Accrington Woodnook Primary School Ofsted Report

Full report

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Ensure that the most able children are appropriately challenged so that an increased proportion achieves greater depth in their learning.
• Give pupils more opportunities to develop their reasoning skills in mathematics.
• Work more closely with parents so they all understand and appreciate the effective work that leaders do to ensure pupils’ regular attendance.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Good

• Leaders and governors have high expectations for all pupils. They have shared this vision very clearly with staff, creating systems in the classroom to ensure that pupils achieve well. The cohesive staff team have worked well together to improve provision for pupils.
• Leaders have analysed school information, produced a detailed action plan and worked with staff to move the school forward. Leaders know the school well. They articulate what the school does well and what the next steps are for improvement. Since the last inspection, leaders’ focused and effective action has improved teaching and learning. Leaders have taken advantage of the support from the local authority and the monitoring interventions team, to provide training and quality assurance to improve classroom practice. This external support is now ‘light touch’ because of the school’s successful improvements.
• Leaders manage teachers’ performance well by setting very clear objectives relating to disadvantaged pupils, the quality of teaching and school improvement. Targets for success are quantifiable and relate to pupils’ outcomes. Leaders do not shy away from using the appraisal process to improve the quality of teaching.
• Training has been particularly effective in developing a strong layer of middle leaders. These subject leaders are impressive. They have good subject knowledge and they disseminate apt information to other staff. This enables pupils to develop subject-specific skills, which has a positive impact on their progress in subjects across the curriculum. Subject leaders monitor the work of others. The development of effective middle leaders is clear evidence that the school has the capacity to improve.
• Leaders have developed an interesting and inclusive curriculum, which focuses on pupils’ interests and needs. The curriculum ‘jigsaw’ is shared in detail with parents on the school’s website, at meetings and in the half-termly newsletter. Teachers evaluate the effectiveness of topics, reflecting on how well they have been taught and whether pupils’ interest and learning has been stimulated.
• The school celebrates its diverse culture, with pupils learning from each other. There is mutual trust and friendship within the school. Teachers support pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development well through a variety of lessons and activities. For example, pupils learn about other religions and they vote for a school council. At a recent fundraiser, pupils raised money for a children’s charity while playing number games. Such activities and experiences provide pupils with a good understanding of fundamental British values and prepare them well for life in modern Britain.
• Leaders use the pupil premium funding effectively to raise the achievement of disadvantaged pupils. Focused speech therapy sessions, additional staffing to deliver extra teaching to individuals and small groups of pupils, curriculum enhancement and parents’ workshops have led to an improvement in pupils’ achievements across school.
• Leaders use the primary sport funding wisely to promote pupils’ physical development. At lunchtime, pupils join organised games to keep them active and to encourage fitness. Pupils enjoy this activity and as a result, incidents of poor behaviour in the playground have reduced as pupils play more cooperatively with each other.
• The additional funding for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is used effectively. Enhanced teaching assistant provision means that these pupils make good progress from their starting points.
• Leaders provide a range of activities to engage parents. These include popular social events, such as the ‘bake off’ and ‘strictly come dancing’, where parents can be part of the enrichment activities. There are specific events to share with them what their children will be learning and how parents can support this learning at home. However, there is a small minority of parents who are unhappy with aspects of the school’s provision, in particular the actions taken to improve pupils’ overall attendance.

Governance of the school

• Since the last inspection, there have been a number of changes to the membership of the governing body. There has been an effective drive to strengthen the governing body, to ensure a good mix of essential skills. Governors possess key skills relevant to the school, for example relating to pupils’ attendance. Governors are aware of their responsibilities. They know the school well, and are able to discuss the school’s strengths and areas of development. They are trained and understand local safeguarding issues.
• Minutes of the governing body meetings show an increase in the number of relevant questions and challenge to senior leaders. This challenge relates to standards and effectiveness, showing that the governing body is holding leaders to account for the quality of pupils’ education.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective. Everyone contributes to the culture of safeguarding across school. Staff are well trained and are vigilant. They understand the local context of the school. They follow procedures and report any concerns.
• Leaders collate pupils’ records to ensure that no aspects of safeguarding are missed. Leaders monitor absence diligently to ensure the safety of pupils who are absent from school. For example, they may visit a pupil’s home or refer to other agencies if necessary.
• The majority of pupils who answered Ofsted’s online survey and those who spoke with inspectors said that they felt safe in school. They know that they can talk to an adult if they are worried about anything.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Good

