Widecombe-in-the-Moor Primary Ofsted Report

Full report

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Improve pupils’ progress in mathematics by ensuring that teaching:
  • consistently develops pupils’ fluency, reasoning and problem solving
  • quickly assesses the gaps that some pupils have in their learning and takes effective steps to fill them
  • sets tasks that are well suited to promoting the progress of pupils, whatever their ability.
• Improve pupils’ personal development, behaviour and welfare by ensuring that:
  • rates of attendance rise
  • the school’s work to develop positive attitudes to learning has a bigger impact on the minority of pupils who are yet to develop them.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Good

• Although school leaders have not sustained the outstanding quality of education identified at the previous inspection, they have a very clear understanding of the school’s many strengths and the areas the school needs to work on, most notably achievement in mathematics and attendance. Their planning for school improvement is insightful and thorough. The executive headteacher and the head of school work well as a team to provide clear direction for the work of all staff in the drive to improve pupils’ education.
• Middle leaders, including those in charge of particular subjects, play an important role in developing the typically effective teaching in the school. They receive strong support from senior leaders and the training they undertake as part of their professional development is helping them to develop their leadership skills rapidly, especially those relatively new to their roles.
• Leadership of teaching has had a bigger impact in improving the quality of teaching, learning and assessment in English than in mathematics. This is reflected in the faster progress that pupils make in reading and writing compared to mathematics.
• The curriculum is very well designed to meet pupils’ needs. As a result, pupils develop their knowledge, understanding and skills well across a wide range of subjects. Leaders’ rationale for how they have constructed the curriculum to promote pupils’ progress is clear and this helps pupils to achieve well.
• The school provides a wealth of extra-curricular activities for its pupils. For example, over half the pupils are members of the school choir, which performs regularly to audiences outside the school. These extra-curricular activities play an important part in the school’s successful work to promote pupils spiritual, moral, social and cultural development.
• The school makes particularly good use of the primary physical education (PE) and sport premium to promote participation and develop healthy lifestyles. All the older pupils represent the school in at least one sports team. Lunchtime sports are also well organised to encourage participation and to develop pupils’ sporting skills by introducing them to sports such as hockey.
• The school has relatively few disadvantaged pupils and the pupil premium is used well to promote their progress, especially in reading and writing. Leaders’ rationale for how they use the pupil premium is clear and they evaluate its impact closely and well.
• Fundamental British values, such as tolerance and respect, are well promoted both through the curriculum and by other supporting activities, such as assemblies. School leaders are highly aware that the school serves a rural and mainly White British community. Consequently, they are very active in promoting opportunities for pupils to experience other facets of life in multi-faith, multi-ethnic modern Britain. As a result, pupils are well prepared to be good citizens.
• Pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is promoted very successfully through the curriculum, by the wide range of extra-curricular activities and via the emphasis on fundamental British values. Frequent charitable fundraising, for example, develops pupils’ empathy and understanding for the lives of others.
• The school has a very small number of children in the early years foundation stage. Nonetheless, this provision is well led and a consistently higher proportion of the children than the national average attain a good level of development at the end of Reception.
• Leaders are fully aware that attendance needs to improve. They have recently undertaken a concerted programme of working with parents to address this and there are some signs that this is having an impact. Nonetheless, rates of absence and persistent absence remain too high.
• The provision for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is good. Many of their parents speak highly of the support they get from the school and the special educational needs coordinator in particular.
• External support from the multi-academy trust has been effective in developing the quality of teaching in the school by, for example, providing professional development for subject leaders, which includes opportunities to moderate pupils’ work alongside that produced in other trust schools.

Governance of the school

• The local governing body and the multi-academy trust’s board of directors have a very clear understanding of the school. This allows them to exercise their roles of strategic oversight with good effect.
• Governors ensure that additional funding, such as the pupil premium and the PE and sport premium, are used effectively by monitoring their use well. They make clear evaluations of the use of the pupil premium against academic outcomes for disadvantaged pupils. They are developing their ability to measure the impact of all the school’s actions in terms of pupils’ academic achievements.
• Governors have good working relationships with leaders at all levels. This helps them to understand the impact of teaching over time on the progress pupils make and to provide an appropriate level of challenge to school leaders.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.
• There is a well-established culture of safeguarding in the school. As they do in other aspects of the school’s work, the executive headteacher and the head of school lead from the front in promoting pupils’ safety. The head of school provides staff with frequent updates on safeguarding and regularly assesses staff’s understanding of the latest government guidance. The executive headteacher brings a wealth of safeguarding experience, including from her trust-wide role, to her work to promote pupils’ safety.
• Staff training is thorough, including in the ‘Prevent’ duty to protect pupils from the dangers of radicalisation and political extremism. The checks made on the suitability of teachers and other staff to work with children follow the requirements and are well recorded. Safer recruitment is practised consistently and senior staff and governors are appropriately trained in this aspect of their work.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Good

