Holgate Primary and Nursery School Ofsted Report

Full report

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Improve the effectiveness of leadership and management, including governance, by ensuring that:
  • senior leaders and governors identify clear, precise and measurable actions in their improvement plan
  • senior leaders tailor teachers’ professional development and training so that they are ambitious and targeted to the needs of individual teachers
  • leaders analyse pupils’ attainment and progress more effectively so that they can quickly identify those pupils who are at risk of falling behind.
• Improve the quality of teaching and pupils’ learning by ensuring that:
  • teachers and teaching assistants provide some pupils with resources which help them to better understand their learning, and provide other pupils with harder work to help them achieve higher standards teachers provide more opportunities for pupils to apply their skills teachers’ skills are developed to ask probing questions which help pupils explore their ideas in greater depth.
• Improve pupils’ personal development and behaviour by ensuring that:
  • teaching increases pupils’ confidence and self-motivation so that they are able to play a greater role in their own learning
  • senior leaders tackle pupils’ low rates of attendance and reduce the number of pupils who are absent or persistently absent from the school.
• Improve the early years provision by ensuring that adults build in more activities which challenge the higher-attaining children.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Requires improvement

• The executive headteacher and head of school have worked with determination and passion to provide a stronger educational provision but this has taken time to achieve. Pupils’ achievement during this period of transition has remained low. The quality of teaching is improving and pupils are now achieving higher standards than they were, but inconsistencies remain in teaching and in pupils’ progress.
• The school’s collaborative improvement plan does not clearly identify the key actions needed to drive forward the next phase of improvement. The success criteria, used to show the impact of leaders’ work, are not suitably measurable. However, senior leaders have established a set of strong learning principles which provide a solid base for further improvement.
• Improvements in the quality of teaching are not yet widespread enough to remove the inconsistencies in achievement that remain. Senior leaders have not been afraid to tackle difficult issues to improve the quality of teaching, but this has not yet led to consistently good practice. The management of teachers’ performance is linked to pupils’ progress. However, sometimes the professional development teachers receive is not as targeted as it needs to be to help individual teachers now in the school reach a higher quality in their teaching.
• The school’s assessment system is not providing leaders, teachers or governors with the detailed information they need to make their work more effective. Leaders’ actions to improve pupils’ progress and attainment in reading, writing and mathematics are, in some cases, effective. However, leaders’ tracking of pupils from their different starting points and their understanding of how well pupils are doing in a range of different subjects are not sufficiently well developed.
• Leaders’ use of the school’s pupil premium funding has not been fully effective. It has been used to help disadvantaged pupils get the most out of their education and to increase the pace of learning to varying degrees of success. Disadvantaged pupils are now making faster progress than before, but it is not yet consistently good.
• Leaders provide a curriculum to ensure that pupils engage in a wide range of subjects, with the main emphasis on reading, writing and mathematics. It has a positive impact on pupils’ behaviour but, as yet, it is not stimulating pupils in their learning well enough for them to become more confident and self-assured learners.
• Leaders, at all levels, play a valuable role in improving their respective areas of responsibility and the school as a whole. They have a good understanding of their roles and are held to account for raising pupils’ attainment. Leaders are actively involved in checking the work of their teams, providing support and challenge when standards fall below those expected. Some leaders, however, have been appointed only recently and their impact has yet to be assessed.
• The recently appointed leader for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is being successfully mentored by an experienced member of staff. This is helping to maintain an element of stability for these pupils. Funding is used to provide additional support to help the pupils make faster progress, with varying degrees of success.
• Senior leaders’ work to provide parents and carers with information about their children’s learning is improving. They provide a range of opportunities for parents to learn about the curriculum and engage in school life. A few parents, however, through their responses to Ofsted’s online survey (Parent View), expressed the view that communication from the school is not as effective as it could be.
• The curriculum promotes pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development effectively and ensures that they develop a good understanding of fundamental British values. A pertinent programme of personal, social and health education strengthens this element of the pupils’ learning. Pupils also benefit from a range of extra-curricular opportunities.
• The local authority provides the school with strong support. Leaders also benefit from their collaboration with other primary schools and from being a member of a teaching alliance partnership. Leaders support newly qualified teachers effectively. New teachers are appreciative of the support they receive.
• Leaders make effective use of the school’s physical education and sport premium funding. It is used to increase staff confidence and physical education skills and provide additional sporting activities for the pupils to take part in.

