Aiskew, Leeming Bar Church of England Primary School Ofsted Report

Full report

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Continue to improve the quality of teaching so that pupils’ progress is consistently good and attainment rises, by ensuring that all teachers:
  • have high expectations of pupils
  • make effective use of assessment information to plan learning that challenges pupils, especially the most able.
• Improve leadership and governance by:
  • making sure evaluation and improvement planning accurately identifies and addresses all areas of weakness
  • ensuring monitoring is more regular and systematic so any specific weaknesses in any teachers’ practice are addressed more quickly
  • restoring parents’ confidence in the school’s ability to manage pupils’ behaviour and to promote their children’s progress
  • continuing to make effective use of the support the local authority is providing.
• Improve pupils’ behaviour, minimising the negative effects of the few pupils on the many by:
  • keeping detailed and systematic records of bullying, discriminatory and other behaviour incidents and using this information to inform action that is more effective.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Requires improvement

• Since the last inspection, the quality of teaching has declined. A high turnover of staff and difficulties recruiting permanent teachers have compounded the problem. Though teaching is improving, resulting in pupils beginning to make quicker progress, teaching over time has not secured good pupils’ outcomes and too many pupils still have a long way to catch up.
• During the inspection, a small but significant minority of parents expressed a loss of trust in the school’s leadership. Parents are concerned about disruptions to their pupils’ learning because of the high staff turnover. These parents do not have confidence that the problems are yet resolved.
• Leaders carry out checks on the quality of teaching, identifying precisely what teachers need to do to improve. These checks, along with challenge and support from the headteacher, are helping teachers to sharpen their practice. More frequent and systematic checks are needed to improve teaching at a faster rate.
• Leaders recognise strengths and weaknesses in the school, and have appropriate plans in place to tackle weaknesses. Leaders’ actions are beginning to bring about improvements. However, weaknesses in pupils’ reading, where progress has historically been weaker than in other subjects, are not identified in the school improvement plan.
• Leaders have established an assessment system that accurately identifies pupils who are underachieving, including disadvantaged pupils and those who have special educational needs and/or disabilities. The accuracy of teachers’ assessment is due in part to effective work with the partner school. This means leaders are keeping an eye on the progress of pupils who need to catch up, but too many pupils are not catching up quickly enough. Leaders have not identified those most-able pupils who ought to be reaching the highest standards but who are working below their potential.
• There are very few pupils in this small school who are eligible for support from the pupil premium or who have special educational needs and/or disabilities. However, teaching over time has been ineffective in securing consistently good outcomes for these pupils. Consequently, some of these pupils do well and others do not, regardless of how leaders use additional funds.
• Additional funding for sports and physical education has given pupils access to sports they have not tried before such as orienteering and badminton. However, much funding has been spent on training a member of staff who is no longer teaching at the school, so the impact of this spending has been limited.
• The appointment of an assistant headteacher at the beginning of the current school year has helped to relieve the load of the headteacher, whose time is shared between two schools. The assistant headteacher has already been instrumental in helping to improve the teaching of writing.
• Pupils’ absence has reduced substantially. This is principally because the headteacher has emphasised the importance of attendance and begun to formally recognise those pupils with full attendance. Nearly half the pupils in the school attended every day in the autumn term.
• Pupils largely enjoy a broad, balanced and interesting curriculum, spending a proportionate amount of time on subjects such as computing, geography, history and religious education as well as reading, writing and mathematics. Teachers give pupils opportunities to investigate and experiment in science lessons. Specialist teachers provide weekly French and music lessons. All of this gives pupils a rounded education.
• Frequent visits to places of interest such as Souter Lighthouse, Hackfall Woods and Hadrian’s Wall spark pupils’ enthusiasm, broaden their horizons and provide stimulus for lessons in school. Pupils also have some opportunities to get involved in out-of-school-hours clubs such as the lunchtime recorder club, seasonal choirs and ‘Learn, Play, Grow’ sporting activities.
• Leaders actively promote pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. As a result, pupils demonstrate a knowledge of faiths other than Christianity in this Church of England School. They are beginning to understand democratic principles and in an age-appropriate way about sexual orientation. This learning is helping pupils to prepare for life in modern Britain.
• The local authority has been successfully helping the school to improve. An intervention plan identifies the right priorities and a number of advisers and consultants have helped leaders to begin to make progress.

