Mary Dean’s CofE Primary School and Nursery

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils enjoy coming to school.

The school provides many experiences to develop pupils' character. The range of clubs and activities help pupils to develop confidence. Pupils have a voice in the clubs on offer.

This helps the offer to be broad and interesting for them. Pupils are proud of their sporting achievements in the locality.

The school is ambitious for pupils, including those who are disadvantaged and pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND), to learn alongside one another.

However, the school has not fully implemented the curriculum as intended. Pupils do not learn the curriculum well or achieve as well as they should.... The school's expectations of pupils are not high enough.

This is not the case in the early years, where children receive a strong start to their learning and development.

Recent changes to the behaviour policy are having a positive impact. Pupils know the rules.

They show respect towards adults and one another. They learn and play together well. The school is developing effective support for those pupils who struggle to manage their own behaviour.

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

The trust has a clear understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of the school. It has acted swiftly to prioritise appropriate areas for development. The trust has been instrumental in supporting the school to design and implement a sequenced curriculum.

The impact of the trust and the school's work is beginning to be seen in a number of areas.

There are pockets of ambition and high expectations for pupils. However, these are limited to some areas of the school's work.

Pupils with SEND have their needs accurately identified. Individual learning plans are now better tailored to help close gaps for those pupils. The curriculum design and implementation in the early years are of high quality.

This provides a strong model for the whole school curriculum. Children in the nursery and Reception Year flourish. They know the routines and learn how to share and take turns.

Adults provide children with experiences that build their knowledge over time. The environments are set up to be exciting places of awe and wonder. Children sustain interest in the opportunities to consolidate learning and be curious.

They are well prepared for entry into Year 1.

Staff implement the phonics curriculum well. They follow an agreed and consistent approach to teaching phonics.

This benefits all pupils, but particularly those who struggle to keep up. These pupils receive effective support to catch up. Books match the sounds pupils know.

Adults focus on fluency as the goal beyond segmenting words and blending sounds. The impact of the developments in phonics has resulted in more pupils, including pupils with SEND, being able to read with confidence and fluency.

In many curriculum subjects, including mathematics, programmes are new or in their infancy.

As a result, the curriculum is not securely implemented. Curriculum content is taught in a logical order. However, in many subjects, including English, this knowledge is not clearly identified.

The work given to pupils does not match the aims and ambition of the curriculum. Consequently, teaching does not help pupils to build on what they know.

The school has invested in significant training and development for staff.

However, it does not check the impact of staff training on pupils' knowledge and understanding. The school does not know when the curriculum is implemented as it intends. In a number of subjects, the training that staff receive is not having the impact the school intends.

Where this occurs, pupils struggle to recall knowledge they have learned in the curriculum. While some remember more recent learning, most cannot remember previous years' learning.

Pupils learn about healthy relationships.

They understand some of the ways people can be different. This includes knowing about protected characteristics. Pupils show respect for these differences.

They understand and celebrate different cultures and faiths. Pupils know that tolerance and fairness are important values in modern Britain.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• In some subjects, the school has not identified the important content it wants pupils to learn. As a result, pupils do not build secure knowledge over time. The school and trust need to make sure that the content of the curriculum is clear so that pupils learn more and remember more.

• Staff do not have the subject and pedagogical knowledge they need in some subjects. This means they lack the expertise needed to teach the curriculum consistently well and support pupils sufficiently. The trust must ensure that professional development has the impact needed so that all pupils follow an ambitious and clearly sequenced curriculum.

• The school does not hold staff to account effectively to ensure that the curriculum is implemented as intended. This means that pupils' experience of the curriculum is too varied across subjects, year groups and within teams. The school and trust must ensure that they check with greater rigour how well the curriculum is implemented so that pupils experience the curriculum as the school intends.