21 May 2015
Mrs Gill Gooch
St Mary and All Saints Church of England Voluntary Aided Primary School
Wensley Road
Coley Park, Reading
Berkshire, RG1 6DU
Dear Mrs Gooch
Special measures monitoring inspection of St Mary and All Saints Church
of England Voluntary Aided Primary School
Following my visit with Caroline Dulon Her Majesty’s Inspector to your school on 19
and 20 May, I write on behalf of Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education,
Children’s Services and Skills to confirm the inspection findings. Thank you for the
help you gave during the inspection and for the time you made available to discuss
the actions which have been taken since the school’s previous monitoring inspection.
The inspection was the second monitoring inspection since the school became
subject to special measures following the inspection which took place in October
2014. The full list of the areas for improvement which were identified during that
inspection is set out in the annex to this letter. The monitoring inspection report is
attached.
Having considered all the evidence I am of the opinion that at this time:
The school is making reasonable progress towards the removal of special measures.
The school’s improvement plan is now fit for purpose.
The school may not appoint newly qualified teachers before the next monitoring
inspection.
This letter and monitoring inspection report will be published on the Ofsted website.
I am copying this letter and the monitoring inspection report to the Secretary of
State, the Chair of the Governing Body, the Director of Children’s Services for
Reading and the Diocesan Director for Oxford.
Yours sincerely
Ann Henderson
Her Majesty’s Inspector
Tribal
Kings Orchard, One Queen
Street, Bristol
BS2 0HQ
Direct T 0117 311 5323
Direct email:suzy.smith@tribalgroup.com
Annex
The areas for improvement identified during the inspection which took
place in October 2014
Secure essential improvements to leadership and management at all levels by:
- implementing rigorous and effective systems for monitoring all aspects of the
school’s work,
- ensuring that self-evaluations are accurate developing the roles and
responsibilities of senior leaders, so they guide the work of the school and
challenge and support middle leaders and other members of staff
- effectively improving middle leadership so that it has greater impact on pupils’
achievement
- ensuring governors hold all leaders, especially the headteacher, properly to
account
- broadening and deepening the curriculum so that it fully meets the needs of
pupils
- ensuring that procedures for managing teachers’ performance are fully
effective and staff are held to account for their impact on pupils’ achievement.
Significantly improve teaching to raise the achievement of all groups of pupils in
all subjects by:
- raising teachers’ expectations for all pupils and groups of pupils so that work
is appropriately challenging and builds on what pupils already know and can
do
- ensuring teachers use assessment information to inform their planning so that
work set in lessons consistently meets the needs of pupils with differing
abilities
- developing teachers’ subject knowledge in all areas of the curriculum
- ensuring that activities in the early years are purposeful and relevant, helping
children to build on what they have already learned.
Improve pupils’ behaviour through:
- consistently setting and expecting high standards of behaviour so pupils are
ready to learn more quickly and know how to keep themselves safe
- urgently tackling incidents of bullying and racist behaviour.
An external review of governance should be undertaken in order to assess how
this aspect of leadership and management may be improved.
An external review of the school’s use of the pupil premium should be
undertaken in order to assess how this aspect of leadership and management
may be improved.
Report on the second monitoring inspection on 19 and 20 May 2015
Evidence
Inspectors observed the school’s work, scrutinised documents and met with the
interim executive headteacher, the head of school, staff, pupils, members of the
governing body, two representatives from the local authority and the diocesan
officer.
Context
Since the previous monitoring visit in January 2015, the headteacher has left the
school. The headteacher of Caversham Primary School has been appointed as the
interim executive headteacher for two days a week. The deputy headteacher is now
the head of school. The school business manager (SBM) left the school at the end of
January. A new SBM has been appointed. The post of assessment coordinator has
been created. A new senior leadership team has been established. This team
includes the executive headteacher, the head of school, two newly promoted
assistant headteachers, the special educational needs coordinator, the assessment
coordinator and the SBM. There are three new middle leaders: a mathematics
subject leader, an English subject leaders, and a leader responsible for the use of
pupil premium funding. Four teachers have left the school. Three part-time teachers
have joined, including a specialist music teacher. There is a supply teacher covering
the Nursery class and a part-time supply teacher in one of the Year 1 classes. One
teaching assistant, two early years practitioners and one welfare assistant have left.
One welfare assistant has become an early years practitioner.
Achievement of pupils at the school
Pupils’ achievement is not rising quickly enough. There are signs that the gap
between the achievement of pupils eligible for support through the pupil premium
funding (additional government funds for pupils in receipt of free school meals or in
local authority care) and all other pupils in the school is closing. Overall, too many
pupils are not making enough progress to catch up and reach levels of attainment
that are expected for their age. Currently, the school’s information shows that the
percentage of pupils on track to achieve Level 4 by the end of Year 6 remains below
the government floor targets. In most year groups, pupils are two terms behind in
mathematics and three terms behind in writing. There is a mixed picture of pupils’
progress across the school in reading, partly due to previous poor teaching of early
reading skills. As a consequence, some older pupils are unable to tackle unfamiliar
words well enough. Recently, the school has reintroduced a more systematic way of
teaching phonics (the sounds letters make) which is helping younger pupils to make
better progress. Older pupils who did not benefit from good quality teaching of
phonics remain one term behind where they should be in reading. The teaching of
reading to guide and probe pupils’ understanding of different texts is beginning to
show positive signs of improvement.
