Priestsic Primary and Nursery School Ofsted Report

Full report

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Improve the quality of teaching to improve pupils’ progress and raise their attainment by ensuring that all teachers:
  • have high expectations of what pupils, including the most able and those who are disadvantaged, can achieve
  • regularly check how well pupils are learning and use this information to reshape tasks
  • have high expectations of the presentation of pupils’ work
  • provide opportunities for pupils to apply their numeracy skills in problem-solving activities and develop their reasoning skills.
• Improve pupils’ personal development, behaviour and welfare by:
  • ensuring that all teachers have equally high expectations of pupils’ behaviour and attitudes to learning
  • ensuring that all pupils are taught how to take greater responsibility for their own learning and are less reliant on adults to make faster progress.
• Improve the effectiveness of leadership and management by ensuring that:
  • leaders develop a strategic approach to improving the quality of teaching, learning and assessment and pupils’ outcomes leaders’ plans for improvement focus sharply on improving pupils’ progress and include measurable targets to enable leaders and governors to better hold staff to account for their performance
  • governors more effectively hold leaders to account for their performance
  • the pupil premium is targeted more effectively to enable disadvantaged pupils to achieve at least as well as all pupils nationally and to improve their attendance
  • middle leaders are clear about their roles and responsibilities and take effective action to bring about improvements in their areas of responsibility. An external review of governance should be undertaken in order to assess how this aspect of leadership and management may be improved. An external review of the use of pupil premium funding should be undertaken in order to assess how this aspect of leadership and management may be improved.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management

Requires improvement

• Attainment and progress are inconsistent. In key stage 2, too many pupils, including those who are disadvantaged and the most able pupils, do not achieve the standards expected for their age. Pupils’ progress in reading, writing and mathematics is too low.
• Governors have not been as effective as they could be in holding leaders sufficiently to account for school improvement. They have not challenged leaders sufficiently well about pupils’ attainment and progress.
• Leaders’ use of the pupil premium has little impact on raising the achievement of disadvantaged pupils. Spending on additional support and other activities has not led to sufficient improvements in disadvantaged pupils’ attainment and progress.
• Leaders have not ensured that the most able pupils in all key stages are sufficiently challenged and supported to achieve their best. Improvement planning has identified these weaknesses. However, plans are not as sharply focused on pupils’ progress as they need to be. As a result, the use of assessment information has been too slow in identifying where the most urgent concerns lie.
• Leaders’ monitoring and evaluation of teaching and learning have not resulted in the ironing out of several inconsistencies across the school. Procedures to manage the performance of teachers are not sufficiently robust and leaders have no overall strategy with clear enough timescales and measurable targets to enable senior leaders and governors to gauge the rate of improvements made.
• Newly appointed middle leaders are growing in their effectiveness but have some way to go. Subject leaders have not been checking pupils’ progress regularly enough to fully demonstrate the impact of their work. The support these leaders have received from senior leaders, including in the early years, and joint moderation exercises with other schools have been helpful in ensuring that monitoring and evaluation are accurate and in place.
• The curriculum is broad and balanced and contributes well to the pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. For example, pupils spoke with knowledge and warmth about Remembrance Day, commenting that they were ‘learning respect for those who died for us’. The curriculum is complemented by a range of enrichment activities, including residential experiences for older pupils and engaging visitors, such as the owl owner and puppet theatre for younger pupils. However, the curriculum is not well enough matched to pupils’ different needs and interests to engage them fully in their learning.
• The physical education (PE) and sport premium is used effectively to pay for a sports coach to teach PE lessons alongside staff and provide additional sporting activities at other times of the day that motivate pupils to become physically active.
• Responses to Ofsted during the inspection confirm that most parents and carers are supportive of the school and its leaders.

Governance of the school

• Although governors are supportive of the school and are committed to its improvement, they do not have high enough expectations for the pace of school improvement and are not sufficiently able to hold leaders to account for the progress and attainment of pupils.
• Leaders have worked with governors to ensure that they have a clear view of the strengths and weaknesses within the school. They have the capacity to better use the current information that leaders provide. However, governors’ regular visits to the school are not sufficiently focused on the areas that need to improve quickly. Records suggest that governors have not asked enough searching questions to provide sufficient challenge about school performance.
• Governors have not ensured that additional funding for the most vulnerable pupils is effectively used to ensure that these pupils make good progress, both academically and socially.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.
• There is a strong culture of safeguarding. Leaders act upon any concerns about pupils’ welfare rapidly.
• All staff receive annual training in safeguarding, including training on the ‘Prevent’ duty.
• All the necessary checks are made when recruiting new staff to work with children.
• The site is safe and access to school buildings is controlled effectively.
• The single central record is suitably maintained and checked periodically.
• Policy and procedures to protect pupils from harm are well established. All concerns are followed up appropriately with outside agencies and recorded systematically.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Requires improvement

