Aldercar Infant School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

This is an outstanding school. Pupils make outstanding progress, often from very low starting points.

When they leave Year 2 they achieve above the levels expected for their age in English and mathematics. Children of Nursery and Reception age get off to an excellent start because staff have such strong understanding of how best to promote learning, and do so very well indeed. Teaching is outstanding.

Teachers and teaching assistants inspire pupils and build on their natural curiosity about the world. Teachers almost always pitch the work at exactly the right level for every pupil. Pupils always try their best.

Their behaviour is outstanding, and this... makes the school an exceedingly safe and purposeful place of learning, where pupils thrive. The school's carefully designed teaching programmes provide pupils with many excellent opportunities to develop their reading, writing and numeracy skills by applying them in other subjects. Pupils who are deaf, and those who are disabled or who have other special educational needs are very well taught and fully included in the life of the school.

Consequently, they make at least good, and sometimes outstanding, progress in literacy and mathematics. The governors, the headteacher and her leadership team have managed staff performance extremely well so that teaching and pupils' achievement have improved significantly since the last inspection. Leaders use the information they have about pupils' achievements very carefully to check the achievement of different groups, including pupils entitled to the pupil premium.

Very well targeted and highly effective interventions are swiftly put into place should any pupil be in danger of falling behind. The school's emphasis on 'respect' informs all it does and this, together with the excellent role models staff provide, encourages pupils to think very carefully about how others feel and about their own actions. Consequently their spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is outstanding.

Information about this school

Aldercar Infant and Nursery School is a smaller-than-average-sized infant school. Twenty six pupils attend its part-time Nursery in the morning and a further 26 in the afternoons. There are five other classes, including two Year 2 classes, one Reception class, one Year 1 class and a mixed Reception and Year 1 class.

The proportion of pupils from minority ethnic groups and those who speak English as an additional language is low. The proportion of pupils supported through school action is lower than average. The proportion supported at school action plus or who have a statement of special educational needs, is much higher than usual.

An above average proportion of pupils are known to be eligible for the pupil premium, which provides additional funding for pupils in local authority care, those known to be eligible for free school meals and those with a parent in the armed services. The school manages specially resourced provision for pupils with special educational needs. The Enhanced Resourced Facility for deaf and hearing impaired pupils (ERF) currently supports nine pupils.

Staff working in the facility use spoken language, sign-supported English and British Sign Language, according to pupils' needs. The headteacher is currently seconded two days per week to support other schools within the local authority. An acting headteacher, who is also an assistant headteacher, takes over on these days.