• With the support of the local authority, teachers have embraced the revised national curriculum and a new assessment system. Teachers check pupils’ progress closely, sharing pupils’ work with colleagues from other schools to ensure that their judgement of pupils’ achievement is accurate.
• Teachers ask effective questions to check and extend pupils’ understanding. Teachers routinely capitalise on wrong answers effectively to clarify and improve pupils’ knowledge. Teachers do this skilfully, enabling other pupils to offer suggestions, then revisiting the original pupil to check learning. For example, effective questioning was used to improve pupils’ performance in physical education.
• Teachers demonstrate good subject knowledge, making cross-curricular links for pupils with their prior learning. For example, one teacher made the connection between pupils learning how to read silent letters, such as the ‘s’ in ‘island’, and their previous geography lesson, where they learnt about ‘Ireland’.
• Teachers use the school’s feedback policy consistently to support the development of pupils’ skills. Work in pupils’ books shows that teachers’ application of the school’s marking policy is helping pupils to make strong gains in their learning.
• In class, teachers build constructive and positive relationships with pupils. Pupils want to contribute to lessons because they have a positive attitude to learning. Often, teaching fuels pupils’ great enthusiasm. For example, older pupils showed enthusiasm when reading the end of the novel ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’.
• Teachers include opportunities for pupils to widen their knowledge of the world by providing first-hand experiences. For example, the ‘WOW’ week started with an automated dinosaur roaming the schoolyard.
• Phonics is taught well in the school. Teachers encourage reading through sending books home, and the school librarian supports pupils to change their books at lunchtime. Pupils said that they enjoyed reading. When reading, younger pupils use basic phonics to sound out words. The most able, older pupils read with intonation and take account of punctuation. They infer, deduct and predict from the text they read.
• The teaching of writing has improved. For example, pupils show good writing stamina, as seen by the extended pieces of writing in their books since the beginning of term. Shared writing enables the teacher to collect the pupils’ ideas, while modelling good practice. Short and regular grammar sessions have made a marked improvement in pupils’ grammar, punctuation and spelling.
• In mathematics, teachers provide a variety of tasks and activities to improve pupils’ numeracy skills. They use practical resources with those pupils working at below age-related expectations, to help them to understand concepts. However, pupils do not have enough opportunities to develop their reasoning skills when solving mathematical problems.
• Teachers deploy skilled teaching assistants very well. Teaching assistants work effectively with individuals and groups of pupils and have a positive impact on pupils’ learning. These staff are attentive, and routinely observe pupils and move to support them when necessary.
• Teachers aid pupils’ transition from one class to another by their consistent expectations, routines and resources in the classroom. They transfer pupils’ work books, which means that pupils were off to a flying start in September, not wasting any learning time.
• Teachers plan lessons effectively. They ensure that activities are well matched to the needs of most pupils. However, activities planned for the most able pupils are not always well matched to their abilities. They therefore have limited opportunities to deepen their skills and knowledge.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Good

Personal development and welfare

• Leaders’ work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is good. The school is an orderly environment. Pupils listen and follow instructions straightaway, meaning they make the most of learning time. They have good attitudes to learning and want to contribute because teachers create a positive atmosphere in classes.
• Teachers have generated good relationships based on respect. As a result, pupils listen to and value different viewpoints. They respect people from other backgrounds and treat people equally. One pupil commented, ‘Pupils are great here, everyone likes each other.’
• Teachers and teaching assistants promote pupils’ personal, social and emotional development effectively. The development of pupils’ skills and knowledge can be seen as they move through school. Many children starting in the Reception Year do not know how to share or to play together cooperatively. By Year 1, however, they become confident in expressing themselves and they are willing to share. Older pupils take responsibility to help younger pupils at lunchtime and make sure that they are safe.
• The curriculum to keep pupils healthy and safe is wide-ranging and age-appropriate, and well matched to pupils’ abilities. Pupils learn about how to stay healthy and safe and pupils can talk about this in an age-appropriate way. They know how to keep safe online.
• Pupils’ physical and medical needs are met well. There are adults in school with specific roles to support pupils’ welfare. If necessary, teachers will seek help from other professionals out of school. Pupils know whom to go to for help.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils is good in lessons and around school. Teachers use effective behaviour management. They give clear instructions, reinforcing expectations for pupils. Pupils follow school procedures effectively, emphasising positive behaviour. Some pupils have challenging behaviour, which teachers handle skilfully to ensure that there is no disruption to lessons. This good behaviour in lessons contributes to pupils’ overall good progress.
• Leaders are focused on improving attendance. They have made strategic decisions to support good attendance. These have been effective, as attendance has improved overall and for each group in the last academic year.
• Persistent absence still remains an issue for the school. This is largely due to the number of pupils who miss out on learning because they go on extended holidays. This has a negative effect on pupils’ education, especially their progress and attainment.
• Pupils say that behaviour is good in school, reporting that occasionally pupils were ‘silly’ but teachers dealt with it quickly. Pupils said that there was a little name-calling and bullying, but when it did happen, teachers sorted it out. A minority of parents feel that bullying is not dealt with well by leaders. Inspectors found no evidence to suggest this was the case. Recorded incidents of bullying are low and records show that these are dealt with quickly and effectively.

Outcomes for pupils Good

• The proportion of current pupils reaching the standards expected for their age has increased in reading, writing and mathematics in all year groups. From low starting points, current pupils make good progress. This is across each year group, in a wide range of subjects and for different groups of pupils.
• Work in pupils’ books shows that they make good progress over time in a wide range of subjects. In their English books, pupils’ handwriting, spelling, punctuation and grammar support an improvement in writing. In mathematics books, there is an improvement in pupils’ ability to solve number, calculation and word problems. However, there is limited evidence of the development of pupils’ reasoning skills.
• The proportion of pupils who reach the expected standard in the phonics screening check in Year 1 remains below the national average. However, pupils’ attainment in phonics is improving and they make good progress from their starting points because of the strong teaching they receive. The proportion of disadvantaged pupils who reach the expected standard in the phonics screening check has also increased.
• In key stage 1, pupils’ attainment has improved in reading, writing and mathematics, and is now in line with the national average. By the end of key stage 2, the proportion of pupils who reach the standards expected for their age in reading, writing and mathematics remains below the national average. However, pupils make strong progress in these subjects from low starting points.
• Good use is made of the pupil premium funding and this has a positive impact on disadvantaged pupils’ learning across the school. Disadvantaged pupils make good progress in most year groups from their starting points in a wide range of subjects. This is clear from the performance information held by the school and the progress observed in pupils’ books. Accurate assessment and targeted support for disadvantaged pupils enables them to make strong progress.
• Pupils who speak English as an additional language make strong progress across the curriculum. Leaders check the progress made by pupils and are quick to act if pupils are falling behind.
• Pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities make good progress from their starting points. This is strongest in reading. The school uses additional funding to support these pupils effectively by the deployment of skilful teaching assistants.
• A legacy of underachievement in the past means that there are few pupils working at greater depth in their learning. The progress of the most able pupils is hindered because activities are not always well matched to their abilities. They are, therefore, not always challenged to achieve as well as they can.