• Teaching is not consistently good and varies widely. It is generally more effective in upper key stages 1 and 2. Not all teachers have high enough expectations of pupils, including the way pupils present their work. Some of the most able pupils commented that they would ‘like their work to be harder’. As a result, some pupils do not make the progress of which they are capable.
• Where teaching is stronger, teachers use a variety of strategies to make sure that pupils understand their learning. Where pupils are struggling or need to move on, these teachers are confident to adapt their teaching to meet the different needs of individuals. Too often, however, pupils are left to steadily work at their own pace, without clear timescales or expectations as to how much work they are expected to complete and by when. Not all teachers make regular checks as pupils work on tasks, to see if what pupils are doing is correct or if they are working hard enough.
• In mathematics, pupils learn well when teachers model different methods of calculation and provide work matched to pupils’ abilities. However, there were too few opportunities for pupils to apply their numeracy skills in problem-solving activities or to develop their reasoning skills.
• The teaching of phonics is effective. Pupils in the very youngest classes apply their phonics knowledge well in their early reading and writing, making sensible guesses at unfamiliar words.
• ‘Learning challenge books’ show that pupils have regular opportunities to study different subjects and write in different styles. However, pupils do not have enough opportunities to apply their writing and reading skills or write at length.
• The pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) receive effective support, especially those with complex and emotional needs. Teaching assistants working with these pupils have a good understanding of how to support them. The impact has been that these pupils have developed positive attitudes to learning.
• Most teachers manage pupils’ behaviour well. Good relationships and lots of praise are evident in these classes. Weaker teaching results in low-level disruptive behaviour. Some pupils do not concentrate, their attention wanders and progress is slow.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Requires improvement

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare requires improvement.
• This is an inclusive school that welcomes pupils from a range of backgrounds and with a range of different needs. This includes pupils with complex and high levels of special educational need. All staff go out of their way to provide a safe, stimulating and vibrant environment in which to learn. As a result, pupils settle quickly to their learning and enjoy coming to school.
• Pupils enjoy coming to Priestsic, saying it is a ‘good school’. Pupils know how to treat each other and treat one another courteously. Positive relationships are evident throughout the school, supported by a clear set of values which are prominently displayed around the school and of which the pupils are proud.
• Pupils understand how to keep themselves safe, including when online. This is because leaders ensure that pupils are taught how to be safe. Pupils feel valued and listened to, sharing their views at the school council for example. Pupils, however, lack sufficient independence and resilience to learn effectively on their own. Often, pupils will wait for instructions or help before they can complete work, slowing their progress.
• British values and what it is like to be part of modern Britain are taught well. The values of equality and respect feature in cross-curricular work and displays. These and other curricular and enrichment activities add significantly to pupils’ good spiritual, moral, social and cultural development.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils requires improvement.
• Not all pupils display positive attitudes in lessons. Most pupils remain on task, but when teaching fails to retain their interest, a few pupils easily lose interest and can disrupt the learning of other pupils. Progress slows as they disengage with learning.
• Pupils are taught how to stay safe, including online safety. They said that some bullying does occur, mostly boisterous playtime behaviour, name-calling and pushing. However, these incidents are uncommon. When they do occur, pupils feel that adults will help them to stop it.
• Throughout the inspection, pupils were well behaved, pleasant and well-mannered around the school. Pupils know each other well and look after each other. At playtimes, a lack of organised activity led to boisterous play and the occasional collision among older boys.
• Overall attendance is just below average but persistent absence is above average and has been rising in recent years. Strategies to reduce these absences have not proved to be effective enough.