The quality of teaching
Teachers are beginning to plan lessons which more effectively meet the learning
needs of pupils with differing abilities in their classes. Some teachers are better able
to do this than others. In some classes, lower ability pupils struggle because tasks
do not take sufficient account of their different starting points. This hinders their
progress. In the same way, the most able pupils in some classes are not challenged
sufficiently well to make better progress because they spend too much time carrying
out activities that are too easy for them.
Teachers use their subject knowledge of literacy to build pupils’ spelling and
grammar skills. The use of technical language in literacy supports pupils’
understanding well. Pupils in Years 5 and 6 showed a good understanding of the use
of imperative verbs to persuade and adverbial phrases to capture the interest of the
reader. Sometimes in mathematics lessons, teachers do not use accurate
mathematical language which leads to misconceptions and errors.
The quality of pupils’ written work is showing signs of improvement. Teachers expect
pupils to set out their work neatly, with a clear and legible handwriting style. The
quality of teachers’ marking and feedback to pupils has improved since the
introduction of the new marking policy. Pupils understand the reason why their work
is highlighted in pink, showing what they have done well. They also know that where
their work is highlighted in green they need to make improvements. Teachers
provide useful feedback to help pupils know what they need to do to improve their
work. Pupils usually respond to this well.
In the early years, observations of children’s learning are used to plan their next
steps. Adults know the children well but do not always check on their understanding
well enough during activities that children choose for themselves. As a result,
opportunities to develop children’s learning through appropriately targeted questions
are sometimes missed.
Behaviour and safety of pupils
Pupils are positive about the recent improvement in behaviour in lessons and around
the school. They understand the new behaviour policy and like the reward system
which encourages them to behave well. During the inspection, pupils moved around
the school calmly and quietly. Pupils are polite and respectful to adults and each
other. They say they feel safe and know what to do and who to go to if they have a
problem. Pupils’ attitudes to learning are mainly positive in lessons. In a few lessons
where expectations were not always made clear or where the behaviour policy was
not consistently implemented, some off task behaviour was observed.
Attendance is slightly higher than in the last academic year. Even though school
leaders have emphasised the importance of a punctual start to the school day, too
many pupils still arrive late. This is a concern because pupils miss vital learning time
when they arrive late and the learning of those who are punctual is interrupted too.
Although pupils say that bullying still exists occasionally, they have a much better
understanding of what constitutes different types of bullying and know what to do if
it occurs. The anti-bullying week held in the spring term raised their awareness and
also informed parents about the procedures for tackling bullying at St Mary and All
Saints.
The quality of leadership in and management of the school
There has been a number of changes in the leadership of the school. The recently
established new leadership team has strengthened the school’s ability to tackle the
areas needing improvement. The school improvement plan now provides a clear set
of actions to promote improvement. The plan would benefit from more sharply
focused steps to measure its success, closely linked to the difference the actions are
expected to make towards improving pupils’ achievement. School leaders are now in
a better position to address weaknesses in the curriculum and regularly check on the
quality of teaching. However, because senior leaders are very new to their roles and
responsibilities, the impact of their work is limited. Training to develop their
leadership skills is underway.
The interim executive headteacher and head of school are working well together to
establish a clear and systematic process for monitoring the quality of teaching,
checking the quality of pupils’ work and gathering accurate information about pupils’
achievement. The assessments teachers make on pupils’ learning and progress are
being checked by senior leaders and groups of teachers from other schools. This has
resulted in a more accurate picture of the standards pupils are reaching. A new
system to track the progress that pupils make has been implemented. Teachers have
a better understanding of the progress that pupils are making. Regular meetings
between teachers and senior leaders identify pupils who are falling behind. Teachers
and school leaders discuss and agree a range of strategies to begin to help pupils
catch up. The new curriculum leader, in discussion with all teachers, is developing a
more structured, broad and appropriately balanced curriculum for all year groups.
This is due to be completed at the start of June.
The review of governance has been completed. There were many positive aspects of
the work of governors. However, the structure of the committees is being reviewed.
The governing body’s strategic committee is meeting more regularly to check on
pupils’ progress. Governors are questioning school leaders more thoroughly and
gathering information themselves through visits to the school and discussions with
staff. School leaders are checking on the performance of staff more systematically
and have tackled some underperformance. Governors know that procedures for
managing the performance of teachers effectively are not in place.
A review of the use of pupil premium funding has also been completed. The review
identified a wide range of issues for school leaders to address. An officer from the
local authority is working alongside the pupil premium leader to ensure that the
current allocation of funding is targeted effectively and to evaluate the impact of last
year’s funding. Leaders and governors know that this information must be made
publicly available on the school website.
A meeting was held for parents in the spring term so that they could better
understand what the school needs to do to improve. A parents’ forum has been
established so that parents and staff can work together to improve the school.
External support
The local authority is providing a range of support and guidance for school leaders
and teachers. The English and mathematics advisers are working alongside teachers
to improve aspects of teaching. However, the impact of their work to rapidly improve
pupils’ progress is yet to be seen. The diocesan adviser continues to support school
leaders and the religious education leader to prepare for their next statutory
inspection of Anglican and Methodist schools.
