New City Nursery, Hackney

Large Victorian windows, gardens beside the ground-floor rooms and a sensory room give New City Nursery, Hackney a recognisable setting within New City College’s Hackney Campus. This is a converted school building in Hoxton, with space for indoor play and outdoor exploration. Its appeal is concrete: babies have their own routines respected, older children tackle practical activities, and parents have a continuing part in planning their child’s learning.

Children can attend from 3 months to 5 years, and the nursery has 131 places in total. At its March 2024 inspection, Ofsted rated it Good, judged safeguarding effective and found that children with SEND and those learning English as an additional language received strong support. Two improvement points deserve attention: children needed longer to answer questions, and the pre-toddler lunchtime routine needed better organisation.

Full days and morning or afternoon half days run during term time. The college calendar matters as much as the daily timetable.

Rooms and Ages

The youngest rooms have clear daily caps. Blossom Babies accommodates up to 12 babies aged 3 to 16 months, follows their individual routines and uses the key-person relationship to connect care at home with care in the nursery. Twinkle Stars takes 12 children aged 16 to 24 months, with sensory materials and outdoor exploration supporting their growing physical skills and curiosity.

Busy Bees accommodates 16 children aged 2 to 3 years, with songs in children’s home languages and opportunities to investigate nature outdoors. Panda Room takes 20 children aged 3 to 5 years, combining early number work, pre-writing activities and simple baking with play. These are room limits, rather than a description of how many children attend together on any particular day.

The building extends across two floors, and the ground-floor rooms have neighbouring gardens. Large windows bring natural light into the classrooms, while the sensory room adds another indoor space. For families comparing environments, the useful distinction is the combination of age-group rooms and outdoor areas close to the ground-floor play spaces.

Learning and Activities

The Early Years Foundation Stage provides the framework for learning and development: children build communication, physical and social skills through play, alongside early literacy, mathematics, creativity and exploration. Here, teaching is planned around a child’s interests and starting point, with both spontaneous play and activities organised by adults. That gives children choices while keeping their learning purposeful.

Water play involves handling and moving materials; creative activities include paint, playdough and textured substances. Reading has its own area. These experiences give children different ways to practise coordination, express ideas and develop language, rather than putting all learning into a single group activity.

The typical routine combines songs and rhymes at circle time with child-chosen play and small-group activities led by a key person. In March 2024, babies joined songs through movement and clapping, while older children encountered new words during their investigations. Storytelling also extended into play: children used nets and wooden insects to retell Ten Little Ladybirds. A book became something they could act out.

The language improvement point was specific. In March 2024, adults sometimes supplied an answer before a child had enough thinking time. Families should weigh the songs, books and conversation alongside that concern about how questioning was handled.

Outdoor and Community Life

Wooden Adventure Playground provides climbing opportunities, while Tricycles and Scooters add movement and balance practice. Mud Kitchen and Sandpits give children materials to dig, handle and experiment with. Outdoor provision therefore includes physical challenges and exploratory play, rather than relying on one type of equipment.

Friday term-time Stay and Play brings parents, carers and children together for shared play. Its weekly workshops can include storytelling, cookery, and arts and crafts, with a contribution requested towards drinks and resources. The point is participation: adults can try activities beside their child and talk with staff, rather than simply watch a demonstration.

Relationships and Communication

Every child has a key person who observes their play, assesses development and uses those observations to plan activities. Parents can contribute comments to assessments and describe new interests at home. This creates a practical link between what a child is doing in the nursery and what matters to them beyond it.

Settling sessions are shaped around the child. Parents complete an All About Me form and discuss routines, abilities, interests and concerns with the key person. Rather than treating settling as a fixed exercise, the arrangements allow parent and practitioner to agree times that help the child become familiar with nursery life at their own pace.

Learning journals are accessible to parents, who can add their own observations and comments. Regular progress meetings provide another opportunity to discuss development. When a child moves rooms, the existing and incoming key people exchange relevant information, and settling sessions introduce the next room. The relationship is handed over deliberately.