Outcomes for pupils Requires improvement

• Leaders have not ensured that all pupils achieve well enough. Overall outcomes at the end of key stages 1 and 2 have been highly variable. Outcomes for disadvantaged and most-able pupils in particular have not improved significantly.
• Progress from key stage 1 to key stage 2 has been variable over time. Too few pupils exceeded expected rates of progress in 2017 and 2018. Progress of pupils currently in the school is inconsistent within year groups and between subjects. However, it is clear in their books this term that an increased proportion of pupils, especially in upper key stages 1 and 2, are exceeding expected progress.
• Scrutiny of pupils’ work in their English, mathematics and ‘learning challenge’ books shows that expectations of the progress that pupils can make are not consistently high enough. In mathematics, for example, although slowly improving, progress has been slow because there has not been enough emphasis on the development of reasoning, fluency and problem solving.
• Provisional information shows that the proportion of most-able pupils attaining at a greater depth in reading, writing and mathematics by the end of Year 6 improved slightly in 2018 but remained below average. Expectations of these pupils is not high enough. Not all staff provide sufficiently challenging work for them to do. Aspirational targets are not set for increasing the attainment of the most able.
• Over the past two years, disadvantaged pupils have not made enough progress in reading, writing and mathematics. Very few of the most able disadvantaged pupils have exceeded the expected standards. Not enough has been done with the additional funding that the school receives to improve the outcomes of these pupils.
• Attainment in phonics has improved in the past three years and is now above the national average. The pupils in the school acquire and use good phonics skills, which enable most pupils to develop fluency in reading and writing.

Early years provision Requires improvement

• The school operates its own Nursery on site, making the transition into Reception for the majority of children a smooth one. Children are welcomed by an established team of support staff and teachers.
• Children are kept safe. Staff know them well. The children’s behaviour is good. The classroom and outdoor area are bright, stimulating and safe environments for children to learn and play together.
• The proportion of children achieving a good level of development at the end of the Reception Year increased to above the national average in 2018. These children were well prepared for their move to into Year 1.
• Children show enthusiasm and interest in the various activities that adults provide. For example, children spent time performing on the stage, developing their confidence, concentration and ability to work together with other children. However, a number of children still roam from one activity to another in the Reception class and, on occasion, adults do not intervene quickly enough to ensure that learning is completed and fully consolidated.
• Adults use their skills well to ask children appropriate questions about what they are learning or doing. Boys are drawn to construction and performance activities, while girls work independently. Although the activities are appropriate, insufficient and ineffective interventions by staff fail to ensure that they are making good progress.
• All staff establish positive, warm relationships with children, which parents say they welcome. As a result, children are confident to approach visitors and tell them about their classroom and their achievements.
• Currently, not all children make good progress, especially disadvantaged and the most able children. Too often, unchallenging worksheets fail to challenge pupils to improve their writing, for example, or explore a subject independently. Their writing books show some evidence of good progress, including early development of sentences and cursive letter formation, and some most-able children know how to use capital letters, but this is inconsistent.
• Good links with parents and carers ensure that they are well informed about their child’s development and well-being. There is, however, little regular and ongoing information from parents that is used effectively to inform teachers’ planning for children’s individual needs.

School details

Unique reference number 122468 Local authority Nottinghamshire County Council Inspection number 10047643 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 483 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Sarah Poxon Headteacher(s) Tracey Riley and Sarah Stamp Telephone number 01623 465705 Website Email address www.priestsicprimaryschool.co.uk/ admin@priestsic.notts.sch.uk Date of previous inspection 5–6 November 2014

Information about this school

• Priestsic is larger than the average-sized primary school which includes a nursery.
• The large majority of pupils are White British. Very few are from minority ethnic backgrounds. Very few speak English as an additional language.
• The proportion of pupils eligible for the pupil premium is above the national average. The proportion of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is below the national average, as is the proportion of pupils who have an education, health and care plan.

Information about this inspection

• Inspectors observed all the teachers at work in lessons; some of these observations were carried out with school leaders. They visited an assembly and carried out a learning walk to gauge the quality of pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural education.
• They held meetings with leaders and teachers, including recently qualified and experienced teachers, three members of the governing body and different groups of pupils.
• Inspectors observed the school’s work. They looked at safeguarding and child protection policies and procedures, self-evaluation and improvement planning, minutes of the governing body’s meetings, records of pupils’ attendance and other information provided by school leaders.
• Inspectors scrutinised pupils’ books. They considered the eight free-text comments sent by parents during the inspection and the 12 responses to Ofsted’s online questionnaire, Parent View. They also considered the 24 responses from staff and the 28 pupil responses to their respective questionnaires.

Inspection team

Phil Garnham, lead inspector Shaheen Hussain Fiona Rigby

Her Majesty’s Inspector Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector