My daughter was having a hard time expressing herself so we received services through regional center of the east bay at kiddo land.
We were matched with Kaia?, I believe was her name, at first. She called us and made an appointment to come to our home. When the day came, she didn't show up. I texted her and called her with no answer. Six hours later, she finally texted back and didn't even know who I was or that we even had an appointment. Kaia explained that another teacher was switched with her to teach my daughter and that I should have been contacted by her. I explained that it's extremely unprofessional of her to not cancel our appointment and to rely on someone else to pass on the message. She completely wasted my time. She gave me the new teachers, Maria, phone number and told me to contact her.
I contacted Maria, rather than her contact me, and set up an appointment. Maria came and played with my daughter but didn't seem like she knew what she was doing. She had textbook knowledge, but you can tell she was inexperienced with kids from the way she interacted with my daughter. We only saw her for around a month. She brought toys that were inappropriate for my daughters age/abilities each week, 13 month old at the time. She made my daughter completely scared of balls. Two weeks in a row, she brought a spikey sensory ball. Both weeks she bounced the ball high repeatedly at my daughter, above and at eye level. She hit my daughter in the face TWICE, not once, but TWICE with the spikey ball. The first time, sure it could have been an accident and I can understand that. The second time, a week later, inexcusable! My daughter kept flinching her eyes and distancing herself from the ball because she was scared. Maria asked why she kept flinching, and laughed at her doing it....and I had to state the obvious that she was scared of the ball. My daughter still distances herself from balls now, it's so unfortunate.
I contacted Maria's supervisor, Moon, soon after. She did not return my call for a whole day so I decided to contact my daughters case manager. She happily changed our provider to someone from the Kidango program. Moon finally returned my call but was completely rude and could care less to speak to me. My daughters new teacher from Kidango was AMAZING. It was seriously night and day the difference in professionalism and experience compared to the ladies at kiddo land. My daughters other therapist even told me she's not fond of the services at kiddo land and would never send her kids there. She sees what these centers are like when parents aren't around. We are so glad that we were able to switch providers. I do not recommend kiddoland at all. read more