Governance of the school

• While recognising the challenging circumstances the school has faced, governors make no excuses for weak pupils’ outcomes. They are determined that each pupil should achieve well. Nevertheless, though the governing body is now helping the school to move forward, governors have not managed to prevent the less than good progress made by too many pupils over time.
• Governors have a suitable range of skills and experience that enables them to fulfil their duties and to hold school leaders to account. They ask some challenging questions. However, until recently, leaders have not presented detailed assessment information sufficiently in advance of governing body meetings to enable governors to interrogate and challenge as well as they might.
• Governors make regular visits to school to find out about aspects of the school’s work. Some governors’ records, however, show an overly positive view of the progress leaders are making, emphasising what leaders have done rather than the difference it has made.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective. Leaders carry out the required checks on adults to make sure they can be considered suitable to work with children. Adults are well trained, know the signs that a pupil may be at risk, and how and to whom they should report concerns.
• Though leaders take appropriate action where they have concerns about a pupil’s safety, they recognise that some records are not as detailed as they should be. The headteacher has immediately begun to put in place measures to improve this essential aspect of safeguarding.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Requires improvement

• Teaching over time has been variable in quality, hampering pupils’ progress. This has been compounded by staffing and recruitment challenges that have disrupted pupils’ learning.
• Teaching is improving but there remain some inconsistencies in quality. For example, mathematics taught to the same groups of children by two different teachers reveals differences in expectations of what pupils should be able to do, and therefore the degree of challenge provided to pupils, especially the most able pupils.
• There has been an improvement in the teaching of writing, so pupils are beginning to make faster progress. However, the writing skills of too many pupils in both key stage 1 and key stage 2 are still lagging behind where they ought to be.
• Similarly, the teaching of mathematics is improving. Teachers have been increasingly providing pupils with more opportunities to develop their reasoning skills and to attempt problems that are more challenging. However, these critical aspects of mathematics teaching are inconsistent and not well enough established to produce the rapid progress needed to help pupils to catch up quickly.
• Teachers are adept at devising lessons that interest pupils and the planned curriculum content enthuses many pupils. Conversely, at times, some pupils easily become uninterested, and they do not get on with their work without close supervision. For example, few pupils in Year 1 have developed the writing stamina to keep going when required to write a longer piece.
• Pupils enjoy practical lessons, for example carrying out investigations in science and attempting artwork using a variety of tools and materials. Work in pupils’ workbooks reveals good teacher knowledge in these and some other subjects that helps some pupils to complete accomplished work. Teachers provide opportunities for pupils to apply their writing and mathematics skills in other subjects but with variable challenge.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Requires improvement

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare requires improvement.
• A small number of pupils and parents report that occasionally bullying is not dealt with well. Leaders need to take action that is more rigorous so that any risks to pupils are further minimised. Records of bullying and discriminatory incidents are not sufficiently detailed and robust. However, bullying is not frequent or widespread and the behaviour of this small number of pupils is currently better than it has been.
• Leaders actively promote tolerance and respect for diversity. A visitor has taught the pupils about Islam and pupils have learned about Islamic Relief as well as Christian Aid. Pupils talked knowledgeably about the types of families represented on a Stonewall poster. While most pupils demonstrate tolerance and respect, a small minority demonstrated less respectful attitudes towards a pupil with a disability during this inspection.
• Pupils enjoy their responsibilities such as serving lunches, organising playground equipment and library duties and being ‘digital leaders’.
• Adults teach pupils how to stay safe. This includes teaching about how to stay safe online and about road safety, for example.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils requires improvement. Most pupils get on with their work. Some teaching strongly engages and involves pupils in learning, encouraging positive learning behaviours. However, good learning habits and positive attitudes to learning are not well embedded for some pupils, who without close supervision are inclined to wander off task, disturbing their own learning and that of others. Other pupils show more staying power, given the opportunity.
• Relationships between adults and pupils are strong, and this helps teachers to manage challenging behaviour sensitively when it occurs in lessons. The vast majority of pupils conduct themselves well in lessons, in the playground and around the school, including in the hall during lunchtimes.
• Attendance has risen from below average to above average. Many pupils are enthusiastic about working to earn a full attendance certificate each half term. The percentage of pupils who are absent for more than half a day a week on average has fallen dramatically. None of the disadvantaged pupils or those who have special educational needs and/or disabilities are persistently absent – a stark contrast with the position last year when pupils from these groups were over-represented in absence figures.

