My Gym Early Childhood Development Center 美吉姆国际儿童教育中心

We signed up for a series of classes at MyGym, and I have to say, I've been happier and happier each time with them.

The subsequent times the music level and style was very acceptable (and they even played Night Fever by the Bee Gees once: Bonus!)

The best thing, really, besides the free fresh ground automatic coffee, is that the staff RELIABLY all speak English. The in class instructors, and also Stella and Minnie as customer liasons, are all quite fluent. No "pretending to understand" only to find out thirty minutes later they had no clue. They really do speak OK english! And, they're helpful, and super nice.

Today, I showed up at Gymboree next door to just scout them out as a possible future venue. Their "English speaking people" in person and on the phone are nowhere near as good as MyGym. And...Gymboree is much more expensive. We bought a cool toy, though, and split....

Wanted to say that to get to the Wangjing My Gym, the "E" entrance is this: first, get to the Int'l Finance center, enter the opening to the square (there's a Gome Home, and a Kudi Pets aka CoolPet) Then you 'll see carnival rides and such in the square there. Walk on the left side until you see the BIG RED ENTRANCE on your left, maybe halfway down or so on the left of the common square area. Go in the red entrance, take elevator to floor 2, and you'll see MyGym there. (p.s. the first place you see is a cool science learning toy shop. They also do school programs and presentations, but only in Chinese).

Went today to the Wangjing Location of MyGym (there are THREE locations, see their website. Haidian, Wangjing here 2nd Floor, No. E Wangjing International Commercial Center, No. 9 Wangjing Street, Chaoyang District, Beijing Tel:010-59203056 and the Blue Castle location)

We were ten minutes late, so we waited in their open lounge area till the next class began at 11 am. Very kid friendly of course. A couple of toys, fish to look at, lots of books (all in Chinese) and of course you can walk around and see all the classes going on through strategically placed kid height windows. They do not allow photographs.

The gym class was really really awesome. Free play, then the short "class" begins. All instruction and communication is first and foremost in English, followed by another Chinese team teacher translating for those who don't speak English. The head teacher today, Mark, is Filipino and very nice.

So. First, warmup exercises in a circle time. Maybe 15 minutes of some songs, moving and naming body parts to get the circulation going, copy along with the parent, that sort of thing. They said afterward that this time helps attention span and delay of gratification. Today my daughter was not into this circle part- I could not, nor did I want to, pull her away from exploring the ball pit, etc. I was feeling pretty yuk about the class at that stage. I thought to myself "who blames her? they can't expect her to ignore all this COOL NEW stuff" and "if it were that INTERESTING over there in the circle area, she'd want to be there, but no, here we ARE over here doing what she's interested in". But just a moment later, after the circle greeting/warmup time comes much much more free play time on the various equipments and that's really what we're all there for.

OK. Complaints! They had a FABULOUS totally automatic cappuccino machine but they said it was "broken" and I couldn't use it. They had no instant coffee, but plenty of jasmine tea, lipton tea, even rosebud and chrysanthemum flowers for tea, but no coffee whatsoever. But that was no big deal really.

My biggest single complaint is that the music in the MyGym class was mostly low quality modern clubbing and one was a serious hard rock song. All of it was far TOO LOUD, especially for infants and toddlers. The Norah Jones song they put on at the very end when they brought out "cool down" toys was a welcome relief.

To their credit, they did turn the clubbing music way down when I mentioned that I thought it was loud and made a painful face (because it really was so high as to be slightly painful, to my ears, the volume, and I have been to many a rock concert in my day). Even once the volume was reduced, the racket that they call music prevented most if not all meaningful verbal exchanges. The fun activities could be a speech and language pathologist's dreamscape for new and germaine speech and word usage, or just good communication and loving bonding time.....but the way they had the music, it's certainly not. That was disappointing. Still, for my daughter who needs more physicality in her life, the room and activities are fabulous for the sheer physical aspect.

For the 1-2 year olds, they had a wide balance beam (really, a polished plank of wood close to the floor) which helped the kids walk with their feet closer to the center rather than planted far out, and makes them use their core muscles much more than wide planted feet. My daughter particularly needs this sort of exercise, it's like they knew we were comin'.

They had a crawling track inclined down and very tiny babies can either learn to crawl down it (ala Glenn Doman's Crawling Track) or alternatively, well, it was not super slick like some, but slippery enough to sort of slide down in a sort of slow, controlled manner. My daughter climbed up and slid down many times. It's a low low incline, maybe 25 degrees. Later in the class they took out a Fisher Price riding car and had rides down it too. It had side rails, made of polyeurethaned wood.

There was a big padded "house" made out of a parachute and padded things. Although we've only been once, I get the feeling they change around something about the room every week or so, because there were a few cool structures made out of component parts (you know, those big foam rectangles etc. inside of the mat cover material).

They hung hula hoops and put large balls out to toss through them. Later, they put out around 5 swings, hung from the ceiling, sturdy Stage 2 plastic ones, with 5 point harnesses, which were a very big hit. There was a trampoline and a ball pit and some other things in the room. Nearing what I suppose they might call the Cool Down time, they did a neat activity with a floor mat. They placed scarves onto the floor, one for each child, who were sitting in the parent's laps at that time. They then said a short rhyme and at a certain spot in the rhyme let the gym mat down fast, creating wind, and the scarves blew over to the kids. Stuff like that. Interesting demonstrations and activities.

Because 3 of the structures were quite high, you should spot the baby often, but they are able to mostly do everything themselves at this toddler age (Waddlers Class, we went to). There were places to practice walking up steps right alongside soft steps for crawling up. Everything was very padded, but not the floor in some spots so parents will want to stay close to lil ones not give them totally free reign at all. It looked like all Western equipment, and there was zero chemical odor that I could detect.

The way the fee structure works is this.

Come for any free demo class you like. My Art (20 months and over), My Gym (6 week old infant to 13 years) or My Music classes. There is a schedule for each location - you schedule in advance your trial class by phone. (Stella and Minnie both speak English at the Wangjing location.)

Then if you want to attend more, and you probably will, you buy a set number of Classes. The lowest number of classes is 12, for 3,150 kuai or thereabouts (I do remember that it broke down to around 260 or something rmb per class. Higher numbers of classes are a cost savings per class) .

The 12 class card I noticed, had a time limit, and needed to be used up within 16 weeks. So there are time limits imposed. But you don't necessarily sign up for any classes. You can attend any classes, anytime you want. Do all 3 types of classes some weeks, mix n match. For an afternoon class, you can show up if baby is up already from nap in time, skip it if they're sleeping. My girl sleeps once a day, but somewhat irregular start time and length, so I really love this flexible aspect.

Today was probably a typical weekday (Tuesday). It was a nice busy atmosphere, but didn't seem overly crowded. (Eating is a big thing there, in the lobby area. So are waiting Grandmas and Grandpas to coo over your lil one. There are highchairs and just about everyone had tupperwares full of fruit, soup, etc I suppose waiting for another class to begin. ) Oh that makes me wonder. I *suppose* it's possible to show up and a class be full. They didn't mention maximum class sizes but I'm sure they have some sort of guidelines on that. I don't know if they take reservations for classes but if your schedule's tight it's maybe something to ask about.

I plan to buy a membership- baby was super tired and cranky, so quick exit today.

thanks for reading!

Liora
ModeratorMom
founder of Beijing Mamas, Beijing Organic Consumers and BJ Food Allergies and Special Diets Yahoo groups