Canvey Junior School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

Canvey Junior School is a place where pupils flourish. Staff have pupils' best interests at heart and care deeply for them. This has led to mutually supportive relationships with families.

Pupils actively welcome everyone here, looking to celebrate their differences and unique qualities.

The school's motto 'together everyone achieves more', is embodied in the high expectations for both the academic and social skills that pupils develop at the school. Pupils, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities, (SEND), typically rise to these expectations.

Throughout the school, behaviour is exemplary. Older pupils set an excellent example to yo...unger ones by walking sensibly around the school. The younger children soon adopt the routines.

Classrooms are hives of learning activity. Pupils enjoy learning and they contribute enthusiastically during lessons.

Pupils benefit from inspiring activities for their personal development.

Pupils think hard about the 'big questions' that they regularly encounter. They develop the maturity and language to communicate with clarity. This grows over time, for example, as they learn to speak in front of their peers and in public at local poetry reading festivals.

Pupils relish the opportunity to represent their school in sports competitions and a wide range of after-school activities.

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

The school have shown relentless determination to create a school where pupils thrive. Leaders have drawn upon a wide range of research and practice to inform their thinking about the curriculum.

They have designed a highly ambitious and exciting curriculum. All pupils learn this curriculum, including those pupils with SEND.

Pupils across the school develop a love of reading.

Pupils learn to read and recite poetry and enjoy selecting books for themselves from their well-stocked school library. On joining the school, reading is assessed to identify needs. Pupils at the early stage of reading receive prompt additional help to enable them to catch up rapidly with how to break up the sounds of words.

They then learn more complex groups of letters and sounds. This enables pupils to read with success and confidence. All staff are trained well in this aspect.

There are a few pupils who are able to read but, while this is the case, they do not understand the meanings of some words, indicating that their vocabulary and comprehension of unfamiliar words need further work.

In most subjects, staff use their strong subject knowledge to plan lessons that engage pupils. Pupils across the school are supported to make connections with earlier learning.

This helps pupils to remember what has been taught and to deepen their understanding over time.Pupils with SEND achieve extremely well. The school effectively caters for those pupils in the school's specialist provision for pupils with social, emotional and mental health (SEMH) needs.

Teachers make careful adaptations that enable these pupils to access the curriculum. Parents are fully involved in this process. As a result, pupils with SEND are successfully prepared for the next stages of their learning.

Pupils' positive behaviour around the school is exceptional. Their mature attitudes to learning contribute significantly to their ability to learn well. There is very little if any disruption to learning.

Pupils enjoy school and maintain regular attendance.

The personal development of pupils is exceptional. Pupils develop an extremely well-developed understanding of difference and diversity in their community and the wider world.

They know and respect, for example, that family structures may be different from their own. The school deepens pupils' knowledge about democracy through elections for student leadership positions and thoughtfully planned visits to the Houses of Parliament. The school prepares pupils well for life in modern Britain.

Leaders, including governors, know the school's strengths and areas for development exceptionally well. They ask robust and challenging questions and hold leaders to account. Prompt and well-considered action is taken to address any areas that need further attention.

Staff are proud to work at this school. They appreciate the many professional development opportunities they receive.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• Occasionally, pupils do not understand the vocabulary in the texts the school provides. As a result, some pupils do not understand the text or the full question asked of them. The school should ensure that gaps in pupils' vocabulary knowledge are addressed effectively and quickly, so that the pupils know the meanings of the words that they encounter.

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