I don't know that it's THAT hard to get a sense of how a daycare or preschool operates? We chose a daycare for DD#3 last year and as we stood chatting with the director, after getting the fairly irrelevant tour, I had plenty of time to watch the other staff with the kids and see that staff at place #1 had bunches of kids sitting on knees or nearby, but that they weren't actually interacting with those kids, and instead were absent-mindedly distracting the children while they had nice chats with each other, the whole time that we were there. The other kids were milling around aimlessly. Place #2 on the other hand had visibly better staff to child ratios, the kids were all busily doing stuff (sand pit, pushing things, swinging, painting, puzzles, all manner o things), the staff were readily directing aimless kids to new things to try and they were getting down onto 2yr old eye level to talk to seemingly non-verbal kids like they would understand every word said to them. No staff having chats with each other because they were too busy talking to kids and getting stuff done... No guesses which place we chose. And every time I walk in I see the same thing - busy children doing a variety of activities and busy staff that see everything that goes on, walk away from adult conversation (with parents) to fix problems they see and who talk to the children like people who deserve respect. Would my DD rather spend a day 1:1 with a devote adult, of course; Yet I certainly don't think daycare is harming her and I do think it's actively beneficial to spend some time with kids roughly her own age (which there is little chance of outside of daycare, our eldest is older than our friends' kids and our youngest is younger).