• The teaching of English is highly effective. It is typified by very good use of the technical vocabulary of the subject in a way that makes it easy for pupils to understand. As a result, pupils pick up new concepts in, for example, grammar quickly. In literacy teaching, teachers’ subject knowledge is strong and this gives them a firm foundation on which to develop pupils’ understanding and skills. As a result of this strong teaching in English, pupils make rapid progress in reading and writing.
• The teaching of mathematics is not as consistently effective as it is in English. The work that pupils are asked to do is sometimes not pitched at the right level, being either too easy or too hard. Some pupils have gaps in their knowledge. Moreover, teaching in mathematics is not developing pupils’ reasoning and problem-solving skills as quickly as their reading and writing skills. So, while pupils are making progress in line with their peers nationally, relatively few are demonstrating depth in their knowledge, understanding and skills.
• At the last inspection, the need for teachers to promote better presentation of work by pupils was identified. In their writing, pupils’ work is very well presented and handwriting skills are successfully developed from an early stage, including in the early years. This allows them to express complex ideas with confidence. In mathematics, the presentation of work is mostly clear, which promotes accuracy in pupils’ work.
• The teaching of the most able pupils, especially the older ones in Years 5 and 6, is characterised by a high level of challenge across the curriculum. These pupils respond enthusiastically to this and make fast progress as a result. The activities that the most able pupils undertake in both English and mathematics are designed well to promote depth of understanding.
• Teachers’ use of questioning is typically effective. It probes, assesses and develops pupils’ knowledge and understanding. In addition, teachers provide pupils with useful information so that they can improve their work. This is particularly effective in developing pupils’ writing skills.
• Classroom teaching is supported by meaningful homework, which pupils are set regularly in English, mathematics and the various different projects they undertake. The work that pupils do as part of their home learning consolidates their key skills and teaches them to study with independence and perseverance.
• The teaching of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities ensures that they are able to experience the same range of opportunities that their classmates have. As a result, they make similarly good progress from their individual starting points.
• The reports that parents receive from the school provide them with clear and comprehensive information about the progress their children are making.
• Teachers have high expectations of behaviour but these are sometimes not reinforced consistently. Moreover, where teaching is less than effective, a small number of pupils, mostly boys, lose focus and their progress slows.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Good

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is good.
• The school provides older pupils with opportunities to take on leadership roles, such as librarians or sports leaders. This makes an important contribution to their maturity and prepares them well to transfer to secondary school when the time comes. A good example of the way the school works to promote pupils’ personal development was their involvement in the redesign of what one pupil called ‘our lovely library’. Pupils were involved in every stage of the project and this helped them to learn about taking responsibility and how the world of work operates.
• Pupils of all ages are enthusiastic participants in the many creative, artistic and sporting after-school activities the school offers. These activities promote pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development very well.
• The school’s active promotion of fundamental British values prepares pupils well for life in modern Britain and to be good citizens. Elections to the school council, for example, help them to learn about fairness and the need to respect each other’s views.
• Pupils understand how to stay safe, including when they are online. Their keen participation in sport helps them to stay healthy and promotes their general well-being. The gardening club grows vegetables for use in the school kitchen and this helps pupils learn about healthy eating.
• Pupils say bullying is extremely rare. Parents and pupils believe that the school deals with it effectively if it does occur.
• The majority of pupils have developed a good understanding of how to be successful learners. Especially when the teaching is effective, they demonstrate positive attitudes to their schoolwork and rise to the challenge it presents. Nevertheless, a minority of pupils, mainly boys, do not demonstrate the levels of maturity required to make the most of their time in lessons.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils is good.
• Pupils are polite and conduct themselves well in lessons and around the school. They usually show respect for each other’s views but on occasions they talk over each other inappropriately.
• All the parents who responded to the online survey, Parent View, agree that the school makes sure that its pupils are well behaved. Acts of serious misbehaviour are extremely rare and the small amounts of low-level disruption to lessons are mostly a consequence of pupils losing focus in the face of less effective teaching.
• Although attendance has improved, it is still too low. The school is working hard with pupils and their families to promote the importance of good attendance. This has also had an impact on the number of times that pupils are late to school. Nonetheless, school leaders are aware that they need to do more to ensure that rates of absence and persistent absence keep falling.

