Rushey Mead Primary School Ofsted Report

Full report

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Improve the impact of leadership and management by:
  • developing and implementing plans to improve the reading skills of the most able pupils in key stage 2
  • ensuring that these plans contain milestones and success criteria by which their effectiveness can be measured.
• Improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment by ensuring that teachers:
  • provide more challenging reading activities for the most able pupils in key stage 2
  • encourage pupils who speak English as an additional language to read extensively to broaden their vocabulary.
• Reduce, to national proportions or lower, the proportion of pupils, including children in the early years, who are persistently absent from school.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Good

• Leaders have created a very positive culture where diversity is welcomed. Pupils experience an inclusive school that promotes tolerance and values difference. Many staff, pupils and parents described to inspectors how valued they feel within this positive school community.
• Leaders’ evaluations of the school’s strengths and areas for development are accurate. They ensure high-quality professional development opportunities to support teachers to further enhance the effectiveness of their teaching. Teaching staff value the training and the positive impact it has on accelerating pupils’ progress.
• Leaders collaborate well. Through partnership working, they have increased pupils’ access to, and time spent, reading. Children in the early years and pupils in key stage 1 are provided with books, free of charge, so that they can increase the amount of reading they do at home. Pupils in key stage 2 have a school library full of appropriate books. Pupils are able to speak about stories that they have read at home and speak about their favourite book and author.
• Leaders know pupils and the community well. They make sure that the needs of pupils who speak English as an additional language are best served by employing expert staff with skills in a wide variety of languages. These pupils progress well.
• Leaders have built strong relationships with parents. They make extensive use of the local authority’s adult learning service to support the teaching of English to parents who wish to learn or improve their English language skills.
• Leaders have a good knowledge of the barriers to learning that pupils who have special educational needs (SEN) and/or disabilities have. They quickly identify when pupils’ progress slows and intervene to ensure that actions are taken to help these pupils make faster progress.
• The curriculum is broad and balanced. It is planned to meet pupils’ needs. The curriculum builds on pupils’ strengths, their religious and cultural diversity, and gives them a variety of experiences. Pupils gain many opportunities to extend their learning outside of the school and beyond the city. These experiences make a positive contribution to pupils’ personal development.
• Pupils have an appropriate understanding of fundamental British values. They understand their role in voting for prefects and members of the school council and take these issues seriously. Pupils learn to appreciate each other’s differences. They learn about a wide variety of faiths. They visit a range of religious institutions and celebrate many religious festivals, including Eid, Diwali and Christmas.
• Leaders use the pupil premium effectively. They are aware of the barriers to learning for this group of pupils and have put in place an effective range of support, including the guidance from highly trained teaching assistants. Disadvantaged pupils achieve well and make progress in line with their peers.
• Leaders have made sure that the primary physical education (PE) and sport premium is used wisely to support pupils to engage in a range of activities that promote their health and well-being.
• The school development plan is based on leaders’ accurate assessment of the school’s performance. However, the plan does not identify the desired outcomes or milestones necessary for leaders to assess the impact of their actions.
• Plans to improve the reading skills of the most able pupils are not precise enough. The reading skills of these pupils are not improving quickly enough.

Governance of the school

• The governors of the school offer strong challenge to school leaders to monitor the quality of education and the performance of the school.
• The governor with oversight of safeguarding has been trained as a designated safeguarding lead. She provides robust challenge and good support to leaders in this area.
• Governors are aware of the key priorities for the school. For example, they regularly scrutinise the progress made by leaders in tackling pupils’ persistent absence. They show great commitment to continuing the school’s improvement.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.
• Safeguarding training provided for staff is relevant and up to date. Staff have a secure understanding of their safeguarding responsibilities, including the prevention of radicalisation. They understand local priorities, for example the risk of female genital mutilation and children missing education. Staff know what their statutory duties are and how to carry them out.
• The designated safeguarding lead knows and discharges the duties of the school in relation to pupils with a child protection plan. Relevant training means that staff are confident in reporting any concerns that they may have about a pupil’s welfare.
• The safeguarding culture of the school is particularly evident in its openness and inclusivity. Pupils from many different cultural and religious backgrounds attend the school. The very large majority play and learn well together and say that they are happy and feel safe at the school.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Good

