White Hall Academy and Nursery

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils here are well cared for. They have positive relationships with staff.

Pupils know that their teachers will help and listen to them. They are confident to share any concerns they may have.

The school sets high expectations for pupils' behaviour.

Pupils reflect these in their positive and respectful behaviour, both in and out of lessons. Pupils demonstrate the school's values of 'be kind, be safe, be responsible' throughout the school day.

Pupils enjoy learning new knowledge in their lessons.

Staff have high ambitions for pupils. This motivates them to concentrate and try their best. Pupils listen well to their teachers.

They v...alue education and know why it is important. This helps them to develop their confidence across the curriculum.

Pupils benefit from a range of carefully designed activities.

They enjoy the different clubs on offer, such as science, art or 'Shakespeare Club'. These help pupils to learn new skills and develop their interests. This wider offer helps pupils to think about their next stages of learning.

For example, older pupils benefit from visiting local universities and businesses as part of the 'IntoUniversity' scheme. This helps to broaden pupils' experiences outside of their local area.

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

The school has set out the important knowledge and skills that pupils need to learn.

In most subjects, this knowledge has been broken down into small steps. This helps teachers know what to teach and when to teach it. It also helps teachers to check whether pupils have any gaps in their knowledge.

However, in a few subjects, the school has not broken down this important content into small enough steps. In these instances, pupils find it hard to make connections between what they have already learned and what they are learning now. This means they do not secure their understanding of important content as well as the school would like.

Pupils start to read as soon as they join the school. Reading lessons help pupils to learn the sounds that letters make. They ensure that pupils can blend these sounds together to read words and sentences.

Teachers make daily checks on how well pupils are learning to read. They match reading books well to the sounds pupils know. This helps the school to provide swift and effective additional support for pupils who need to catch up.

There are, however, occasions when conflicting approaches to learning to read are taught to pupils. This leads to inconsistencies in how well pupils learn to read unfamiliar words. Despite this, overall, pupils achieve well with their reading.

Reading lessons continue into key stage 2. Older pupils enjoy the wide selection of books that teachers introduce them to.

The school has trained staff effectively to identify and support pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND).

Where appropriate, staff make subtle adaptations to the curriculum, such as providing additional resources in mathematics. This helps pupils with SEND to access their learning. The school works closely with external experts to make sure that pupils with SEND receive the right kind of support.

This is a key strength.

In the early years, staff have prioritised children's language and vocabulary development. This helps children begin to understand and use key words, such as 'polar' and 'winter', when talking about their topic work.

Children quickly learn and understand the consistent routines and expectations for behaviour. This prepares them well for learning in Year 1.

The curriculum teaches pupils about healthy living.

This helps to prepare pupils to make positive choices as they move to their next stages of learning. Pupils celebrate diversity and equality through experiencing a wide range of culturally diverse texts and events. For example, learning about dance, food, music and art during a Mayan workshop deepened older pupils' learning about this civilisation.

Pupils are given opportunities to be leaders and are given a voice. For example, they worked with the local governing body to improve play equipment in the playground.

Governors and trustees support leaders to prioritise education and well-being.

Trust leaders are instrumental in providing support and professional development for staff. Staff share best practice with one another. This helps to create consistency and grows expertise within the school and trust.

It also helps staff to feel well supported. Parents greatly appreciate the work of the school. As one parent said, 'Staff at White Hall go above and beyond.'



Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• In a few subjects, the school has not broken down the broad knowledge and skills pupils need to learn into smaller steps. As a result, lessons in these subjects do not routinely build on pupils' prior learning.

This makes it hard for pupils to make links between what they already know and what they are currently learning. The school should ensure that it breaks this important content down into the building blocks of knowledge pupils need to know and remember so that pupils are better able to secure their understanding of important content. ? The school is in the process of changing its approaches to the teaching of phonics.

There are occasions when staff do not teach pupils consistent strategies for reading new and unfamiliar words. This means there are times when pupils do not become as fluent as quickly as they might. The school should ensure that it continues to provide the ongoing training and support staff need in how to teach consistent strategies for reading.

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