Black Lane C.P. School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Black Lane Primary School is a caring and nurturing school. Senior leaders promote a vision that focuses on striving to ensure that everyone is happy, healthy and safe.

All staff share this vision. They are compassionate and support the needs of individual pupils well. As a result, pupils have high levels of well-being across the school.

Most pupils behave well in class and when moving around the school. At playtimes, nearly all pupils play well together and enjoy spending time with their friends. Within the positive learning environment, most pupils make good progress in all areas of learning during their time in school.

Pupils and staff enjoy being a part of Black Lane Primary and they are proud of their school.... Senior leaders, supported by governors, work diligently to evaluate the school's strengths and to identify areas in need of improvement. They plan for change effectively and have a strong track record of improving teaching and learning.

For example, they have improved provision to develop pupils' Welsh language skills. The support for pupils in need of additional help with their learning is a strength of the school. There are effective arrangements in place to identify and meet pupils' needs during their time at the school.

This supports pupils with additional learning needs (ALN) to make good progress in relation to their individual targets. Teachers plan exciting and engaging activities for pupils and learning is fun. Nearly all pupils are highly engaged in lessons.

Staff support pupils well to develop the skills they need to improve their own work. Teachers generally have suitable expectations for the standard of pupils' work and the progress they make. However, they do not always match the level of challenge well enough to pupils' capabilities, especially in the mixed age classes.

Senior leaders have supported staff to develop engaging learning areas outdoors, to further develop pupils' skills and opportunities to explore the natural environment. However, the provision for purposeful and meaningful outdoor learning, especially for older pupils, is at an early stage of development. The school collaborates well with parents and the local community.

Parents have beneficial opportunities to visit school and engage in their child's learning journey through regular 'come and see' sessions. Pupils enjoy the many opportunities to perform and to meet people that live and work in the local area, to enhance their learning experiences. Recommendations R1 Ensure that teaching and planned activities challenge all pupils and support them to make the progress of which they are capable of R2 Further develop outdoor learning experiences for pupils What happens next The school will draw up an action plan to address the recommendations from the inspection.