Inclusion and Wellbeing

The SENCO works with the key person on individual plans, adapting activities and resources to the child’s abilities and interests. With parental consent, this can involve Speech and Language Therapists, Health Visitors and Early Years Inclusion Officers. Plans are reviewed with parents, so support has identifiable people, actions and review points.

In March 2024, staff used Makaton, a communication resource, alongside visual prompts and boards showing what would happen next. They also learnt useful words from children’s home languages. Those examples show how adults helped children understand the day and communicate across different starting points.

Safeguarding arrangements include staff training in procedures and how to respond to a concern about a child’s welfare. The daily routine also includes regular nappy checks and an early-afternoon sleep period for children attending all day; children attending sessions can instead join small-group play or use the garden.

The pre-toddler lunch concern needs its own weight. In March 2024, some children spent too long waiting at tables before lunch, and the unsettled atmosphere interrupted their learning. That is a question about the organisation of care, not simply the food served.

For the move to school, a teacher is invited to meet the key person and relevant transition documents are passed on. This supports continuity by giving the next setting information about the individual child.

Sessions and Attendance

The address is New City College, Falkirk Street, London, N1 6HQ. Opening hours are 8am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, over 38 term-time weeks each year; college holidays are closures. Families needing care through holiday periods should treat that calendar as a central part of the decision.

A full day runs from 8am to 6pm. Half days run either from 8am to 1pm or from 1pm to 6pm, giving families a choice between a complete day and a shorter morning or afternoon booking. The afternoon half day fits the part of the routine that includes indoor and outdoor play, tea and a story.

Enrolment enquiries go to nursery@ncclondon.ac.uk or 0207 613 9181. Fees are paid in advance, either monthly or weekly. Current prices come in the nursery’s written quotation.

Funding and Paid Extras

Both privately paid childcare and funded childcare are offered. The entitlements are 30 hours a week for children aged 9 months to 4 years and 15 hours a week for children aged 3 to 4 years, subject to eligibility, within the term-time operating calendar. Funded hours are deducted from fees; the fees page explains the payment structure.

New City College staff qualify for a childcare discount, while eligible adult learners at the college can access free childcare during their studies. These are arrangements tied to college employment or study, rather than benefits for every family.

Fees include meals, drinks and snacks, with college chefs preparing food onsite and a two-week menu providing a daily vegetarian alternative. The nursery’s food policy includes catering for allergies and dietary requirements and identifying allergens on menus; parents can also see the daily menu on an information board.

For Blossom Babies, parents supply nappies, wipes, cream and comforters. Those items belong in the family’s nursery bag and budget alongside the childcare quotation.

• The college calendar. Attendance runs for 38 term-time weeks, with closure during college holidays. Match those dates against work or study commitments before choosing full days or half days.
• Pre-toddler lunch and conversation. March 2024 brought improvement points about waiting before lunch and giving children time to answer. On a tour, ask how those routines now work, especially for a child moving into Twinkle Stars.
• The funded-hours quotation. Funded childcare is offered and Blossom Babies parents supply changing essentials. Ask for a written breakdown of how meals and consumables are treated during funded hours, alongside any additional private hours.
• Friday Stay and Play. The session finishes at 11am in one timetable and 11.30am in another, a timing conflict worth resolving before attending. Families managing allergies should also confirm current food arrangements when planning participation.

New City Nursery, Hackney suits families seeking term-time full days or morning and afternoon half days, especially those whose work or study follows the college calendar. Its strongest practical assets are the capped baby rooms, gardens beside ground-floor rooms, substantial outdoor equipment and a key-person system that gives parents a continuing role.

The March 2024 Good judgement sits alongside two precise concerns about adult questioning and pre-toddler lunchtime organisation. Those deserve direct discussion. For a family comfortable with the holiday closures, the combination of age-group rooms, play-based learning and documented support arrangements gives this nursery a clear identity.