Cleeve Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Outcome

Cleeve Primary School continues to be a good school.

What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils say that their school is a 'sensible, safe and calm place to learn'. All adults have high expectations of pupils' behaviour.

Relationships between pupils and adults are respectful.

Incidents of bullying are rare. Pupils say that they have an adult in school who they can speak to if they have any worries or concerns.

They say that adults resolve problems quickly. Pupils have great confidence in staff to keep them safe. Pupils value the care and support they are given.'

Open floor' sessions, led by the school's safeguarding team, give pupils the opportunity to... share their thoughts and feelings on a wide range of topics.

Pupils demonstrate the school values through their positive attitudes towards their work. They say that working hard helps them become more resilient and confident.

Pupils told the inspector that their work in mathematics 'challenges them to push themselves to their limits'. They enjoy this.

Pupils speak with pride about the roles they have in school.

Older pupils volunteer to be 'Cleeve buddies'. They take these roles seriously and enjoy helping younger pupils during lunchtimes. School councillors meet regularly with school leaders to share their ideas about improving the school.

They have recently designed and named their school attendance mascot to encourage better attendance.

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

Leaders are ambitious for all pupils. They ensure that staff are well trained in the school's phonics programme.

Teachers assess pupils' phonics knowledge and understanding regularly and accurately. Phonics teaching begins as soon as children join the school. Children in Reception get off to a strong start with their reading.

Leaders provide extra phonics support for pupils who need it. Pupils who are behind catch up quickly. The books pupils' read match the sounds they already know.

This is helping them to become fluent readers. However, leaders teach pupils the skills of comprehension at an early stage. In some cases, this is introduced to pupils too early and before they have become confident readers.

The mathematics curriculum is well established. Carefully sequenced mathematical topics help pupils to become confident mathematicians. Leaders and teachers use assessment well to identify any gaps in pupils' knowledge.

Teachers regularly check that pupils understand what they have been taught. They ensure that there are regular opportunities for pupils to review their learning. Because of this, pupils can recall what they have been taught.

Children in Nursery and Reception benefit from strong mathematics teaching. Teachers use books and rhymes to help pupils to count with confidence. Adults are skilled at asking questions to secure pupils' knowledge of number.

The activities that pupils complete provide plenty of opportunity for children to practise and rehearse counting. The classroom environment is rich with opportunities for pupils to explore numbers.

In subjects in the wider curriculum, such as geography, exciting topics motivate pupils.

Leaders have carefully sequenced the skills that they want pupils to learn and remember. However, the crucial content that pupils must learn is not consistently clear in curriculum plans. Teachers choose the content they want pupils to learn through the topics they teach.

As a result, there are gaps in pupils' knowledge and understanding.

The special educational needs coordinator supports teachers to make changes to the curriculum so that pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities can access the full curriculum alongside their peers. These pupils get effective support so that they achieve well.

The school's emotional literacy support assistants ensure that pupils' get the right support for their social and emotional needs.

Pupils benefit from a well organised personal, social and health education curriculum. Regular enrichment days give pupils invaluable experiences to learn about themes, such as diversity.

A well-planned relationships and sex education curriculum means that pupils have an age-appropriate understanding of healthy relationships. Leaders have acted quickly to restart clubs and activities that were interrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Leaders have continued to adapt and develop their curriculum so that it gives pupils rich and varied experiences.

Pupils have a clear understanding of the importance of fundamental British values. Pupils show respect and tolerance towards others.

Leaders and teachers benefit from partnership working with schools across the trust.

The local governing body holds leaders effectively to account. Leaders consider staff's workload. Teachers, who made their views known to the inspector, feel well supported by leaders.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

There is a strong culture of safeguarding. Leaders ensure that all necessary checks are carried out on staff to ensure that they are safe to work with pupils.

Staff receive regular safeguarding training. Their knowledge and understanding of how to keep pupils safe are strong. All staff understand their responsibilities to keep children safe.

Leaders work well with other agencies to provide timely help and support for families and pupils when required.

Pupils understand how to stay safe online. The school's curriculum helps pupils to understand how to keep themselves safe both online and offline.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• Despite teaching phonics well, leaders have chosen to teach comprehension skills to pupils who do not have secure phonics knowledge. As a result, time is lost that could be spent supporting pupils with learning new sounds. Leaders should review the timeliness with which the teaching of comprehension is introduced to pupils so that only those pupils who are fluent readers receive this.

• In some subjects in the wider curriculum, such a geography, leaders have not thought carefully enough about the content that pupils must learn and the order in which it should be taught. This means that teachers are not clear about what they should teach and when. Leaders should ensure that curriculum plans make clear the knowledge they want pupils to learn and the order in which they want pupils to learn it.

Leaders are taking action to address this. For this reason, the transitional arrangements have been applied.

Background

When we have judged a school to be good, we will then normally go into the school about once every four years to confirm that the school remains good.

This is called a section 8 inspection of a good or outstanding school, because it is carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. We do not give graded judgements on a section 8 inspection. However, if we find some evidence that a good school could now be better than good, or that standards may be declining, then the next inspection will be a section 5 inspection.

Usually this is within one to two years of the date of the section 8 inspection. If we have serious concerns about safeguarding, behaviour or the quality of education, we will deem the section 8 inspection as a section 5 inspection immediately.

This is the first section 8 inspection since we judged the school to be good in September 2016.