Little Sunshine's Playhouse & Preschool
reviews and complaints

I’ve debated for a bit whether or not to write this review. After time to process I feel that I need to share my experience as I worry about the other babies that are in the care of LSP Val Vista.

I toured and interviewed many child care centers while I was pregnant and fell in love with LSP. I secured a spot for my son when I was 5 months pregnant to start at 8 weeks old as I had to return to work. I did the tour with the assistant director Rebecca. She is very lovely and answered all my questions. The facility is beautiful and seemed clean and well kept.

The day before my son started care at LSP we were to meet his teacher. We met with Danni who stated she was the lead infant room teacher and would be with my son while he was in care. We shared our son’s feeling schedule, temperament, sleeping patterns etc. She shared that there was ALWAYS 2 teachers in the classroom , curriculum and what days looked like for the babies. We were excited for the care our son would receive.

The next day we arrived at 9:30am for my son’s first day. First thing that I thought was strange was they had me take my son to a different classroom with older babies. When I walked into the classroom there was 1 teacher and 10 babies. All but 2 babies were crying and pretty upset. There were 2 babies sitting on the floor, one of the babies kept climbing on top of another one and knocking him down, sitting on top of him and grabbing his face. The baby was pretty upset and screaming. Another baby was in a crib screaming and his leg was caught in the crib slats, he was turning and trying to get his leg loose , twisting his leg and causing him to cry louder. The young teacher seemed frazzled and overwhelmed. I didn’t feel good about leaving my 8 week old there. I called my husband anxious and he told me that I was just being a worried mama and having well guilt about leaving our baby. So I tried to have faith that this was it and I dropped my son off.

My husband and I have pretty random hours and get off work sometimes pretty early. My husband got off early and went to pick my son up at 2pm on the first day. When he arrived he was pretty shocked to see the teacher we had met with the day before asleep on the couch in the entrance. This is where parents come in to sign out baby before going into the classroom. He called me to tell me that he went in the classroom to get our son and there was one teacher and many crying babies while his “teacher” was asleep on the couch. This seemed concerning. However we didn’t know what was going on and tried to again tell ourselves we were being over cautious parents.

Our son only went 3 days per week so we were hopeful it was a one time thing. The next time I went to drop off my son there was a different teacher in the classroom (Yolie) She seemed very nice. Babies seemed calm and most were asleep. I felt better about drop off that day.

Again, my husband went to pick our son up. When he got there they sent him to another classroom , with different teacher, with older babies and our son was strapped in a chair crying. Our son seemed out of sorts. We thought it was due to adjusting.

A few days past and this continued. Our son always seemed puffy eyed, and sad when we’d get him.

We noticed when we’d get our son is clothes would be soaked in formula and his butt was quite red. He also wasn’t eating much while there. He’d come home so hungry and inhale a 6oz bottle and go to sleep. My son usually only eats 3oz every 2-2.5 hrs at this point. But was eating 5-6oz in 6 -7 hrs while at LSP.

One day my husband went to get our son and when he walked through the door he could hear our son screaming. My husband thought “that can’t be our son, he rarely cries and definitely not like that”. My husband walked up to the classroom and could see in the window that our son was strapped in a bouncer, screaming, visibly distraught, red, tears rolling down his face and breathing heavy. My Huss and rushed in and grabbed our son. The teacher (Danni) was sitting right in front of him feeding a baby. She nonchalantly said “oh, I just tried to feed him but he kept hitting the bottle away”. For context our son is at the stage of figuring out his arms and tries to “help” with the bottle. This doesn’t mean he’s not hungry it means he’s learning arm control not to stop feeding him. When my husband got home with our son, my husband went to change his diaper and what we saw horrified us. His butt was so raw and red there were blisters, burns and his skin was coming off! 😡😭 we took him to our pediatrician and she said these were skin burns from being left in a surety diaper for long period.

That was enough. I messaged the director with my concerns and asked for a meeting. The next day I met with the director. She presented as concerned. I showed her where the daily logs did not make sense and that it showed that my son had gone 4 hrs without feeding. The director assured me that she spoke with the teacher (Danni) and that she had apologized and would make sure to do better. The director also said she would be in the classroom often and keeping an eye on my son. I wanted to have faith that this wasn’t ever going to happen again. I was told to go through the director and bring it to her attention prior to pulling our son.

After that we tried again and when I dropped off my son the teacher (Danni) was holding a baby with one arm propped up on a counter not very secure scrolling on her phone. 🤦🏻‍♀️

I went out to speak with the director and as I approached the desk the desk phone rang. The director answered the phone and it was on speaker phone. You could hear babies screaming and crying and you could hardly hear the teacher. The director hung up and asked one of the teachers that was up front socializing “can you go see what Danni needs she sounds like she needs help and I couldn’t hear her”. That teacher left and came back not 2 mins later and continued socializing taking about her weekend with other teachers. Why weren’t they in the classrooms?!

At that point I had had it. It wasn’t the first time we walked in the classroom and the teacher (Danni) was scrolling on her phone while babies cried. The classroom was dark most the time, babies were strapped in chairs, swings or in cribs majority of the time and there were always crying babies and one teacher only.

I went and toured other child cares and pulled our son.

The head director that oversees all the LSP’s in AZ called me and wanted me to explain what happened. When I told her she was very apologetic. At that point I was not going to let my son go back.

My son has been at his new daycare center going on 2 weeks now. It’s a 360 difference. The classroom always has 2 lovely teachers. My son is eating, napping and thriving. They do so many activities with the babies and he is rarely in a chair. He is always happy when we come to pick him up and at drop off’s. Not once has he come home with a red butt or starving. Not once have we gone to drop of or pick up and babies are screaming. They are being played with and doing age appropriate activities. I have peace of mind now and feel good about dropping him off.

LSP is expensive. I got the impression it was more about getting as many babies for $$$ rather that the care and quality of care.

I do pay the same at the new daycare but they. Have less babies and more workers. They have a standard and you can really see it.

I hope that LSP hires better teachers and has more eyes on what is going on. I hope the quality of care gets better too.

After a week, we decided we didn't need their full-time services anymore. When we tried to change the schedule, they told us we had to give a 30-day notice and pay the current rate. It was disappointing that they couldn't be more flexible, especially if they had mentioned this policy during the orientation. We tried reaching out to their home office, but they never seemed willing to work with us.

We had lots of problems with LSP. First, they never moved our child to the right class 'cause they had staffing issues and couldn't meet state rules. 'Cause of that, our kid went backwards in speech and behavior. We tried another school and saw a big improvement in just a few days. At LSP, our child was in Toddler 1, but at the new school, they put him in Toddler 3. When we told LSP about our issues and wanted to leave, they just threw their 30-day policy at us and took our money even though they didn't provide any service. We decided to keep our child in the new school 'cause LSP couldn't do their job right. They said we could bring our child back anytime in those 30 days, but that didn't make sense 'cause he'd be in the wrong class. At LSP, the teachers let the kids run around without shoes and make a mess with yogurt everywhere. Our child got sick every week and it ruined our weekends. But at the new school, they teach him to wash his hands and he hasn't been sick since leaving LSP. At LSP, our child used to cling to us every morning, but now he happily walks in with his lunch bag at the new school. I just don't wanna pay for a whole month when my child isn't even there 'cause LSP couldn't do their job right. The 30-day policy seems like a money grab to me, just trying to get more tuition for a month when they didn't provide any service or put my child in the right class.