Fairfield Endowed CofE (C) Junior School Ofsted Report

Full report

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Improve the quality of teaching so that pupils achieve more across all subjects by ensuring that all teachers:
  • accurately identify next steps in pupils’ learning, so that work is more closely matched to pupils’ abilities
  • provide more opportunities for pupils to extend their thinking and deepen their learning in all subjects
  • challenge the most able pupils, including those who are disadvantaged, in their learning so that they achieve the high standards of which they are capable, particularly in mathematics
  • develop their knowledge of phonics so that lower-attaining pupils catch up with their peers in reading.
• Increase the impact of the governing body and leaders on improving the school by:
  • checking and evaluating more effectively the impact on pupils’ progress of strategies to improve the quality of teaching and learning
  • building on the school’s good links with the community to prepare pupils for a better understanding of the diversity of life in modern Britain.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Good

• Since her appointment in January 2016, the current headteacher has used her considerable expertise to skilfully develop staff to become effective leaders. This has created strong capacity in the leadership team and a platform for continued future improvement.
• The headteacher and leadership team have effectively implemented wide-ranging actions to secure considerable improvement in the last year, including in the quality of teaching.
• Leaders have ensured that performance management is rigorous. Identified actions for improvement are followed through and supported by highly effective action planning, coaching and training. School leaders are aware where teaching is strongest and where teachers need additional support, and they are using this information to share good practice to improve the quality of teaching.
• Leaders have been successful in engaging the whole staff in their vision for improving the school. Staff respond positively to support, challenge and training that has been provided or recommended by the diocese and, to a lesser extent, the local authority. Leaders have also carried out training themselves to tackle identified issues. Middle leaders talk enthusiastically about their training for reading, writing and mathematics but they have yet to identify the full impact on pupils’ learning.
• The school provides for pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural education very well. Displays in corridors show pupils’ aspirations and their good work on behalf of charities. Pupils value the celebration of their work and the rewards for improving attendance. They are proud of their school and relish the opportunities to share their achievements with their families during assemblies.
• The local authority and diocese have provided effective support to the school since the last inspection through training for leaders and checking the quality of pupils’ work and their progress. Staff from the diocese, in particular, have provided a good level of rigour to support school leaders in accelerating improvement.
• Use of the funding for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities has been effective in providing specific support and interventions which are focused on individual needs.
• Leaders use the additional funds from the physical education and sport grant to good effect. They have ensured that teachers have worked alongside a sports coach to improve their teaching and coaching skills. Pupils have many opportunities to take part in a range of sports and competitions. The sports coach encourages whole families in the school community to participate in keeping fit and healthy.
• Additional pupil premium funding is used effectively to support disadvantaged pupils. Direct adult support within the classroom and other specific interventions, including pastoral support for pupils and families, are carefully targeted to ensure that disadvantaged pupils make faster progress. An example of leaders’ commitment to raising pupils’ achievement is where they deliver comics to pupils’ homes to encourage them to read with their parents or carers. Leaders have ensured that this group of pupils have every chance to participate and be successful in all aspects of timetabled and extra-curricular activities. The most able disadvantaged pupils, however, are not receiving sufficient challenge in their learning.
• Senior leaders ensure that middle leaders are provided with support and challenge, including from external sources. Leaders, including the headteacher, have a clear understanding of their roles but do not reflect precisely enough on the extent to which their actions are improving teaching and raising pupils’ achievement.

Governance

• Governors are passionate about the school and ambitious for the future of the pupils. They have a clear understanding of the school’s context and have worked with the headteacher to raise the profile of the school within the community.
• The governing body knows its responsibilities in relation to safeguarding and carries them out effectively. Governors support the headteacher in her management of teachers’ performance to hold staff accountable for effective teaching and pupils’ outcomes. They keep a close check on the school’s use of the pupil premium and physical education and sports funding to ensure that it is effective.
• The governors have a good understanding of the priorities for improvement for the school and are increasingly effective in checking the impact of the actions taken by leaders. They regularly check the information they have been given on the school’s performance. However, they do not always use this information to assure themselves that pupils are making enough progress.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective and leaders ensure that statutory requirements are met. There is a strong emphasis on nurturing and the well-being of pupils and their families. This is central to the ethos of the school. Training for staff and governors has raised awareness of the signs and symptoms of the different forms of abuse.
• There is a strong culture of care and protection, and the school works hard to establish relationships with families and the community. Pupils trust adults in the school and concerns are dealt with quickly and effectively.
• Pupils are confident that incidents of bullying are rare and, when they happen, are dealt with quickly by staff. They say that school is a safe place to learn.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Requires improvement