Outcomes for pupils Requires improvement

• Pupils’ progress has been inconsistent over time. Progress by the end of key stage 2 was stronger in 2015 than in 2016, though progress in reading was less than good in both years. Progress by the end of key stage 1 has been less than good overall for the last two years. Leaders attribute some of the weak progress to above-average numbers of pupils joining or leaving the school at times other than the usual start or end of the school year. Even so, leaders have little analysis of any negative impact this factor may have had.
• Too many pupils in Years 1 and 2 left the early years not having achieved a good level of development and have not yet caught up to where they ought to be. No pupils in key stage 1 are working above age-related standards.
• Throughout the school, too few pupils are identified as most-able because the prior attainment of too many pupils has been lower than that of which they are capable. For example, those pupils who are doing the best in Years 2 and 6 are reading with appropriate fluency and understanding but are barely on target to attain a higher standard or greater depth by the end of the year. Teachers currently assess only two pupils in the school as working above an expected standard in any subject.
• Disadvantaged pupils and those who have special educational needs and/or disabilities currently in the school are few in number and the progress they are making is not consistent. Some are making better progress than others.
• The proportion of pupils meeting the required standard in phonics in 2015 was average but fell in 2016 to well below average. Phonics teaching is much improved so that the proportion of pupils on track to meet the standard this year is nearer to, but still below, the national average.
• Overall progress is quickening because of improvements in teaching. However, the progress of pupils currently in the school is too variable between year groups and subjects. Around a third of pupils as of January 2017 were not making sufficient progress in at least one subject. In Year 2 and Year 6, progress in mathematics is more positive. This patchiness of progress is evident in pupils’ workbooks.

Early years provision Requires improvement

• Over a three-year period, the percentage of children reaching a good level of development by the end of the early years has been below the national average. Even taking into account the fact that many children enter the school with skills, knowledge and understanding below that which is typical for their age, this does not represent good progress. Too few children have made more than typical progress from their starting points and too few are prepared for Year 1 by the time they leave the early years. This is evident in the way too many pupils are still struggling to catch up in Years 1 and 2.
• Following the appointment of a new, more effective teacher/leader in January, the early years provision is beginning to improve. The leader has identified appropriate priorities for improvement. As a result, children are beginning to make faster progress so that more are likely to reach a good level of development this year.
• The teacher skilfully enthuses children with purposeful and enjoyable tasks. For example, children enjoyed hunting for the Aliens who love underpants, enthusiastically getting involved in a range of purposeful activities.
• Given the opportunity and quality resources, children challenge themselves and sustain interest. For example, children concentrated as they made rockets for the aliens, while another experimented with blocks to see how high he could build them before they fell. However, many of the resources and equipment, especially outdoors, are old and uninviting, including some basic mark-making tools.
• Adults generally intervene effectively in pupils’ learning, asking questions that promote talk and thinking. The teaching of phonics and other basic skills in the joint Reception and Year 1 class is now more effective than it was.
• Adults keep the children safe. Children follow instructions and get along well with each other, learning to share, cooperate and collaborate with each other as they play and explore together.
• Assessment is regular, comprehensive and accurate and covers all aspects of learning. The early years staff are taking action to involve parents more fully in their children’s learning and assessment. For example, recently some parents and children recorded what they had been doing during the half-term holiday.

School details

Unique reference number 121472 Local authority North Yorkshire Inspection number 10023928 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 Voluntary controlled Age range of pupils 4 to 11 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 60 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Elaine Bean Headteacher Stephen Simper Telephone number 01677 422403 Website www.aiskewleemingbar.org/ Email address admin@aiskewleemingbar.n-yorks.sch.uk Date of previous inspection 26–27 March 2013

Information about this school

• Aiskew, Leeming Bar Church of England Primary is much smaller than the average primary school.
• A very small number of pupils are supported by the pupil premium fund. The percentage is much smaller than the national average and too small to report on in detail without risking identifying individual pupils.
• The proportion of pupils from minority ethnic groups is below the national average. The proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is well below the national average.
• The percentage of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is just below the national average. No pupils have an education, health and care plan.
• The proportion of pupils who enter or leave the school at times other than the beginning of a key stage or school year is higher than average.
• The school does not meet requirements on the publication of information about admissions, access facilities for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities, or the impact of sports and physical education funding on its website.
• The school meets the current floor standards. These are the minimum expectations of pupils’ achievement in English and mathematics set by the government.

Information about this inspection

• The inspector visited all classes more than once to observe teaching and pupils’ learning. All of these observations took place jointly with either the headteacher or assistant headteacher.
• The inspector questioned pupils about their learning, and what it is like to be a pupil at the school. Pupils’ workbooks were scrutinised, and the inspector listened to a few pupils read. Pupils’ behaviour was observed around the school, including at breaktimes and at lunchtime.
• Discussions took place with the headteacher and other school leaders and teachers, and four members of the governing body. The inspector met with a representative from the local authority.
• The inspector listened to the views of several parents during the inspection. There were 17 responses to Ofsted’s online survey, Parent View. The inspector also took account of the written responses of 14 parents. There were just two responses to the staff survey and 17 responses to the pupil survey.
• The inspector analysed a number of documents, including the school improvement plan, leaders’ monitoring notes, governing body minutes and information about pupils’ achievement. Records relating to attendance, behaviour and safeguarding were scrutinised.

Inspection team

Philip Riozzi, lead inspector Her Majesty’s Inspector