Early years provision Good

• The majority of children begin the Reception Year with knowledge and skills below those typical for their age. This is especially the case with their communication and language skills and their personal, social and emotional development. However, children make good progress from their starting points, meaning that the proportion of children who are well prepared to start Year 1 has risen dramatically.
• Children join the Reception class from one main nursery. Teachers work closely with this nursery to exchange information and begin to form an accurate assessment of each child prior to the summer. This means that they can ‘hit the ground running’ in September because they know what each child’s gaps are and their next steps. Staff work with teachers from other schools and external professionals to ensure that children’s information is accurate. For example, the speech therapist completes a baseline assessment of children’s language skills where required.
• The early years leader is very experienced. She facilitates extensive training for all staff with the support of the local authority. Teaching assistants are highly skilled, very well deployed and are effective in supporting children’s learning.
• Teaching is good in the early years. In every activity, there is a necessary focus on developing language. Adults talk with the children constantly. They model language, providing a narrative for what children are doing. They ask questions to extend language. They provide opportunities for children to develop their confidence and skills to provide basic information, such as their name, age and birthday. As a result, children’s communication and language skills develop rapidly.
• Adults show a great deal of skill and patience. Children who have not been at school long are not used to sharing, following instructions and listening. By the time children leave the Reception class, they have made noticeable progress in their language skills and personal, social and emotional development and in their behaviour.
• Leaders have introduced a number of strategies to improve children’s reading and writing skills. Children have regular guided-reading sessions where they hear text being read and answer questions. This has improved children’s reading, especially those who speak English as an additional language. The daily writing booster has had a positive impact on children’s progress in handwriting, spelling, punctuation and grammar.
• Leaders target additional funding effectively to provide disadvantaged children with good-quality support. For example, the addition of speech therapy supports children’s early language development. Consequently, the performance of these children is improving year on year. They are making better progress on average than other children nationally and in school.
• The children’s learning journeys support inspection evidence that indicates that children make good progress from their starting points. In mathematics, they develop their number, shape, space and measure skills well.
• Teachers plan the outdoor learning space activities carefully. They are keen to enhance children’s experiences and provide activities that they may not have access to at home, such as riding bicycles and using slides. This improves children’s physical development.
• The school provides regular opportunities for parental engagement. For example, there are ‘readiness for school’ activities, ‘stay and play’ events and class assemblies.
• All safeguarding and welfare requirements are met in full, ensuring that children feel safe and are kept safe.

School details

Unique reference number Local authority Inspection number 119341 Lancashire 10036781 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 4 to 11 Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 194 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Headteacher Telephone number Website Email address Julie Lloyd Nicola Trayner 01254 233020 www.woodnookschool.co.uk head@woodnook.lancs.sch.uk Date of previous inspection 14–15 October 2015

Information about this school

• The school meets requirements on the publication of specified information on its website.
• This is an average-sized primary school.
• The vast majority of pupils are from minority ethnic groups and a well-above average proportion speak English as an additional language. The largest group are of Pakistani heritage.
• The proportion of disadvantaged pupils is above the national average.
• The proportion of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is in line with the national average. No pupils have an education, health and care plan.
• The school meets the current government floor standards, which are the minimum expectations for pupils’ progress and attainment by the end of Year 6.

Information about this inspection

• The inspection team observed teaching and learning in all classes. The headteacher observed jointly with Her Majesty’s Inspector.
• Inspectors considered the 56 responses from Ofsted pupils’ questionnaire, met seven pupils formally and spoke with many pupils informally during the inspection.
• Inspectors scrutinised pupils’ workbooks from the last academic year and their behaviour in and out of lessons.
• Inspectors considered the 31 responses from Ofsted online questionnaire, Parent View, the 155 responses from the school’s own survey, and spoke with many parents at the school. Inspectors spoke to two parents by telephone.
• Inspectors scrutinised a wide range of documents relating to all aspects of the school’s work. These included minutes of governing body meetings, self-evaluation documents, improvement planning, leaders’ monitoring of teaching and learning and documents relating to safeguarding.
• Inspectors met with the headteacher, deputy headteacher, middle leaders, three governors, representatives from the local authority and the monitoring intervention team.

Inspection team

Jean Robinson, lead inspector Liz Kelly

Her Majesty’s Inspector Ofsted Inspector