• Teachers do not always match the work or the support they give to pupils’ abilities. Pupils often repeat activities rather than developing their skills and practising them in new contexts. This slows their progress.
• Teaching does not consistently provide sufficient challenge for the most able pupils so that they can securely achieve a deeper understanding, particularly in mathematics. Again, this slows their progress.
• Teachers do not have a secure knowledge of phonics and how it should be taught. This particularly affects least-attaining pupils who are not able to catch up with their peers.
• Leaders have recently introduced a range of strategies to improve teaching and learning. Teachers have taken up many of the ideas to improve their practice but this is not universal, and the impact of these on pupils’ learning is not yet consistently good in all year groups and across subjects.
• Teachers are not robust in their assessment of pupils’ work and their evaluations of their progress. They do not review regularly the progress pupils are making and use this information to guide their subsequent planning of the next steps for pupils’ learning.
• Leaders have rightly identified reading as a priority and the development work that has occurred has resulted in reading becoming a strength for the school. The strong focus on reading for pleasure at home and the school’s investment in quality texts for pupils in school are having a positive impact on writing. Pupils say they love reading.
• Pupils in Year 6 are enthusiastic learners and are making accelerated progress.
• Teachers plan carefully for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities and intervention groups are used to support pupils’ individual needs. Teaching assistants are used well to support pupils’ learning and provide good-quality pastoral support to vulnerable pupils so that they are ready to learn.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Good

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is good. A strong ethos of respect and care is evident in all aspects of school life, fulfilling the school motto: ‘Happy. Proud. Successful.’
• Pupils understand how to keep themselves safe and feel very safe in school. They know whom to speak to in school if they have any worries. They understand the different forms of bullying, including cyber bullying, and how to keep themselves safe. Pupils say that bullying is infrequent, but are clear on what to do if it does occur.
• The school’s commitment to pupils’ welfare is particularly impressive and staff work hard to build trusting and supportive relationships with families. The school’s safeguarding motto of ‘Stronger Families Safer Children’ is reflected in the recent employment of a family liaison officer who is active in supporting families.
• Pupils enjoy taking on responsibilities, such as being members of the school council, and they are encouraged to take an increasingly active role in the local community.
• Leaders place particular importance on encouraging pupils to value their education and achievements. They involve parents in celebrating their children’s work and treat health and well-being for the whole family as a priority for the school. An example of this is the weekly ‘Monday mile’ where parents, pupils and staff all walk a mile together. Parents are also invited to join their children in exercise classes run by the sports coach. One parent commented: ‘I find the school to be motivational and encouraging. The amount of extra-curricular activities are really impressive.’
• Pupils are taught about fundamental British values through the school’s curriculum. Nevertheless, their understanding of the diversity of British society outside their local community is limited. Pupils do not always link elections to the school council, for example, with national democratic processes. Leaders have correctly identified that pupils need more understanding of these processes.
• Pupils work well together, listening respectfully to their teachers and to each other. Pupils take pride in their work. Pupils are not always confident, however, in tackling difficult tasks and formulating ways of working things through for themselves.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils is good. Leaders have worked hard to introduce new expectations for learning behaviour, and the introduction of a new school uniform has given pupils a sense of pride in their school and of belonging to it.
• Pupils conduct themselves well throughout the day and move around the school calmly, even on days when the weather is too wet to go outside. Pupils show courtesy and consideration towards each other and adults, including visitors to the school.
• Teachers and other adults model high expectations for behaviour and encourage pupils to take responsibility for their actions and choices. Pupils are recognised for their efforts through initiatives such as the ‘Roll of Honour’.
• Pupils enjoy coming to school. Leaders have taken a range of actions to improve attendance and these are reducing persistent absence for disadvantaged pupils and pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities. Leaders acknowledge the importance of maintaining stringent actions (like the use of the family support officer), however, to sustain attendance rates close to national averages.
• Pupils’ attitudes to learning are mostly good but, where learning is incorrectly pitched to the abilities or needs of pupils, they take longer to settle to tasks.
• Pupils are eager to learn but are not always confident to talk about their work or attempt challenges that may deepen their understanding.

