Bidston Village CofE (Controlled) Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

Bidston Village School is a harmonious place where pupils feel valued and cared for.

Pupils enjoy coming to school. They develop strong and trusting bonds with their friends and with staff. Pupils told inspectors that this helps them to feel happy and safe at school.

Staff expect pupils to behave well and to be respectful. Pupils respond positively to these high expectations. This helps to ensure that the atmosphere throughout the school is calm and purposeful.

The school has high expectations of pupils' achievement. However, in some areas of the curriculum, pupils do not achieve as well as they should. The school has recently refined some subject curriculums....

Nevertheless, these new curriculums are in the early stages of delivery.

Pupils are active and responsible citizens. For example, they enjoy raising funds for different charities and worthy causes.

Pupils take their leadership roles seriously. For instance, they express their views confidently through the pupils' parliament and they demonstrate their maturity as anti-bullying ambassadors.

The school encourages pupils to develop their talents in different areas, including in sports and music.

Pupils benefit from educational visits to different local places of interest, as well as to museums. Older pupils look forward to their annual residential trip where they engage in different outdoor activities, such as rock climbing and abseiling.

What does the school do well and what does it need to do better?

The school has ensured that children in the early years, including those in the two-year-old provision, benefit from a strong and effective curriculum.

This helps to develop these children's language and communication skills well. However, the curriculum in key stages 1 and 2 is less effective. Consequently, some pupils do not learn as well as they should over time across the curriculum.

Some staff use effective strategies to help pupils to remember their learning. These staff also routinely check what pupils know and recall. Nonetheless, these checks and strategies are not used routinely across the school.

This means that some pupils struggle to recount essential facts and information. This makes it difficult for these pupils to make sense of new learning.

The school places reading at the centre of the curriculum.

Staff share books with pupils that reflect a wide variety of genres and a broad range of authors. Children in the Nursery class relish story time. Typically, they listen intently and join in with familiar storylines.

Older pupils enjoy reading. They look forward to attaining certificates for reading regularly.

The school ensures that well-trained staff deliver the phonics and early reading curriculums effectively.

Children in the early years learn phonics from the start of the Reception Year. Pupils read books that match the letters and sounds that they know. This helps them to develop fluency and accuracy in their reading.

Pupils who find reading difficult receive well-tailored support. This support helps these pupils to catch up quickly with their peers.

The school ensures that staff are suitably equipped to identify pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND).

When necessary, staff work closely with many different specialists to make sure that pupils receive timely and appropriate support. In the specially resourced provision for pupils with SEND, teachers adapt learning activities well so that pupils develop their knowledge and skills well in a range of subjects. Across the rest of the school, pupils with SEND successfully access the same learning as their peers.

Pupils have positive attitudes to learning. This starts with the two-year-old children who learn to share resources, persevere when tasks are tricky and listen carefully to adults. Pupils in the nurture base learn different strategies to help them better manage their own behaviour.

Pupils move around the school sensibly and safely. This helps to ensure that lessons proceed with minimal disruption.

The school promotes pupils' personal and social development well.

Pupils learn about different faiths and cultures. They told inspectors that they do not judge people because of where they are from or what they believe in. Pupils know how to maintain a healthy mind and body.

They participate in after-school clubs regularly and achieve success in sporting tournaments. Pupils also enjoy performing in concerts. They like to hone their skills in playing the guitar, xylophone, glockenspiel and clarinet.

Staff enjoy working at the school. They told inspectors that leaders and governors are mindful of their well-being, mental health and professional development. The training and support that staff receive helps them to deliver most areas of the curriculum well.

The school has strong links with the local community. Staff provide different opportunities for parents and carers to be involved in the education of their children. Parents are especially positive about the school.

Typically, they told inspectors that Bidston Village is a 'responsive' and 'caring' school.

Governors know what the school needs to do to further improve. They hold the school to account for pupils' academic achievement.

Governors have successfully supported the school to improve different aspects of the quality of education that pupils receive.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• The school has recently made adaptations to the curriculum in some subjects.

In these subjects, the roll out of this curriculum is in its early stages. Some older pupils have not benefited from these strengthened curriculums and therefore have some gaps in their knowledge. The school should ensure that teachers are equipped to identify and address the gaps in these pupils' knowledge before they move on to new learning.

• The strategies used by some staff to help pupils to remember their learning are not as effective as they could be. As a result, some pupils have not gained the knowledge and skills that they need to deepen their understanding. The school should ensure that staff receive the support that they need to help pupils remember essential knowledge long term.

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