not come out of nowhere , Whenever I would pick up my kids I noticed from couple of my daughters teachers this coldness towards my daughter. It started to feel like she was really unwanted there.

After some time , and them suspending my daughter from school on daily basis ( which I had to pay for ) The owners decided to tell me that my kids are no longer welcome in their school and that my daughter needs to again be placed in some school for troubled kids . And also they said that they will not loose any teachers because of my daughter.

After my kids left we found another day care close by , from the moment we took those kids to this new school, It felt like a miracle has happened . My daughter started to like her new school , started to like her new teachers, her self esteem started to come back .

Its been more than 2 years in the new school . My daughter is one of the best students there she is 5 now , she loves her new day care , she learns a lot and every one loves her there.

This Learning Experience in Lemont in my opinion, is the worst environment you can take your kids to . Yes , it may look nice from the outside , but inside its ran by Honorable people in my opinion.

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