People who took our online class had this to say:
Brandie was a wonderful instructor. She was organized and personable. The content was fresh and relevant. It exceeded our expectations!
Yes. Julia was a great teacher! We appreciated her forthright and balanced approach to teaching. We loved the frank way she handled all questions and concerns. She created a judgement free environment - which is exactly what you want as first-time parents.
Julia was excellent. Very personable and she made you feel very comfortable in the class and when asking questions. Really enjoyed her overall approach. I will definitely be recommending her and the class to friends.
Julia was an amazing educator and I would highly recommend her and this course to new parents. It was incredibly helpful.
Comfort of my own home :)
I enjoyed the fact that we were at home, it made my wife more comfortable to be able to use our own bathroom and have snacks on hand etc. It also allowed us to must ourselves during the discussion and make comments to each other privately when an issues or decision that we wanted to discuss came up.
Erin was really wonderful and had so much information that was easy to follow and was non-judgemental with any questions you had. She did really well with teaching the class online given the current situation.
Bringing Baby Home is a great opportunity for new parents to help learn the basics, get answers to common questions, and connect with the local parenting community and resources.
The prenatal class we took with OCEA was informative and reassuring. We appreciated the experience our instructor brought to the class both as a midwife and a mom. We appreciated that facts were shared in context to make stats less scary as well as providing a broader understanding of labour and delivery. Would recommend!
Although we have plenty of resources available to us, including couples that have recently had babies (some of which explore more "alternative" or new methods in raising their children and others more conservative), plenty of people that are giving us advice, books, online tutorials etc... this course was truly invaluable. The course structure made a lot of sense and the instructor (we had Erin) was so knowledgeable, answering questions based on her wealth of experience, existing research studies, historical context and so on. We can't imagine this information being conveyed in any other way other than in a class such as this. We literally could ask anything pertaining to the course topics and would get a very good answer. We will be recommending this course to everyone that is expecting. We found it especially helpful that we had not made any baby related purchases yet because one component of this course was about what products to buy, should wait to buy, not buy and WHY. Thank you!
This class was an excellent resource for new moms and dads to be - highly recommended! Be prepared to learn a lot that your baby books don't tell you.
The suggestions for community resources were fantastic. It definitely helps to have a starting point to know what to look for and what questions to ask.
The one-day condensed course was a great preparation for giving birth and breastfeeding for both mom and dad! We left feeling more prepared and knowledgeable and armed with more resources for future readings.
Bringing Baby Home provided us with much needed information and then confidence in becoming parents. We feel less anxious now that we have taken the class. We loved the session on what products to buy! We especially loved all of the community resources that were shared. I am going to recommend this class to anyone who is about to become a parent!
If you have any fears or concerns about labour or the initial time after birth this course if for you! The instructors offer a non-judgmental and safe environment where students learn how to cope with all aspects of the process, including current COVID-19 issues.
She did a great job in making us feel comfortable to ask questions.
My husband and I thoroughly enjoyed our experience with the Ottawa CEA's Pre Natal Course. The instructor was fabulous and covered a lot of vital information in just one weekend. We left the course feeling more confident and better informed about the experience ahead of us. It was a great opportunity to bond with my husband over the birth process and have our questions answered in a comfortable, warm and friendly environment. We highly recommend this course and are looking forward to taking the CEA's "Bringing Baby Home" course.
The OCEA pre-natal classes are extremely valuable for first-time expecting parents. The information is shared in a very open, practical and fact-based manner without any judgement attached. It's easy to get overwhelmed by all the advice and research that is out there, but the OCEA classes really manage to distill this information and present it in a clear and structured way. The instructors are very experienced and knowledgeable and are great inter-personally. We were particularly impressed by how they handled giving online classes during the pandemic. They also provide a lot of Ottawa-specific information on the amazing resources that are available here. This was particularly useful to us as newcomers. We have many friends who have given birth in other countries, and when telling them about our experience with OCEA they have all said that nothing like this was available to them and it would have been so useful. Overall, we would highly recommend taking these classes.
Julia was really informative and full of excitement, so it was indeed a wonderful series of class
The information taught in the "Bringing Baby Home" workshop exceeded my expectations and I would recommend it to all first-time parents. The education really helped ease some of my unnecessary anxieties.
Erin was absolutely phenomenal as a course facilitator and her knowledge of all subjects relating to the course was outstanding! She has a casual approach to many baby topics that would otherwise cause great (unnecessary) stress for parents-to-be. The combined experience of having her own family and working with new parents over the years adds an amazing wisdom that was so refreshing to see. It was too bad the course was online as I'm sure it would've been more engaging in person, overall I give it an A+.
The OCEA prenatal course was amazing. We are first time parents and honestly didn't know what to expect or how to prepare for the arrival of our baby. This course and Brandie were excellent and have really helped us prepare with the most useful in depth information. It was more than we could have hoped for. .