Exeter House Special School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

This is a good school From their often very low starting points, pupils make consistently good, and sometimes outstanding, progress.

Children make an excellent start in the Reception class. Lessons are carefully planned and include a wide range of lively activities. Provision in the sixth form is often outstanding and pupils are given increasingly good opportunites to prepare for life after school.

The headteacher, supported by the other senior leaders, sets high expectations for pupils' development and is effective in checking the quality of teaching to ensure these are achieved. The staff are constantly engaged in trying to improve their teaching in the ligh...t of pupils' mounting levels of need. As a result, they increasingly produce lessons where learning is individual for each pupil.

The support from most teaching assistants is a strong feature of the school's work. Pupils are extremely well cared for. They feel secure.

The behaviour of pupils improves from the day they start at the school. Pupils' behaviour and attitudes are outstanding, in lessons and around the school. Pupils are enabled to become mature and sensible members of their school community.

The range of subjects and activities offered provides a good breadth of experiences in lessons and through enrichment activities. Members of the governing body know the school very well and provide consistent support and challenge to drive improvement. The school has received very effective support from the local authority in the last two years.

This support is now more appropriately of a light touch nature. Parents and carers greatly appreciate the good progress their children make. It is not yet an outstanding school because : There is not yet enough outstanding teaching to result in all pupils making rapid progress.

The much improved assessment systems are not yet consistently applied across the school. Middle leaders are not yet being enabled to make a full and effective contribution to whole school development.

Information about this school

Exeter House is an average-sized special school.

The school caters for pupils with severe and profound multiple learning difficulties. A significant number has autism spectrum disorders. All pupils enter school with a statement of special educational needs, with an increasing proportion having sensory and physical disabilities along with more complex learning needs.

There are many more boys than girls on roll. Most pupils are from White British backgrounds and almost all speak English as their first language. Almost half of the pupils are supported by the pupil premium (additional government funding for pupils who are known to be eligible for free school meals, who are looked after by the local authority or whose families are in the armed forces).

This is above the national average. More pupils join or leave the school at times other than the usual points of transfer than in most schools. The school has recently undergone an extensive building project, completed in September 2012.

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