Saxon Wood School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils are happy to attend this school. Parents say their children smile when they talk about their education.

The morning routine runs like clockwork as staff create a positive start to the day. They skilfully help pupils with meeting individual health and care needs, including changes of positioning. This helps everyone settle quickly into learning.

Pupils thrive on the clear and predictable structure that carries on throughout the school day.

Every pupil is valued as a unique individual, and everyone shares the belief that each pupil has a right to their own voice. Leaders and staff work closely with therapists to support pupils to communicate effectively ...using a variety of bespoke approaches.

Pupils demonstrate highly considerate attitudes towards each other. They help out their classmates without question. The atmosphere around school is calm and purposeful.

Staff build strong and trusting relationships with pupils. Pupils rely on them to keep them safe and help them to achieve all they are capable of. Pupils have consistently positive attitudes toward their learning.

They persist in their learning and work hard. Pupils are rightly proud of their achievements. They celebrate their own and other pupils' successes with equal joy.

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

Leaders' aspirations are high. They resolutely ensure that limits are not placed on what each pupil could achieve. This ambition has led leaders to thoroughly review the curriculum offer.

From early years through to the older classes, pupils join a pathway of learning that is designed to deliver learning in line with their identified needs. Leaders have prioritised embedding the core subjects of English and mathematics. Because of this, some of the wider areas for learning and foundation subjects are not yet consistently fully planned and are currently under development.

As the curriculum offer has been reviewed and refined, aspects of the assessment systems are also still in development. The small steps in learning that pupils need to make have not been clearly defined across the whole curriculum. In some subjects, pupils' next steps lack precision.

This means that pupils are not always given time to consolidate their learning before moving on.

Leaders have a sharp focus on reading. For those pupils who are ready to learn to read, the teaching of phonics is a well established part of the curriculum.

Pupils enjoy these lessons, and over time, they become independent readers. Pupils in the early stages of learning braille are fully included in the lessons by skilled staff who adapt the resources with expertise. Other pupils are carefully taught to read important symbols for daily life.

Staff creatively deliver sensory stories and support pupils to enjoy and understand books. Many pupils proactively request their favourite books when they have an opportunity for free choice.

The early years curriculum is organised to encourage children to develop their curiosity.

Adults seek out opportunities to help children explore their interests and enhance their understanding of the world. Across the school, all pupils experience a broad range of learning activities. Throughout the day, staff seamlessly meet the medical and care needs of pupils, with minimal distractions from their learning.

A growing range of enrichment activities are being built into the curriculum offer. Pupils are enthusiastic about their horse-riding lessons. They are reflective about their progress and can share the important words they use to instruct the horses.

Members of the school council proudly represent the views of their classmates. They shared how they had organised recent coronation celebrations. Pupils make a strong contribution to the inclusive ethos of this school.

They consistently show kindness and patience to each other. This was exemplified during a group discussion. While one pupil persevered with their eye-gaze communication system to answer a question, another pupil calmly commented to the group 'let's all give her time, she is finding her words'.

All staff have high expectations of how pupils behave. For those pupils who need support to regulate their behaviour, very bespoke approaches are in place to meet their needs. Pupils were keen to share how they earn 'gold coins' for their positive attitudes.

Weekly assemblies give the opportunity to celebrate each other's achievements. Following a recent trip to local shops, pupils were complimented on their exemplary behaviour.

Governors have a strong sense of loyalty to the school.

They know how tirelessly leaders have worked to make improvements for the pupils. Staff feel these changes have been worthwhile. They appreciate the opportunities for training and development that help them to make a difference for the pupils.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

Leaders and staff know pupils and their families well. Carefully planned safeguarding training for all governors and staff happens regularly and accurate records of this are kept.

This means everyone is able to identify any signs that might mean a pupil is at risk. Pupils are also taught about how to stay safe, and they trust adults to listen to them.

Staff are vigilant and report all concerns to the safeguarding leaders without delay.

When families need help, leaders take swift action to get support in place. They have close links with other professionals and work effectively with them to support pupils' welfare.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• Leaders' work to revise the wider curriculum is still in development.

In some foundation subjects or wider areas of learning, leaders have not clearly identified the important knowledge and skills they want pupils to learn and when. This limits opportunities for some pupils to develop their understanding securely. Leaders need to ensure that teachers know what they should teach and when in each subject so that pupils fully develop their understanding over time.

• Leaders have not yet fully embedded a coherent assessment system that encompasses the small steps of progress that pupils need to make across the curriculum. This means that sometimes the targets set for pupils are not always the most important or valid next steps. Leaders need to ensure that the small steps of learning in each subject area are clearly articulated so that pupils can consolidate and generalise their learning before moving on.