Saturday, September 8, 2012

Toddler play group in Mont Kiara, Bangsar, MidValley

Kids are getting more intelligent nowadays, and learning fast so parents are rushing to send their babies to the latest baby learning centres to make sure that their babies will have the competitive edge too.

My mummy does the same and here are some of the feedback of the baby classes for babies about 12 months / 1 year old.

Heguru - MidValley shopping mall (you need to pay a fee of about RM100 for the trial class where the baby and the mom / dad will be placed in a room with 3 other babies. The teacher would be talking superfast and mumble terms in English and even Japanese as this is a Japanese baby learning program. The prices of the classes vary accordingly to either weekday or weekend. This seems not so suitable for younger babies and better suited for kids about 2 years old or more.

Gymboree Kids Center - available in many outlets including the Publika in Mont Kiara, Bangsar Village 1, Tropicana Shopping Mall. Classes include play gym where toddlers and babies are asked to perform various tasks such as going through tunnels, climbing up the stairs, and going down the slides. All parents / guardians need to wear socks while babies will be barefoot. They even have music classes and this is done in a room. For this class, it is more tiring for parents as you will need to lift your babies throughout the songs, dancing, so good for burning up the extra pregnancy fat. Sign up for the free trial class of their playgroup!

TweedleWink - Bandar Damansara Perdana, my cousin sister joined this for about 3 months when she was just about 12 months old but her mommy mentioned this was quite similar to HeGuru but more based on American baby learning method. This center does not allow any trial classes so you have to join instantly after the consultation. Babies below 2 years old might find it hard to concentrate and seemed more interested in the "other" babies in the class rather than the instructor's teaching.

Another very popular baby learning program is the Shichida method which has 2 centers - Wisma Lim Foo Yong in KL and Bandar Utama Centrepoint but most of the calls to this center are unanswered and having a long waiting time. We preregistered with them 1 year ago and till now, there was no reply (they mentioned there is a 6 months waiting period for their classes) and how we wish there would be more centers.

After 18 months, there will be more choices for baby and toddler learning classes. Rather than forced in many types of classes, babies should be allowed to just be themselves and play. Cos as they grow older there are still many years of classes to attend but you only get to be a baby 1 time!

News updated by my mommy, Fione Tan during her visit to Hanoi, Vietnam