Harmony Child Care Center

"This place is the best. Many of the teachers have been here for a long time and they treat the children like their own. My daughter tells me she loves her teacher all the time, and she tells me that her teachers tell her they love her. It really is like a home away from home. They have a good curriculum with language learning and teacher directed projects everyday, such as painting, drawing, beading, building etc. They also go to story time at the local cafe, and they check out books from the local library. I feel this is not your typical daycare, the teachers here and the director go above and beyond to ensure the kids are well cared for and enriched. They also get plenty of time each day for independent play, and I noticed that the teachers often try not to interfere and let kids learn to solve social problems on their own before stepping in. I think people should know that the Chinese/mandarin language can sound harsh, so to non-native speakers it sounds like “barking orders”. And if the teachers are playing/joking with the children it can sound even harsher. Also, many of the teachers don’t speak English fluently so in order to get updates you will need to catch the director or the supervisor to get updates on the day. They tend to float around to the classrooms, and I’ve seen the director reading to the children on many occasions. It is obvious that all these teachers love what they do and they have been taking care of young children and teaching Chinese for a long time."

"My kid Chrys went to Harmony from when she was 1 until pre-K. She loved this one older lady there when she was little, always wanted to go back. They had a set daily schedule and each teacher had their own thing going on. When the kids got older, they learned to do things on their own. But now we moved to Cali and can't find a daycare like Harmony for my new little boy."

"Not a good learning environment. Looks like chaos every time I pick up/drop off. The classrooms are rampant with bad behaviors (yelling/screaming, hitting, throwing, yanking toys away, pushing) and teachers turn a blind eye. They at least refunded my deposit when I decided to switch schools. Couldn't stand going there any longer, even if it was for the language benefit. Not worth your kids picking up terrible behaviors and feeling reinforced by it because the teachers are lazy and simply don't care/bother to correct them. We have not had the same behavioral issues after the change in placement."

"Very poor management after committing a WA State violation. I will explain as briefly as I can. My daughter sustained a head injury at Harmony at 9:20am one morning, and we were not notified about her injury until she was picked up that evening because she had a very large bruise and significant swelling (2.5 inches across) on her forehead. The injury incident report that we were given was not filled out properly (according to the report, there was no treatment provided, but the director insisted that they provided an ice pack after I called her about this incident the next day). My daughter verbally expressed to me (unprompted) that her head hurt throughout that evening, 9 hours after the incident happened. This meant that she went through nearly her entire day with pain and the director/staff did not contact us as parents at all. Had I known, I could have taken her that morning to urgent care right away, looked into pain relief options, etc. My daughter complained of pain sporadically that night (woke up multiple times) and the next day as well. Was uncoordinated in her gait, bumped into furniture, and we found out from a video visit that night (as well as an in-person visit a few days later) that she had a concussion. The staff violated informed consent rules. All injuries above the neck should be reported to parents, yet they did not do this. When discussing my concerns with the director of Harmony, she was rather dismissive and rude. She said she would share my concerns with the owner of the daycare, a so-called "Lily" who lived in Taiwan, and was unavailable by phone, video chat, etc. Basically, a person who "makes the rules" but is unable to be reached by parents except through email. Lily took 4 days just to respond to my email about my concerns. She never apologized once or acknowledged that her staff should have notified me about the head injury sooner. Instead, the owner of Harmony told me that I was stressing out her staff and bluntly stated that it was hard to hire/train a new person at this time, so she told me to immediately stop bringing my daughter to the daycare. I never would have imagined that a daycare owner would: (1) make a violation by failing to report a child's head injury to the parents in a timely manner instead of 9 hours later, (2) apologize for what had happened and acknowledge that the staff should have notified parents, (3) expel the injured student because this was causing "stress" for the staff. I am disgusted by these immoral practices and what we went through. Harmony should come with a warning."

"Be warned that Harmony staff have very outdated practices, no video monitoring, no photos or written daily communication, etc. The way they use language to the children definitely does not align with gentle parenting techniques. It's very rude, like barking orders. They are very rigid with their teaching practices and there is very little variety in the activities that are provided at this facility. Regarding the lack of video monitoring, photos, and regular communication, that is something I have seen in most other daycares/preschools in the area. Many of which communicate through apps, sending photos and notes as well as allowing livestream video monitoring during certain time windows. Just very shocked that Harmony does not provide any of that at all and have been very closed off in communication with parents. If you're looking for staff who will be partners in your child's wellbeing or education, you ought to look elsewhere."