• Teachers’ subject knowledge in writing is strong. They ensure that pupils are challenged to extend the vocabulary that they use. Pupils redraft their work to produce high-quality and precise writing across the subjects studied.
• The majority of pupils read to teachers and other adults in school regularly. They reflect on their reading in their reading journals. Teachers encourage pupils to think deeply about what they read. Many pupils are enthusiastic readers.
• Teachers in key stage 1 are skilled at developing pupils’ phonics skills, particularly those pupils who speak English as an additional language. Pupils make good progress from starting points that are often low. However, these pupils do not read widely enough to ensure that they quickly expand their vocabulary.
• Teachers skilfully adapt their teaching and use of language to ensure that pupils, particularly those in key stage 1 or those who are new to the country, engage with learning. They make sure that pupils quickly progress and develop the necessary knowledge and understanding.
• Teachers have high expectations of pupils’ handwriting, in line with the school’s policy. Pupils present their work well and produce extended writing to a high standard across a range of subjects.
• Teachers’ secure mathematics subject knowledge is enabling them to provide challenging work for the most able pupils. They ask probing questions to challenge pupils’ reasoning and secure a good understanding of mathematics.
• When pupils begin a new area of learning, they take part in an introductory day. For example, pupils have visited London and theatre groups have visited the school. Pupils are quickly engaged and motivated to explore new topics. They are inquisitive and hungry to know and to understand more.
• A small number of parents who responded to Parent View, Ofsted’s online survey, expressed concerns that not enough homework was given to pupils. Inspectors explored the homework provided for a sample of pupils across key stages 1 and 2. Pupils are regularly provided with homework, in line with the school’s policy, for a range of subjects, including reading, writing and mathematics.
• The most able pupils in key stage 2 are not consistently challenged to explore the texts that they read, for example to explain characters’ actions, infer motivation and make predictions. The proportion of pupils whose reading comprehension skills are sufficiently well developed to meet the higher national standard by the end of key stage 2 is low.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Good

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is good.
• Pupils exhibit many positive learning behaviours. They are enthusiastic to do their best and achieve well.
• Pupils consistently treat each other and staff with respect and consideration. They have a good understanding of the school’s rewards and sanctions and believe that they are fair.
• Pupils are kept safe in the school, physically and emotionally. They are confident that they can keep themselves safe online. They are aware of the potential dangers of the internet and know how to respond to them. Leaders have encouraged parents to see the value of learning to swim. No pupils are withdrawn from their swimming lessons.
• Pupils understand that there are different forms of bullying. They know what to do if they feel that they are being bullied. The school has worked hard to create an ethos where bullying is not acceptable. Pupils are confident that bullying is rare and is dealt with successfully when it occurs. This is confirmed by the school’s records.
• Pupils who have emotional difficulties are well supported and nurtured. They are skilfully helped to focus on their learning, work cooperatively with others and succeed.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils is good.
• Pupils’ conduct throughout the day is of a very high standard. Many pupils say that they enjoy breaktimes and lunchtimes because they enjoy playing together. Well-established routines ensure that pupils move about the building safely and with respect for each other.
• Pupils’ learning is rarely disrupted by poor behaviour. Pupils respond well to tasks and activities that are set at the right level of challenge. There is very little low-level disruption in lessons. The proportion of pupils who are excluded from school is extremely low.
• Pupils’ attendance is similar to other pupils nationally, but persistent absence is higher than national average. Leaders monitor attendance closely and have put in place many successful actions, including prosecution. Whole-school persistent absence has reduced but remains high. Of concern to leaders is the high proportion of pupils’ absence due to holidays taken within term time.

Outcomes for pupils Good

• Pupils’ attainment at the end of key stage 1 in 2017 was in line with the national averages for reading, writing and mathematics. A higher proportion of low-ability pupils caught up to the national expectations for their age than was the case nationally in reading, writing and mathematics. Pupils were prepared well for their learning in key stage 2.
• Pupils’ progress at the end of key stage 2 in 2017 was in line with that seen nationally for writing and mathematics.
• The attainment of pupils currently in school who have been in the school throughout key stages 1 and 2 is in line with, or higher than, national expectations for the end of their key stage.
• A high proportion of disadvantaged pupils currently in the school, are making progress in line with that of their peers.
• Most pupils currently in the school who have SEN and/or disabilities make consistently strong progress. Barriers to learning have been identified and overcome through the provision of appropriate resources or professional development for staff.
• Pupils who have weak phonics skills when they join the school make good progress. The large majority of these pupils speak English as an additional language and many are new to the country, with little or no English language skills. Teachers are skilled in helping these pupils to make rapid progress and use phonics to read and write in English.
• Inspectors and school leaders jointly undertook a detailed scrutiny of pupils’ work in reading, writing and mathematics. This showed that the progress of pupils currently in the school is strong in reading, writing and mathematics.
• The attainment and progress of the most able pupils in key stage 2 currently at the school is not as strong in reading as it is in writing and mathematics. This is because leaders’ plans to secure progress in reading do not drive improvements sufficiently rapidly for this group.

