Trinity Oaks Church of England Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Outcome

Trinity Oaks Church of England Primary School continues to be a good school.

What is it like to attend this school?

Parents and carers praise Trinity Oaks as an 'incredibly welcoming, nurturing school at the heart of our local community.'

The school's Christian ethos underpins everyday life and pupils' personal development is at the core of the curriculum. Pupils certainly enjoy their learning and value how easy they find it to make friends in this small school. Teachers support them well to develop confidence, resilience and a genuine respect for each other and the wider community.

Skilled early years staff enable children to progress well in Nursery and Reception. Older... pupils are proud to act as buddy readers or as leaders to support younger ones. As one pupil said, 'Everyone here is so kind.'



Staff know each pupil as an individual and foster warm relationships, so that pupils feel safe and secure at school. Pupils value the school rules and typically behave well here: any form of unkindness or inappropriate behaviour is rare. Pupils trust staff to resolve any worries they may have.

Despite the significant challenges related to the pandemic and staffing over the past year, the acting headteacher and staff have maintained high expectations of all pupils. Building on existing strengths, they have maintained a key focus on raising the standard of early reading and mathematics. Leaders know where there is further work to do in some subject areas and to enhance how well assessment is used.

The curriculum is broad, and pupils benefit from a range of after-school clubs, activities and visiting speakers. Trinity Oaks prepares pupils well for their next steps and future learning.

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

Despite significant disruption caused by both the COVID-19 pandemic and changes to senior leadership recently, leaders and governors have worked with the diocese and local authority to maintain and develop the curriculum.

Leaders know that their curriculum planning and assessment are not quite where they want them to be as not all subject leaders have had the time and training that they need. However, work has begun to implement new schemes and over the coming months, leaders have clear plans to strengthen how well some subjects, such as science and languages, are led.

Nevertheless, teachers demonstrate appropriate subject knowledge and deliver learning well across most subjects.

Working together, they discuss what to teach and follow plans diligently to ensure that there are appropriate sequences of learning. Visits to physical education (PE) lessons provided strong examples of this. Here, pupils are supported well over time to develop their knowledge and skills and they develop confidence to recall these and apply them in different contexts.

Leaders prioritise the promotion of early reading. Work to improve the teaching of reading is well under way, and a new scheme for teaching phonics is being embedded. Phonics is now taught in a largely consistent and systematic way in Reception and key stage 1, so that most pupils read well by the end of the key stage.

Children are supported to learn to love books. However, teachers' assessment is not always fine-tuned enough to precisely match the decodable books and age-appropriate books with which some pupils engage. Some pupils who struggle with their reading do not practise reading books that match exactly the sounds they know.

This prevents them from making swifter progress.

New leadership of mathematics has reinvigorated the subject this year. Provision for early mathematics is strong.

From Nursery up to Year 6, the curriculum is well sequenced and planned. Pupils enjoy mathematics and are proud to be able to apply their skills to their learning in other subjects. Teachers are consistent in their approach and typically ensure that pupils really understand what they are learning.

However, in mathematics, as in other subjects, refinements to assessment are needed to more appropriately challenge some of the most able pupils.

Typically, the provision for pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) is a strength and ensures that these pupils learn well in the school. The special educational needs coordinator carefully identifies individual pupils' needs and ensures that their progress is tracked well.

Across the school, teachers and teaching assistants work well together to use suitable strategies that help pupils with SEND to learn well alongside their peers.

Strong relationships exist between most parents and staff, and in-person communication is warm and welcoming. However, the frequency of some communications has been affected recently due to staff absences during the pandemic.

Leaders recognise that this, together with the recently reduced capacity of leadership, has left a minority of parents frustrated. These parents would like better communication, particularly about behaviour and/or provision for their child's SEND. Leaders and governors need to ensure that communication systems address these concerns.

Pupils behave well in class and around the school site. They know and respect the school's rewards and routines, so any disruption during lessons is rare. Pupils play happily and socialise well at break- and lunchtimes.

They are considerate of others and polite. Teachers ensure that Trinity Oaks promotes enthusiasm and equips children with communication skills and confidence. Pupils are well prepared for their next stage of education.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

Teachers ensure that developing pupils' resilience and well-being is at the heart of the curriculum. Staff know their pupils very well and offer a range of support to families.

Pupils know how to keep themselves safe outside school and when online.

Safeguarding leaders have suitable expertise in all aspects of safeguarding. Appropriate checks are made on all adults who work with the children in school.

Leaders coordinate an effective package of training for all staff. Leaders have created a culture of vigilance where adults respond swiftly should any pupils require extra help. Detailed monitoring enables leaders to source support from external agencies when necessary.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• The pandemic and recent changes in the senior leadership team have delayed leaders' plans to improve the curriculum in science and some foundation subjects. Here, subject leaders need to identify what key knowledge pupils need to know by when, so that better assessment underpins more effective progress. Currently, not all pupils' learning is fully maximised.

Recognising this, leaders and governors are committed to, and have begun, improving subject leadership. Consequently, the transitional arrangements have been applied. Leaders need to identify the exact content that teachers should deliver and how this knowledge will accumulate over time.

• Leaders' new phonics scheme is now rolled out across the school, but support for some of the weakest readers is not organised as well as it needs to be. As a result, some pupils who struggle with their reading do not progress swiftly enough. Leaders need to swiftly ensure that these pupils are using books that are more closely aligned with the sounds that they know in order to practise their reading skills.

• The majority of parents praise the communications from the school and recognise the many strengths that Trinity Oaks offers children. However, a small minority do not. The reduced capacity of senior leadership during the pandemic has left some parents feeling frustrated by communications that they feel could be better.

A few parents reported that their worries may not have been heard. Leaders and governors need to refine communication systems so that all parents feel fully involved and informed about their child's education.

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 a section 8 inspection of a good or outstanding school, because it is carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. We do not give graded judgements on a section 8 inspection. However, if we find evidence that a school would now receive a higher or lower grade, then the next inspection will be a section 5 inspection.

Usually this is within one to two years of the date of the section 8 inspection. If we have serious concerns about safeguarding, behaviour or the quality of education, we will deem the section 8 inspection a section 5 inspection immediately.

This is the first section 8 inspection since we judged the school to be good in March 2017.