Padnell Infant School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Outcome

Padnell Infant School continues to be a good school.

What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils speak with great enthusiasm and affection about their school. Leaders have high expectations of them. Pupils work hard, behave well and follow the school's 'GROW' values of 'giving citizens', 'resilient learners', 'original thinkers' and 'wise workers' every day.

Pupils are inquisitive and they enjoy learning all the different subjects. Leaders are particularly proud of the opportunities pupils have beyond the classroom. Forest school is relished by pupils and staff alike.

This learning also helps develop the pupils' intrinsic care for the environment. Leaders provide pupils ...with a variety of after-school clubs. School trips relate well to what is being learned in classrooms.

For example, pupils visit Portchester Castle and the SeaCity Museum as examples of local history projects.

Around the school, everyone is calm and well mannered, making a positive atmosphere for learning. Pupils show kindness to their friends to help everyone enjoy their learning.

While leaders do keep an eye out for unkind words or actions, staff, pupils and parents agree there is no problem with bullying presently. Staff treat pupils who need specific behaviour support or those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) with care and sensitivity.

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

Leaders are very ambitious and want all pupils to achieve the best they can.

All subject leaders prepare their subject curriculums with care and precision. This enables teachers to be able to deliver a high-quality curriculum, that includes the key knowledge, skills and vocabulary pupils need to learn.

Teachers deliver lessons effectively so pupils can learn new knowledge and how to use it.

Adults check how well pupils are learning throughout lessons. Work in pupils' books demonstrates their pride and that they are learning what their teachers want them to. Pupils show resilience and will keep going with a task until they are confident that they are doing it correctly.

For example, pupils kept trying when finding the difference between two small weights in mathematics. However, there are some inconsistencies in how well pupils achieve. This is because some of the subject curriculums are relatively new and have not been fully embedded yet.

While pupils' knowledge is developing across the curriculum, learning does not meet the expectations of subject leaders in all subjects for all pupils.

Leaders prioritise the need for pupils to learn to read well. Despite the recent change in the phonics scheme, all staff use consistent methods, such as using the 'phonics arm', to support the separating of individual sounds in a word.

Leaders have ensured most pupils have a book they can read fluently. Leaders recognise that some pupils need to read more frequently to improve their fluency. To help this, leaders are recruiting volunteers to give pupils more opportunities to read in school.

There is strong provision for pupils with SEND, which parents recognise. Pupils with individual plans are set clear targets about what they need to achieve next. Some pupils with SEND can articulate how the daily support they receive helps them with their learning.

However, leaders agree that sometimes pupils with SEND are set tasks that do not enable them to learn as well as they could.

Most pupils behave very well, both in classrooms and on the playground. Staff reward pupils with a 'golden acorn' for exceptional personal effort in a piece of work or in their behaviour.

In the weekly celebration assembly, the headteacher takes great delight in reading aloud all the names in the 'golden acorn book' to the whole school.

Pupils' early leadership skills develop through a variety of class and school responsibilities. Older pupils from the linked junior school enjoy returning to support the younger pupils at lunchtimes.

Pupils also enjoy Friday lunchtimes in the summer, where they can play together on the field with the older junior pupils too. Leaders are also keen to give pupils opportunities beyond the norm. A music club run by Hampshire Music Service provides an opportunity for some to develop their early musical promise, while all Year 2 pupils had a skiing taster session last year.

Governors monitor and support the impact of the staff's work with diligence. Leaders also keep a close eye on staff and pupils' well-being. They do this to help everyone learn and flourish.

As one parent commented, '[I'm] so impressed with Padnell Infant. They have been consistently supportive, very responsive to questions and feedback and always seem to have the best interests of the children at heart.'

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

Leaders, including governors, have created a strong safeguarding culture. All staff understand the procedures to keep pupils safe, as training is thorough. This enables staff to identify and raise concerns without delay.

Leaders are swift when they need to act further to keep pupils safe from harm.

Pupils know they can talk to a trusted adult if they are worrying about something. Pupils learn how to keep themselves safe.

For example, they learn how to light fires carefully as part of forest school. Importantly, they are also taught the risks of this and what to do if something goes wrong.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• Leaders have recently made considerable changes to what pupils learn across the curriculum.

As a result, not all pupils have yet acquired the full subject-specific vocabulary, knowledge and skills in all subjects. Leaders need to ensure all teachers implement the intended curriculum effectively and routinely check how well pupils are learning the essential knowledge leaders want them to, including pupils with SEND.

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 second ungraded inspection since we judged the school to be good in July 2013.

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