Governance of the school

• The governing body has taken some time to secure improvements. Governors are increasing their knowledge and understanding through relevant training. However, the amount of training undertaken is not yet providing governors with all the knowledge and skills they need to fulfil their roles to a high standard. The governing body is now a group of individuals who have an increasingly accurate view of the school’s strengths and weaknesses.
• An increasing knowledge of how pupils’ progress is measured is used effectively to ask leaders more challenging questions about the impact of their work. Governors now evaluate how well pupils who receive additional funding are catching up to their peers. The more recently established achievement and challenge meetings allow governors to evaluate the impact of leaders’ actions more effectively than in the past.
• Governors gather information first hand through visits to the school. However, the frequency of their visits has not kept up with schedules set. Although governors are involved in the management of teachers’ performance and pay awards, they do not yet evaluate the ongoing quality of teaching well enough.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective. The leadership team has ensured that all safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose. Appropriate vetting checks are undertaken when staff and volunteers join the school to ensure that they are suitable to work with children. All statutory requirements are met and all policies are up to date.
• Groups of pupils who spoke with inspectors said that they feel safe in the school. The curriculum contributes effectively to raising pupils’ awareness of safe practices, such as e-safety, ‘stranger danger’ and road safety. A large majority of parents who responded to Ofsted’s online survey, and those who were spoken with during the inspection, agreed that their children are safe and well cared for.
• The designated teacher for child protection and safeguarding ensures that procedures are implemented robustly and that records are meticulously maintained. Staff are trained effectively and understand the correct procedures to follow, including those associated with radicalisation and extremism. Partnership working with external agencies is effective in making sure that all pupils are safe and, when necessary, are supported.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Requires improvement

• The quality of teaching is improving but it is not yet consistently good across the school.
• Teachers’ expectations, although rising, are not yet high enough for pupils to take responsibility for their own learning and accelerate the rate at which they make progress. Despite this, pupils’ attitudes towards their learning are mostly positive. They are compliant during their lessons but they do not display much enthusiasm or passion for learning. Teaching does not stimulate pupils’ curiosity or encourage them to become keen learners and want to know more.
• Teachers do not use their secure subject knowledge well enough to capture pupils’ imaginations and create a purpose to their learning. They model their knowledge successfully to provide pupils with a sound understanding of concepts and skills, but pupils are not provided with sufficient opportunities to apply the skills they are taught. At times, teachers move to a different area of focus before pupils have had time to practise their skills. This was seen to be particularly true in mathematics.
• Teachers use the curriculum structure to plan lessons which provide pupils with a variety of learning activities. These activities are not routinely adapted to help pupils understand what they are doing. Nor do they challenge higher-attaining pupils to move on more quickly in their learning. For example, in Year 3 guided reading, resources were not used well enough for pupils of different abilities to access the learning from their different starting points. Sometimes, the planning uses accurate assessments of what pupils can already do and ensures that pupils are able to move through their learning at a suitable rate. For example, in Year 1 mathematics, lower-attaining pupils were supported well in their understanding of arrays through the use of well-timed physical resources.
• Teachers’ questioning does not routinely help pupils develop their learning or deepen their thinking, especially higher-attaining pupils. It also does not always tackle pupils’ misconceptions. Some teachers were, however, using skilled questioning to check pupils’ understanding and deepen their learning.
• The higher-attaining pupils are not routinely provided with work that challenges them. Often, they are asked to complete more of the same type of work. Sometimes, pupils are made to think harder; for example, Year 3 pupils were set activities in mathematics which required them to solve more complicated problems.
• The teaching of spelling, punctuation and grammar is not consistent throughout the school. Teachers are now giving greater attention to the development of pupils’ spelling, punctuation and grammar skills. This was seen to be effective in a Year 1 class, where particular attention was given to punctuation as pupils were learning about rhyming words. Handwriting skills are also better developed and teachers provide pupils with valuable feedback on how they can improve their handwriting technique. This is not, however, consistent across all year groups.
• Teaching assistants do not provide a high level of support when working with pupils in teacher-led learning. They provide more valuable support for small-group and individual learning. Disadvantaged pupils and pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities benefit from this approach.
• Phonics teaching has improved. Teachers make effective use of the phonics programme to develop pupils’ reading skills. Pupils who read to the inspectors did so with confidence and made strong use of their phonics knowledge. Inspectors observed good teaching of phonics.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Requires improvement

