Heybrook Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Outcome

Heybrook Primary School continues to be a good school.

What is it like to attend this school?

Everyone is warmly welcomed to this school. Pupils from many different countries and backgrounds arrive at different times of the year.

Regardless of their past experiences, they benefit from every opportunity to be successful in their education. The school teaches pupils to celebrate their differences. Pupils said that learning about different cultures and religions helps them to treat each other with kindness and respect.

Staff have high expectations of the standards that pupils can achieve in their learning. Pupils work hard to meet these expectations. Pupils, including those w...ith special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND), typically achieve well because of the effective support that they receive.

Pupils, including children in early years, come to school with smiles on their faces. They know that staff take very good care of them. Right from the start of Nursery Year, children build strong relationships with staff.

This helps them to settle in quickly and feel happy and safe.

Pupils are excited to contribute to school life. They enjoy taking on responsibilities as play leaders and junior librarians.

The school encourages pupils to try out new things. For instance, pupils in the school choir look forward to performing on stage for an audience.

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

The school has strengthened the curriculum in recent years.

This reflects leaders' and governors' ambition for all pupils to experience a high-quality education. Some of the changes that the school has made, such as those in reading and mathematics, have rapidly become embedded. Pupils, including disadvantaged pupils, are learning increasingly well in these subjects.

In most subjects, the curriculum is well organised. Subject leaders have thought about how pupils build their knowledge from Nursery Year to Year 6. The curriculum in early years prepares children very well for their learning in key stage 1.

By the end of key stage 2, pupils typically achieve highly in national tests.

In a small number of subjects, improvements began more recently. The exact knowledge that pupils should learn has not been finalised.

As a result, teachers sometimes lack the clarity that they need to deliver these subjects well. This hinders how well pupils build up their knowledge in these subjects.

Staff are swift to identify any gaps in pupils' knowledge.

Staff expertly adapt their delivery of the curriculum to address these gaps before they can grow any wider. This helps pupils who have recently arrived at the school to catch up with their peers.

The school has ensured that teachers are skilled at supporting pupils with SEND to learn well.

This begins in Nursery Year, where highly trained staff identify any additional needs that children may have. This helps these children to get the support that they need as early as possible. Pupils who join the school later have their needs identified equally swiftly.

In all key stages, pupils with SEND succeed alongside their classmates.

Reading has a high priority across the school. Two- and three-year-olds in Nursery confidently recite rhymes and join in with songs.

This helps them get off to a flying start with their phonics learning at the beginning of Reception Year. Older pupils in key stage 2 spoke enthusiastically about the books that they have enjoyed.

Staff are experts in teaching pupils to read.

They deliver the phonics programme effectively. Most pupils read accurately and with increasing fluency by the end of Year 1. Skilled support from staff ensures that pupils who find reading difficult, including pupils who are new to learning English, can catch up quickly.

The school ensures that this support can continue at home, for instance by demonstrating to parents and carers effective ways to read with their children.

Pupils behave well. They attend regularly, follow routines promptly and are eager to learn.

Children in early years settle quickly. They learn to share and take turns. They continue to demonstrate this learning as they grow older.

If pupils do fall out with each other, staff take the opportunity to revisit pupils' learning about tolerance and respect. This leads to a calm atmosphere in the school.

The school provides carefully chosen opportunities to support pupils' personal development.

Pupils learn how to stay healthy and safe, for example by learning to ride a bike safely on the roads. Visitors to school help pupils to learn about the role of elected officials and the diversity of their local community.

Staff are overwhelmingly proud to work at this school.

They feel valued and supported, for example by the school's emphasis on reducing unnecessary workload. They said that leaders consult with them before making decisions that will affect them. Governors work closely with leaders to help the school to improve.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• In a few subjects, the building blocks of knowledge that pupils need for subsequent learning have not been fully defined. This means that teachers sometimes lack clarity about the knowledge that they should emphasise when they deliver the curriculum.

This hinders pupils in building up their knowledge in these subjects. The school should provide teachers with greater clarity about what pupils need to learn and remember.

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 an ungraded inspection, and it is carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. We do not give graded judgements on an ungraded inspection. However, if we find evidence that a school would now receive a higher or lower grade, then the next inspection will be a graded inspection, which is carried out under section 5 of the Act.

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

This is the first ungraded inspection since we judged the school to be good in March 2018.