Outcomes for pupils Requires improvement

• In each of the last three years, the school has not met the government’s floor standards and the school is defined as coasting. The school’s current data reflects improvement but progress is not yet consistently strong across the school, subjects and groups of pupils.
• Pupils join the school with varied skills and abilities, often significantly below those typical for their age. Teachers assess pupils’ knowledge and skills when they join the school and leaders are now using these baseline assessments to track pupils’ progress from their starting points more accurately.
• Disadvantaged pupils are making inconsistent progress from their starting points in a range of subjects, including English and mathematics. These pupils are achieving more than they did in previous years, however.
• Leaders have put strategies in place to help pupils make faster progress, including those who are disadvantaged. Leaders have not, however, evaluated the impact of these strategies on pupils’ attainment and progress.
• Teachers and leaders now check their assessments of pupils’ work with staff from other schools to improve the accuracy of assessment. This helps teachers track pupils’ progress and plan their next steps in learning. Nevertheless, evaluation of pupils’ achievements needs to happen more regularly in order to ensure that pupils make good progress and teaching meets the individual needs of pupils.
• The most able pupils do not make enough progress to reach the high standards they should. They are not challenged sufficiently in lessons, and expectations are not high enough, so they do not have enough opportunities to learn at greater depth, particularly in mathematics.
• Pupils’ achievements in sporting activities are good. The school uses the physical education and sport premium effectively. Teachers make links in writing to encourage the most able disadvantaged pupils to write more, for example when pupils were asked to write fact files about sporting personalities.
• Pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities are making good and often accelerated progress.
• Leaders’ use of pupil premium funding to improve the attainment and progress of disadvantaged pupils is effectively focused on interventions that tackle gaps in learning. The funding is also used well for enrichment to encourage and motivate pupils to learn.
• Pupils are improving their reading. Teachers tackle specific weaknesses with small groups of pupils to help them catch up and make faster progress.

(PE)

School details

Unique reference number 112806 Local authority Derbyshire Inspection number 10023111 This inspection of the school was carried out under section 5 of the Education Act 2005. Type of school Junior School category Voluntary controlled Age range of pupils 7 11 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 190 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Caitlin Bisknell Headteacher Jayne Mercer Telephone number 01298 22551 Website www.fairfield-jun.derbyshire.sch.uk

Email address info@fairfield-jun.derbyshire.sch.uk

Date of previous inspection 17–18 June and 18 July 2014

Information about this school

• The school meets requirements on the publication of specified information on its website.
• The school is smaller than the average-sized junior school.
• The vast majority of pupils are from White British backgrounds.
• The proportion of disadvantaged pupils is more than double the national average.
• The proportion of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is above the national average.
• The headteacher took up her headship in January 2016.
• For the third successive year, the school did not meet the government’s floor standards, which set the minimum expectations for pupils’ attainment and progress by the end of Year 6. As a result, it is defined as a coasting school.

Information about this inspection

• Inspectors observed teaching in all year groups. They observed the teaching of reading skills and listened to pupils reading. Inspectors talked with pupils about their school and looked at examples of pupils’ work.
• Inspectors held meetings with the headteacher, deputy headteacher, subject leaders, the special educational needs coordinator, the family liaison officer, governors, and representatives of the local authority and diocese.
• Inspectors spoke with parents informally at the start of the school day. They took account of the 27 responses to Ofsted’s online questionnaire, Parent View.
• Inspectors looked at a range of documents, including the school’s own self-evaluation of current performance and plans for improvement, reports of reviews carried out by the local authority and diocese, the school’s most recent information on the attainment and progress of pupils, information relating to the safeguarding of pupils and the school’s most recent information relating to the pupils’ attendance.

Inspection team

Stephanie Innes-Taylor, lead inspector Her Majesty’s Inspector Shaheen Hussain Ofsted Inspector