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare requires improvement.
• The school’s behaviour records show that incidents of bullying sometimes occur. A small number of parents and pupils who spoke with the inspectors agreed that bullying sometimes happened. Senior leaders follow up bullying incidents and school records show that appropriate action is being taken to tackle any issues.
• Pupils are polite and respectful to each other and to adults. They have a good understanding of how to keep themselves safe. Pupils also know how to keep healthy and that exercise is important. They make good use of the school’s physical education programme and the selection of sporting activities available to them. The majority of parents agreed that their children are safe. Disadvantaged pupils are fully integrated into the school.
• Spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is helping pupils to become more reflective and responsible citizens. Pupils learn about democracy and different religious festivals. They discuss poetry and sign pledges, for example to ‘stop abuse’.
• Pupils benefit from a variety of extra-curricular activities and are able to hold positions of responsibility. A theme for the week, such as ‘special people and special moments’, stimulates pupils’ thinking and creates avenues for pupils to discuss their views. Sometimes, however, opportunities to discuss wider curriculum issues are not taken.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils requires improvement. Pupils’ conduct in lessons is typically positive but they do not always engage in their learning. At times, they are slow to start tasks and sometimes low-level disruption occurs. Staff use the school’s behaviour policy to reinforce the school rules and pupils know what is expected of them.
• The school’s behaviour records indicate that the number of behavioural incidents is falling. Senior leaders are working to reduce the number of fixed-term exclusions from the school. They have excluded a very small number of pupils who have more challenging behaviour, however, and instances of exclusion remain above national figures. A small number of parents believe that behaviour is not good enough.
• Pupils’ rates of attendance are below the national averages. The number of pupils who are persistently absent is high. Leaders’ actions to tackle the number of pupils who do not attend school are not yet showing sufficient success. This is particularly the case for pupils who are disadvantaged and for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities.

Outcomes for pupils Requires improvement

• Pupils have not made the progress they should have done since the school opened in September 2014. They have not been well prepared for the transition to secondary school, but this is improving. The school’s assessment system indicates that pupils are currently making more rapid progress. In some subjects, pupils make good progress. The progress being made by different groups of pupils varies too much, however. The quality of work in pupils’ exercise books confirms this faster progress, but it is not yet consistent in all subjects.
• In 2016, attainment in key stage 1 was below the national averages in reading, writing and mathematics. Current indications are that more pupils are now working towards age-related expectations in Years 1 and 2. This is especially true in reading, where standards are predicted to reach those similar to the 2016 national averages.
• A higher quality of phonics teaching has led to a greater number of pupils increasing their phonics skills and understanding. Leaders expect the results of phonics screening checks to improve this year, but they are not expected to reach previous national averages.
• In 2016, pupils in Year 6 made slower progress in key stage 2 than the national averages in reading, writing and mathematics. The school’s assessment information suggests that pupils are now making faster progress than they have in previous years. Some pupils are making good progress but others are not making the progress they should. Progress in mathematics also remains behind that in reading and writing.
• Attainment at the end of key stage 2 in 2016 was also below the national averages in reading, writing and mathematics. Indications from the school’s assessment system are that pupils are likely to achieve similar standards to last year’s national averages in all areas this year. This pattern of improvement can be seen in many of the other year groups in the school, although standards are not as strong in writing and mathematics as in reading.
• As a large proportion of the school’s intake, disadvantaged pupils are integral to the work of the school. They make the same steps forward in their progress and attainment as other pupils in the school. Equally, however, assessment information shows variability in the number of disadvantaged pupils making good progress. Pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities are also making varied rates of progress. The small number of higher-attaining pupils are not making the progress they should or reaching the higher standards of which they are capable.