Early years provision Good

• Leaders have evaluated the strengths and weaknesses of teaching and learning in the early years accurately. Leaders have identified children’s literacy and high mobility as the most substantial barriers to children’s learning. They monitor teaching and learning every week to ensure that children make appropriate progress in learning English.
• Children’s work is accurately assessed and those who do not make sufficient progress are given additional support. Teachers receive effective professional development to support children to develop their literacy skills. Children with very low starting points are catching up with their peers. Teachers and leaders do not yet sufficiently engage parents in making contributions to their child’s learning journal.
• The setting is safe and secure. The behaviour and learning of all the children are monitored well by staff and appropriate risk assessments have been carried out and acted on. Staff have paediatric first aid training and know the medical needs of all the children well.
• The curriculum is broad and balanced with opportunities to extend children’s experiences beyond their city location. For example, children visited a Victorian country house as part of a pirate-themed learning experience. Teachers make effective use of the outdoor space available at school, providing purposeful activities so that children play and learn well.
• At lunchtime, children use the dining area appropriately. They take turns and are courteous and respectful of each other. Lunchtime is well organised, and children are calm and well behaved.
• Teachers and teaching assistants support children with SEN and/or disabilities well. Accurate initial assessments mean that teaching assistants are focused on individual children’s specific needs and provide strong support. These children make progress in line with their peers.
• Children leave the early years well prepared for Year 1. Phonics is taught effectively. Children develop their ability to recognise and make sounds together. The proportion of children who achieve a good level of development is close to the national average and represents rapid progress from low starting points in English and secure progress in mathematics. Disadvantaged children make progress in line with their peers.
• Persistent absence is higher than the national average. Leaders are not sufficiently successful in promoting the importance of high attendance to parents at this early stage in their relationship with the school. Few parents attend the initial meeting with teachers at the beginning of the year.

School details

Unique reference number Local authority Inspection number 120009 Leicester 10047421 This inspection of the school was carried out under section 5 of the Education Act 2005. Type of school Primary School category Age range of pupils Gender of pupils Community 3 to 11 Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 599 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Headteacher Sue Welford Debra Bailey Telephone number 01162 661 114 Website Email address www.rusheymead-pri.leicester.sch.uk office@rusheymead-pri.leicester.sch.uk Date of previous inspection 22–23 January 2014

Information about this school

• Rushey Mead Primary School is substantially larger than the average-sized primary school. It increased in size by more than 100 pupils in 2015.
• A substantial minority of pupils are new arrivals to the country. Many of these pupils are new to English or are in the early stages of learning English.
• Nearly all pupils speak English as an additional language. A high number of different languages are spoken by pupils and their parents.
• The proportion of disadvantaged pupils is average.
• The proportion of pupils who have SEN and/or disabilities is average.
• The school meets the government’s current floor standards, which set out the minimum expectations for pupils’ attainment and progress in reading, writing and mathematics by the end of Year 6.

Information about this inspection

• Inspectors observed learning in 22 lessons, many of which were visited jointly with a senior leader. During visits to lessons, inspectors sampled pupils’ books and talked with pupils to evaluate the quality of their learning.
• Inspectors observed the behaviour of pupils at breaktime, lunchtime and as pupils moved around the school.
• Inspectors held several meetings with the headteacher, senior and middle leaders, and governors, including the chair and vice-chair of the governing body. The lead inspector met with a representative of the local authority.
• Inspectors spoke with pupils from all year groups in meetings, in lessons and around the school at breaktime and lunchtime.
• The inspection team looked at a wide range of the school’s documentation, including the school’s evaluation of its own performance and its plan for development. They considered information on pupils’ attainment and progress, attendance, bullying, and looked at behaviour records, safeguarding procedures, and minutes of meetings of the governing body.
• Inspectors took account of 14 responses to Parent View, Ofsted’s online survey, and responses from parents to the Ofsted free-text service. The 35 responses to the online questionnaire for staff and the one response to the questionnaire for pupils were also considered.

Inspection team

Clive Worrall, lead inspector Nicola Walsh Gill Weston Ian Hart

Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector