Russell Scott Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils enjoy and benefit from the warm and friendly culture at Russell Scott Primary School. They look forward to coming to school.

The school has high expectations of what pupil should achieve. Pupils are encouraged to 'reach high and go far'. They benefit from a broad range of opportunities to learn about different subjects.

As they move through the school, their knowledge develops securely so that they achieve well.

Pupils enjoy high-quality relationships with staff. They appreciate the interest that staff take in them.

Pupils receive sensitive care and support when they face challenges in their lives and learning.

Pupils learn about how ...important it is to be kind to others. This helps them to form and maintain friendships.

Staff quickly help pupils to overcome disagreements when they occur.

Pupils learn how to look after themselves. For example, staff support pupils to understand their feelings.

Pupils particularly enjoy the sporting life of the school, including daily opportunities to participate in different games at playtime or lunch.

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

The school ensures that pupils, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) and those in the specially resourced provision for pupils with SEND (specially resourced provision), receive a well-balanced education that takes account of their starting points and needs. For the most part, this ensures that pupils develop the knowledge that they need to progress well through the curriculum.

Consequently, when pupils reach the end of Year 6, they achieve well and are ready for the next stage of their education.

The school ensures that subject curriculums are ambitious. Staff are clear about the knowledge that pupils should learn.

Pupils learn content in a sensible order.

Staff, including those in the early years, use well-matched resources to help children and pupils learn subject content. For example, children in the Nursery and Reception classes use different objects to help them count with confidence.

Older pupils make strong links between reading and writing because staff introduce them to carefully chosen texts to model different writing styles.

Staff confidently use their well-honed subject knowledge to explain curriculum content clearly. Across subjects, pupils usually benefit from appropriate activities.

For example, staff in the early years help children to talk about and explore what they are learning. Elsewhere, pupils have well-designed opportunities to practise and recap what that they have learned. Staff make effective use of assessment strategies to identify what pupils know and remember.

They use this information well to address gaps in pupils' knowledge. This helps pupils gain more knowledge as they move through Years 1 to 6.

In recent years, the school has strengthened its approaches to early reading.

However, these recent changes have not had enough time to impact on published data. The unvalidated data shows that, in 2023, many pupils did not reach the expected standard in the Year 1 phonics screening check. That said, pupils are making greater gains in developing their phonics knowledge.

Children in the early years quickly experience a range of opportunities to develop their language and communication. For example, staff pique children's interest with stories, rhymes and songs. Children in the Reception class and pupils in key stage 1 benefit from well-structured opportunities to acquire their knowledge of sounds and letters.

Staff carefully match reading resources to the sounds that pupils are learning. They check pupils' learning carefully to quickly identify gaps in pupils' phonics knowledge. Staff refine what pupils learn next and provide additional targeted support for those pupils who struggle to keep up.

Pupils are encouraged and supported to read in school and at home. As they move through the school, pupils grow to enjoy taking part in reading events and competitions. From these, many pupils gain a love of reading different types of books.

Some children join the Nursery or Reception classes without some of the behaviours and knowledge that they need to learn well. This affects the attention and listening skills of some children. The school identifies these gaps promptly.

Staff design a range of opportunities to help many children make suitable gains in their social, emotional and physical development. This helps the majority of children to quickly benefit from the early years curriculum. However, a minority do not overcome their barriers to learning fast enough.

This impedes their success in some areas of learning and hampers their readiness for Year 1.

The school appropriately identifies the needs of pupils with SEND, including those in the specially resourced provision. Staff support these pupils to progress well through the curriculum.

Pupils are well guided about how they should behave. Staff show pupils how to be polite and courteous. Pupils develop these traits quickly.

This helps pupils to cooperate well with staff and to work and play with others harmoniously.

Pupils benefit from well-connected opportunities to support their social, moral, spiritual and cultural development. Carefully focused lessons, trips and visits help pupils to understand how to develop relationships, value people and be a positive member of their community.

The school's thoughtful consideration of staff's workload ensures that staff make a positive contribution to the development of the curriculum. Staff are suitably supported to develop their practice. However, this support is more developed in some subjects than in others.

In some subjects, the school has begun to establish more effective checks on the quality of education. In these subjects, staff benefit from useful insights into their strengths and areas for development. In other subjects, this practice is at an earlier stage of development.

This means that teachers do not receive the advice and guidance that they need to improve their delivery of these subject curriculums.

Governors are suitably experienced and knowledgeable. This ensures that they undertake the full range of their responsibilities effectively.

They hold the school to account effectively. In doing so, they promote a culture of support and close engagement with all parts of the school community, including staff, pupils and parents and carers.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• Some children in the early years do not develop their attention and listening skills quickly enough. This affects how quickly they gain phonics knowledge and, as a result, how quickly they gain knowledge in other subjects. The school should ensure that staff are well equipped to support children to overcome their barriers to learning so that they progress well through the early years curriculum.

• In some subjects, the checks on the quality of education are not as effective as they are in other curriculum areas. In these subjects, staff do not get a rich insight of how to strengthen their practice. The school should ensure that staff benefit from advice and guidance about how to strengthen their practice across all of the subjects that they teach.