St John Catholic Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

This is a good school The school has improved significantly since the last inspection because the executive headteacher and head of school are providing strong leadership, especially of teaching and learning. The school is well placed to develop further.

Senior leaders, other leaders and the governing body are providing good support in improving teaching and pupils' achievement. Leaders promote pupils' spiritual, moral, social and cultural development successfully, as well as their physical well-being. The quality of teaching has improved since the last inspection and teaching is now good.

Teachers are making good use of robust systems for assessing pupils' ac...hievements in English and mathematics. Their good subject knowledge and effective questioning enable pupils to acquire new knowledge, understanding and skills quickly. Children in the Reception class are now making good progress in the early years as a result of good teaching and good leadership.

This is leading to clear improvement in the proportion of children who are set to reach a good level of development at the end of the Reception Year. Pupils' behaviour in lessons and around the school is good. They enjoy school, their attendance is above average and they are punctual to lessons.

Good pastoral support promotes pupils' personal development and welfare effectively. It is not yet an outstanding school because : Teachers do not consistently implement the school's policy to ensure that all pupils respond to the advice given when their books are marked. Children in the early years are sometimes given insufficient guidance, so that they are not confident about what they need to do.

Tasks are sometimes too hard for lower attaining pupils, or too easy for higher attainers. Other than in English and mathematics, subject leaders have not fully developed systems to track and record pupils' attainment and progress within their subjects.

Information about this school

St.

John's Catholic Primary is smaller than most primary schools. Most pupils are White British and the proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is below average. The proportion of disadvantaged pupils who are eligible for the pupil premium is below average.

The pupil premium is additional funding provided by the government for pupils who are known to be eligible for free school meals and children who are looked after. The proportion of pupils who have special educational needs or disability is below average. The school meets the government's current floor standards, which set the minimum expectations for pupils' attainment and progress by the end of Year 6.

Since the previous inspection, the school received two monitoring visits by Ofsted to determine how much progress it was making in meeting its areas for improvement. There have been changes of headteacher and a significant turnover of staff. In September 2015, an executive headteacher, who leads St.

Joan of Arc Catholic School, was appointed to a part-time leadership role and the deputy headteacher was appointed as the new head of school. The schools have formed a soft federation together. The school works closely with a local education improvement partner school.

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