Codsall Middle School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

Codsall Middle School is a friendly and happy school.

Pupils are proud to be members of the school community. They enjoy coming to school and rarely miss a day. When pupils join the school, they settle quickly and feel very comfortable.

The school is a safe place. Pupils are kind towards each other, get on well together and understand that everyone is different. Leaders make sure that pupils treat each other with respect.

Pupils behave well in lessons and this allows their teachers to teach uninterrupted.

Lessons are exciting and help all pupils to do well. At the end of lunchtime, pupils are eager to get to their next lesson.

As lessons sta...rt, pupils are encouraged to practise mindfulness for a few minutes. This helps them to focus on what they are about to learn. At the end of the school day, the school is an exciting place to be.

Every day there are a wide range of activities for pupils to take part in, such as sports clubs, music groups and a debating club. Pupils make the most of these activities and attend them regularly.

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

The school provides a good quality of education.

Leaders want pupils to do as well as they can in as many subjects as possible. As soon as pupils join the school, they study the full national curriculum. Pupils move around the school for different lessons so that they can access specialist equipment.

For example, there are well-equipped science laboratories and design and technology classrooms. The majority of lessons are taught by teachers who are specialists in their subjects.

A year ago, leaders noticed that pupils were not doing as well as they could in English and mathematics.

Leaders have addressed this. Pupils are now doing much better in these subjects and achieve well. Leaders and teachers have made sure that the topics that pupils are learning are taught in a sensible order.

This enables pupils to use what they have learned in one lesson to help them in future lessons. This is also happening in subjects such as history. However, science is not taught as well.

Science lessons are not planned as carefully and do not always follow a logical order. Sometimes, the topics jump around meaninglessly, which confuses pupils.

In English, mathematics and history, teachers are improving the way they check what pupils can and cannot do.

This is helping them to plan their lessons so that every pupil can be successful, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities. This does not happen as well in science.

Pupils behave well in lessons.

They respect their teachers and they respect each other. When they are in lessons, they know that they are there to learn and they make the most of the opportunities that their teachers give them. They take pride in their work and they are keen to learn from their mistakes.

All staff want to make sure that pupils develop into confident, considerate and well- rounded people. They talk to pupils during assemblies and in lessons about their health and encourage them to make good choices. Leaders carefully plan activities and trips that give pupils a rich set of experiences to encourage kindness and thoughtfulness.

For example, pupils enjoy attending a fair-trade club where they can learn about helping those less fortunate than themselves.

Leaders engage with the local community well but they want to be even better at this. When they make changes in school, they consider how these changes may affect parents, carers and staff, for example by making sure that school reports have the information parents need to know, as well as not creating too much work for teachers.

Governors know what they need to do in their roles and are ambitious for their school. They work well with school leaders and ensure that any additional money they receive for pupils is spent well.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

Leaders make sure that staff are suitable to work with children. All staff receive appropriate training, which means that they know what to do to keep pupils safe. They are quick to spot the signs that a pupil may be at risk of harm.

They act quickly to ensure that pupils get the help and support they need.

Leaders provide strong support for the pupils who need it. Pupils feel safe in school and they know who to go to if they are worried or concerned.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

The curriculum in science is not well planned. Topics are not ordered in a logical sequence. When they plan, teachers do not give sufficient consideration to how topics link together.

This is preventing pupils from using their prior learning to help them in subsequent lessons. Therefore, leaders should ensure that the science curriculum is coherently planned so that pupils build upon their scientific knowledge and skills over time. .

Assessments are not always used effectively to check how well pupils have understood what they have learned. This is particularly the case in science, where assessments are typically used to check how well pupils can remember a specific set of facts and words. Leaders and teachers need to ensure that assessment is used to check the depth of pupils' understanding in a topic, rather than their ability to recall facts.