Early years provision Good

• A high proportion of children join the school with skills that are well below those typical for their age. They make good progress in their learning and development during their time in the early years. Children who join the school in the Nursery make particularly rapid progress. They are well prepared for their entry into Year 1.
• The early years provision is enthusiastically and competently led. The early years leader has an accurate view of the strengths and weaknesses of the provision and uses this to target improvement. Staff work well as a team and receive appropriate training. They are ambitious for the children and determined in their approach.
• The learning environment is bright, stimulating and well designed. It supports a high-quality curriculum which meets the needs of the children, both indoors and outdoors. Children’s learning journals show a broad range of experiences across all areas of learning. The curriculum is planned to promote enjoyment and participation in learning. This enjoyment can be seen in the ‘awe and wonder’ projects the children have been involved in.
• Adults make accurate use of assessments to identify gaps in children’s skills and development. They plan activities which encourage choice, engage children and help them to sustain their play.
• Teaching is good in the early years. Adults interact positively with the children and use questioning to deepen children’s understanding. This was seen to work well during a seed planting activity in the Nursery class. Structured learning, led by adults, is well targeted. Phonics teaching, in particular, is very effective. Inspectors observed a high-quality phonics session where good modelling by adults was helping children learn how to blend their sounds successfully. This was also effectively linked to their writing development.
• The children have positive attitudes to learning and are keen to take advantage of the variety of activities on offer. They cooperate in their work and play well together. For example, children happily shared resources as they played with modelling clay.
• Although the vast majority of children make good progress, they are not yet reaching age-related expectations in each of the learning goals. Disadvantaged children and children who have special educational needs and/or disabilities are catching up with their peers but not at the same rate in all learning areas. Children who are higher attainers are not being challenged routinely to extend their development further.
• Leaders work hard to engage parents in their children’s learning in the early years. They also make effective use of other agencies and partnerships to provide the children with any additional or individualised support they may need.
• Adults take care to ensure that children are kept safe. Statutory requirements in the early years are met and safeguarding is effective.

School details

Unique reference number Local authority 140616 Nottinghamshire Inspection number 10031119 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 455 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Headteacher Colin Lumbis Nicola Davies (executive headteacher) Emma Severn (head of school) Telephone number 0115 956 8281 Website Email address http://holgateprimary.org office@holgateprimary.org Date of previous inspection Not previously inspected

Information about this school

• In September 2014, Annie Holgate Infant School and Annie Holgate Junior School amalgamated to form a new school, called Holgate Primary School. At this time, the school also entered a formal collaboration with Sutton Road Primary School. Jeffries Primary School also joined the collaboration in September 2016.
• There has been a high turnover of staff since the amalgamation. The school has a new executive headteacher and head of school, as well as other senior leaders and a range of other staff. Pupils and staff moved into a new purpose-built school in January 2016.
• Holgate Primary is larger than the average-size primary school. The school has a higher proportion of boys than most schools. The vast majority of pupils are from White British backgrounds.
• The proportion of disadvantaged pupils is well above average.
• The proportion of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is well above average. The proportion of pupils who have a statement of special educational needs or an education, health and care plan is well below average.
• In 2016, the school did not meet the government’s floor standards, which are the minimum expectations for pupils’ attainment and progress in reading, writing and mathematics by the end of Year 6.
• The school meets requirements on the publication of specified information on its website.
• Holgate Primary School is part of the Minster Teaching School Alliance.

Information about this inspection

• Inspectors observed pupils’ learning in 17 lessons. Some of this learning was observed jointly with a senior leader.
• Discussions took place with school staff, members of the governing body and a representative of the local authority.
• The inspectors met with two groups of pupils and talked with pupils informally. Inspectors observed playtime and lunchtime and listened to pupils in Years 1 and 3 reading.
• The 38 responses to a survey completed by staff and the 24 responses submitted by parents to Ofsted’s online survey (Parent View), including 18 free-text responses, were taken into account. Inspectors also spoke informally with parents at the beginning of the school day.
• Inspectors observed the work of the school and looked at a broad range of evidence, including: the school’s analysis of its strengths and weaknesses; planning and monitoring documentation; the work in pupils’ books; records relating to attendance and behaviour; and the school’s own information on pupils’ current attainment and progress in reading, writing and mathematics.
• The school’s child protection and safeguarding procedures were scrutinised. A review of the school’s website was made to check whether it met the requirements on the publication of the required information.

Inspection team

Vondra Mays, lead inspector Anne White Andrew Lakatos

Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector