Great nursery. I sent my son there and they were very caring and looked after him well. Communication with parents was excellent.
We couldn’t be happier with the care and dedication shown by Dickory Docks staff. Every member of the team is kind, patient, and genuinely invested in the children’s happiness and development. They create a safe, nurturing, and stimulating environment where children feel confident, valued, and excited to learn. Communication with parents is excellent, and it’s clear how much thought and effort goes into every day. We are incredibly grateful for the love and support they give and would highly recommend this nursery to any family.
Unfortunately, our experience with this nursery was extremely concerning, to the point that we felt we had no choice but to report several issues to Ofsted and other relevant authorities. After raising our concerns, the owners reacted in a way that we found deeply distressing, including making threats to contact social services with allegations of negligence. These allegations were never pursued, which in our view made the threat feel retaliatory rather than genuine. Over several months, our child attended the nursery every Wednesday. We began to notice a clear pattern: almost every Wednesday, while both of us were working in London, we would receive a call informing us that our son was unwell and had to be collected immediately. We fully acknowledge that our son was a challenging child to care for and may not have been completely ready for nursery at that time. However, what raised our concerns was the consistency of the pattern and the fact that the calls always came from the same member of staff. We requested the temperature records. The nursery’s own logs recorded temperatures as high as 40°C on several occasions. Yet when we collected him and checked his temperature at home, it was consistently normal. The explanation offered was that they had given Calpol, but in our experience this did not align with what we observed. It increasingly felt as though one particular carer did not have the patience to manage our son’s needs and was repeatedly sending him home instead. When we raised these concerns with management, the reaction from the two owners was extremely hostile. They insisted that what we described could “never happen” and spoke to us in a way we found very unprofessional. They also threatened to contact social services about us — a threat they never followed through on. During the same discussion, one of the owners told us that her daughter was a lawyer and that they would sue us for defamation if we continued to challenge them. This too never happened. For context, all of this took place more than six years ago, yet the experience has stayed with us because of how intimidating and unnecessary it felt at the time. Due to the seriousness of the situation, we reported the matter to Ofsted. Ofsted later informed us that they had taken official action in response to our concerns, although they could not disclose the details of that action. Overall, our experience left us feeling unsafe, unsupported, and intimidated, and we believe prospective parents should be aware of the issues we encountered before making a decision.
My daughter joined this nursery almost two years back. She really enjoyed the cordial environment she got from the nursery. Initially we were confused to change her nursey as she got settled to her old nursery but we made a right choice to move her to Dickory Docks nursery. My daughter got a friendly environment from all the teachers especially from Deepali. I liked about the nursery that the staff gives attention to the parents need (like my daughter is very picky eater) and listen your expectations upon which later they work on it and gives feedback time on time. Nursery had alots of events which are not just for the kids but they include parents also so that kids have a good time with parents in the nursery. The management team Bob and Narender are also very approachable and friendly.
My son absolutely loves Dickory Docks. Having started in the baby room and now in the preschool, he has thrived with the care and support from all the staff. Any queries have been handled professionally and quickly, there are regular opportunities for parental consultation with appropriate staff, and there are frequent updates and messages on the parent app. We did consider removing him during my maternity leave as drop off and pick up would each be an hour round trip due to the distance from home, but we ultimately decided to reduce his days so he can still attend. He will be joined by his baby sibling in September, and Dickory Docks have been very accommodating and flexible with the days we will need - and the funded sessions are considerate to school hours, which is a massive help for families.
Dickory Docks Educational Day Nursery is located at Kings Academy Prospect, Cockney Hill, Tilehurst, Reading RG30 4EX, UK
You can contact Dickory Docks Educational Day Nursery at +44 118 959 8252
You can find directions to Dickory Docks Educational Day Nursery by following this map link