Outcomes for pupils Good

• Pupils make rapid progress in reading and writing across all year groups, including in the early years. Highly effective teaching enables them to develop quickly the attributes of highly literate learners. Their written work, by the time they reach Years 5 and 6, is characterised by complex sentence structure, sophisticated grammar and secure punctuation. Moreover, they can use these foundations to produce highly creative pieces of sustained writing.
• The rapid progress that pupils make in reading and writing was confirmed by the outcomes of the key stage 2 national curriculum assessments in 2016. Virtually all pupils who took the assessments made progress at a faster rate than other pupils nationally with similar starting points, especially in writing. In the key stage 1 assessments, a higher proportion of pupils than the national figure attained the expected standard and a higher proportion were working at greater depth. Children in the early years attained very highly in the reading and writing early learning goals.
• There are relatively few disadvantaged pupils in the school and they are making similarly strong progress in reading and writing. In the 2016 key stage 2 assessments, progress for middle-ability disadvantaged pupils was very fast, although the cohort was very small. The pupil premium is used effectively to promote the good progress that disadvantaged pupils make.
• Pupils make less consistent progress in their mathematics than they do in literacy, especially in key stage 2. Progress is quicker in the early years and key stage 1 than it is in the first few years of key stage 2. By the end of key stage 2, however, pupils have made progress at a rate similar to that of pupils with the same starting points nationally. Nonetheless, too few of them are achieving at a high standard in key stage 2 or at greater depth in key stage 1, as teaching is not developing their mastery of mathematics as effectively as their literacy is developed.
• The most able pupils currently in the school, including the most able disadvantaged pupils, make very strong progress across all the subjects they study. They rise very well to the challenge that teaching in English, mathematics and science presents them.
• Academic outcomes for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities are good, as a result of effective teaching which meets their needs. In reading in 2016, for example, pupils who receive support for their special educational needs and/or disabilities made significantly faster progress in their reading than pupils did nationally.
• There is a strong culture of reading in the school, one in which pupils participate keenly. Not only are outcomes in reading strong but also pupils read widely and make very regular use of the newly redesigned library. Pupils who read to the inspector did so with fluency and enthusiasm. They tackle sophisticated texts appropriate to their ages and deal with difficult or unfamiliar words with confidence.
• This culture of reading is built upon the firm foundations of effective phonics teaching. The outcomes of the Year 1 phonics screening check have been above the national average for a number of years.
• There are very few pupils currently in the early years and it is not possible to make meaningful generalisations about their overall progress. Historically, however, children’s outcomes show that pupils get off to a very strong start in Reception. For the last four years, the proportion of pupils attaining a good level of development in the early years foundation stage profile has been higher than the national average.

School details

Unique reference number Local authority Inspection number 136563 Devon 10008236 This inspection was carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. The inspection was also deemed a section 5 inspection under the same Act. Type of school Primary School category Age range of pupils Gender of pupils Academy converter 5 to 11 Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 60 Appropriate authority Chair Headteacher Academy trust Graeme Cock Rachel Shaw (executive headteacher); Des Stokes (head of school) Telephone number 01364 621261 Website Email address www.widecombe.devon.sch.uk admin@widecombe.devon.sch.uk Date of previous inspection 30–31 January 2013

Information about this school

• The school meets requirements on the publication of specified information on its website.
• The school complies with Department for Education guidance on what academies should publish.
• Widecombe-in-the-Moor Primary is a small primary school. It is a member of the South Dartmoor Multi-Academy Trust.
• Pupils are taught in three mixed-year classes. The vast majority are from White British backgrounds. The number of disadvantaged pupils is below average. The proportion of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is slightly above average.
• The school meets the current floor standards.

Information about this inspection

• The inspector observed pupils’ learning in lessons and examined their work across all year groups and a range of subjects. All observations in lessons were undertaken jointly with the head of school.
• The inspector had discussions with the executive headteacher, the head of school and middle leaders. He spoke to the chief executive officer of the trust by telephone. The lead inspector met with members of the local governing board and a member of the trust’s board of directors. He also had a conversation by telephone with the school’s educational welfare officer.
• The inspector talked to pupils, both formally in a group and informally during lessons and at other times. In addition, a number of pupils of different ages were listened to reading aloud.
• A range of documentary evidence was examined. This included the school development plan, minutes of governors’ meetings, attendance information, records of assessments of pupils’ work and information about their progress. Documents relating to safeguarding and child protection were also examined, as was the single central record of the checks the school makes on the background of teachers and other staff and their suitability to work with children.
• In making his judgements, the inspector took into account 29 responses to Parent View, Ofsted’s online parental questionnaire. He also talked to parents at the beginning of the school day.

Inspection team

Stephen Lee, lead inspector Her Majesty’s Inspector