Halstead Community Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

At this school everyone is made to feel welcome.

Staff and pupils are caring, respectful and accepting of others. Pupils, including children in the early years work and play alongside one another positively, regardless of differences or needs. The school encourages pupils' enthusiasm for learning.

It is ambitious for what pupils can achieve. Pupils are keen to learn and share what they know. Most pupils achieve well, ready for the next stage of education.

The school ensures expectations for pupils' behaviour and attitudes are clear. Consequently, pupils know what is expected of them in terms of conduct. They are proud when rewarded for their efforts and achie...vements.

Throughout the school, pupils behave well, classrooms are calm, children in the early years settle quickly into their routines. Pupils are happy and feel safe.

The school values its place in the community.

It is proud of the locality it serves. Pupils have extensive opportunities to visit and participate in their local and wider community. For example, joining arts and craft activities at a residential care home for the elderly, performing in pantomimes at local theatres or working with local secondary schools to enhance their learning in science.

The school also provides a strong offer of broader opportunities. These include performing Shakespeare on a stage, making a boat which floats on a river or playing golf. These opportunities help pupils to develop their confidence and resilience.

The school ensures all pupils take part in a range of exciting and interesting experiences.

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

Since the school's previous inspection, the school and the trust have taken decisive and effective action to improve the quality of the school's curriculum. The school's curriculum is ambitious and aspirational.

The school has mapped out what it wants pupils to learn and the order it should be taught.

In the early years, children practise their skills independently and with others in the well-structured indoor and outside spaces. This helps them to remember important information.

Children engage with and concentrate well on activities because they are purposeful and linked to their learning. Teachers explain new learning clearly. Lessons have established structures and routines.

In lessons, pupils revisit and practise what they already know. This means most pupils recall effectively and develop their knowledge over time.

Teachers carefully consider, what pupils already know and can do.

They adapt learning to ensure pupils have the foundational knowledge to learn new and more complex ideas and skills. However, on a few occasions, adaptations to learning resources or activities, is not sharply tailored to the individual needs of some pupils.

Reading is prioritised.

Pupils have opportunities across the day to practise reading. Books are matched to pupils' abilities. This helps pupils develop their fluency and further enhances their enjoyment of reading.

Staff are knowledgeable about how children learn to read. The systems in place check pupils' reading knowledge and skills. Support is put in place to help those pupils falling behind to catch up and keep up.

The school works with a range of professionals both across the trust and externally, to learn and improve. Staff value this collaborative working. This includes the use of professionals to assess and understand the needs of pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND).

This partnership approach enables staff to identify, and put in place swiftly, the right support needed. Pupils with SEND learn and play alongside their peers. They are included in all aspects of the school.

In the early years, children quickly build positive working relationships with the staff team. Staff support children to manage their emotions and develop their understanding of sharing. As pupils move through the school, these positive working relationships continue.

Staff get to know pupils well and act swiftly if pupils are worried or upset. Learning is rarely disrupted by behaviour in classrooms.

The school has carefully thought about pupils' personal development, including how they help prepare pupils for their future lives in modern Britain.

Through opportunities such as growing and selling vegetables, pupils are taught how to budget. They learn about what it means to be financially secure. Pupils become members of the eco or school council.

All pupils have the opportunity to represent their school at sporting events and competitions. This encourages pupils to become responsible citizens.

Pupils enjoy coming to school.

They enthusiastically talk about being driven in a limousine for the schools' film festival or attending educational trips to museums and galleries. However, some pupils miss out on these opportunities because of poor attendance. The school monitors attendance effectively identifying pupils whose attendance falls below expectations.

It works closely with parents and carers to ensure they understand the impact poor attendance has on pupils personal and academic outcomes. For some pupils attendance is improving over time.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• On occasion, adaptations to learning activities and resources to support pupils' learning lack precision and do not meet their needs. This means that some pupils do not have the right support to practise, strengthen and develop new knowledge and skills. The school should ensure that teachers have the skills to adapt learning opportunities successfully so that all pupils are well supported in their learning.

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