Park Hill Junior School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Main findings

Park Hill Junior School provides pupils with a good education. Pupils' attainment is high when they enter Year 3 and high when they leave at the end of Year 6.

Good, methodical teaching helps pupils of all abilities to make good progress. Pupils enjoy school, as indicated by their attendance, which is high compared with that of other schools nationally. They feel very safe within the school's caring environment and develop an excellent understanding of issues which might affect their safety.

They also have an excellent understanding of what they need to do to lead healthy lifestyles. Most pupils make sensible choices of food and participate enthusiastically in the very wide range of sporting ...activities which are on offer, as reflected in the school's Activemark and Healthy Schools awards. They have good social skills and are well prepared for the move to secondary school.

It would not take a great deal to turn Park Hill into an outstanding school. Some aspects of the school already point the way forward. For example, the school provides an excellent range of interesting, imaginative special events and extra-curricular activities which engage and motivate pupils.

However, the curricular plans which determine the day-to-day teaching do not reflect a similar willingness to try new ideas, to link the teaching of different subjects together and to be more adventurous. In some areas, pupils are given excellent opportunities to use their initiative and independence, and they flourish as a result. Many of the extra-curricular activities, for example, are run by the pupils themselves and attract widespread interest.

Within lessons, however, the work is more regimented and pupils do not have enough opportunity to undertake extended independent research or engage in larger-scale collaborative projects. The marking of pupils' work is regular; it normally points out to pupils what they have done well and gives them something to improve. However, feedback, orally and in writing, is not always critical enough to challenge and extend pupils, particularly the more able, to move to an even higher level.

The school has been through a difficult period and there have been a number of leadership changes since the previous inspection. However, staff, the governing body and pupils have shown resilience in maintaining high standards throughout. Entering into federation with the nearby infant school marks a new phase in the school's development.

The governing body has dealt skilfully with this major change and shown a strong determination to move the school forward and make the best use of the collective expertise available to the two schools. This determination, the maintenance of high standards and improvements over the last two years, particularly to the quality of the teaching, show that there is good capacity for further improvement.

Information about the school

Park Hill is an average-sized junior school.

There are two classes per year group for pupils from Years 3 to 6. The proportions of pupils known to be eligible for free school meals and of pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities are below average. Most pupils are White British.

Around 13% come from a wide range of minority ethnic backgrounds; around 5% speak English as an additional language, although none are at an early stage of speaking English. After two-and-a-half years with an acting headteacher and difficulties in recruiting a substantive headteacher, the governing body entered into a hard federation with Thorns Community Infant School in January 2011. A new governing body was established, incorporating new governors and those who had served on the governing bodies of the two federated schools.

An executive headteacher was appointed and took up her post to oversee the running of both schools in September 2011. The day-to-day management of Park Hill is overseen by a head of teaching and learning who was previously the school's acting deputy headteacher. The school holds the Activemark and Healthy Schools awards.