Sandfields Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

The staff in Sandfields Primary School create a warm, friendly, and inclusive environment with the pupils' well-being at its heart.

Nearly all pupils are happy and enjoy coming to school. They feel that they are looked after extremely well and are kept safe. Most pupils show respect to all staff and visitors and show concern and care for each other.

Pupils' behaviour across the school is very good. The school's provision to support pupils' emotional and social challenges is a strength. Effective programmes help pupils to engage in school life and enable them to access their lessons successfully.

Most pupils have positive attitudes towards their learning and contribute well to what and how they learn. Teachers are ...developing a creative curriculum for pupils to build on their knowledge and to deepen their understanding of their locality and wider area. They provide beneficial life experiences for the pupils and engage them well in their learning.

However, in class, teachers' expectations of what pupils can achieve are too low, particularly for more able pupils. Furthermore, over-direction from adults impacts on pupils' ability to develop as independent learners. Although staff praise pupils for their achievements regularly, written feedback does not help pupils to improve their work.

In addition, there are limited opportunities for pupils to reflect on their own, and each other's learning. From low starting points, many pupils develop clear speaking skills and listen carefully. They have a sound understanding of number and are beginning to apply their numeracy skills in other areas of learning suitably.

However, pupils' ability to write at length is underdeveloped and pace of development in their digital skills is slow. The headteacher, staff and governors work together effectively. Overall, they have good understanding of many of the school's strengths and priorities for improvement.

However, their work to evaluate and improve the quality of teaching and learning is not effective enough. Recommendations R1 Sharpen self-evaluation and improvement processes so that they impact more positively on the quality of teaching and learning R2 Improve pupils' writing and digital skills R3 Raise teachers' expectations of what pupils can achieve, particularly the more able R4 Ensure that the quality of feedback from teachers targets the next steps in pupils' learning and that pupils have suitable opportunities to improve their work What happens next The school will draw up an action plan to show how it is going to address the recommendations. Estyn will work with the local authority to review the school's progress.