Worfield Endowed CofE Primary School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Short inspection of Worfield Endowed CofE Primary School

Following my visit to the school on 26 June 2018, I write on behalf of Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Education, Children's Services and Skills to report the inspection findings.

The visit was the first short inspection carried out since the school was judged to be good in March 2014. This school continues to be good. The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection.

Since the previous inspection, the school has federated with two other local schools. In March 2014, you were approached by the diocese and local authority to support a school in challenging circumstances. You readily took on this... challenge and used your skills and expertise to build a strong executive leadership team.

In the autumn term 2015, a further school joined the federation. You are now executive headteacher to three schools, which are known as The Trinity Federation. You are ably supported by an informed and effective governing body for the federation.

You have created a calm and purposeful learning environment for pupils and staff. Pupils are happy and achieve well across the school. Children get off to a good start in early years, and results at the end of the Reception Year have been above the national average over the last three years.

Attainment in phonics in Years 1 and 2 is also strong, with almost all pupils reaching the expected level. In 2017, attainment at the end of key stage 1 and key stage 2 was above the national average, demonstrating that pupils are well prepared for the next stage in their education. You have successfully addressed the key issues identified at the previous inspection.

Pupils are confident and given strategies to attempt more challenging work. You have continued to ensure that teaching is good and that pupils behave well and develop into well-rounded individuals. Pupils are polite and respectful and enjoy the wide range of curriculum topics and opportunities afforded to them.

However, there is further work to be done in making sure that work is set at the right level for pupils of different abilities, especially for disadvantaged pupils and those who have special educational needs (SEN) and/or disabilities. Further development is needed in relation to pupils' reasoning skills in mathematics so that a greater proportion can demonstrate that they are working at greater depth. Relationships with parents and carers are positive overall.

However, a small minority of parents have concerns about the leadership and management of the school and would not recommend it to other parents. This acts as a barrier to their engagement with you and your staff. Safeguarding is effective.

There is a strong safeguarding culture in the school. This is because you ensure that health and safety are 'everyone's responsibility'. You ensure that you and your designated safeguarding leaders keep your knowledge and skills fully up to date.

You also provide training for all staff and governors to ensure that they know precisely what to do if they have any concerns about pupils. You are rigorous in following up cases in which there are ongoing or serious concerns about a child's welfare. Record-keeping is thorough and records are stored securely.

Together with your governors, you carry out all checks needed when appointing staff to make sure that they are suitable to work with pupils. Risk assessments are carried out for school activities to minimise and avoid potential dangers. Pupils said that they feel safe and have a good understanding of how to keep themselves safe.

This is because key messages on safety are threaded carefully through the curriculum. For example, the 'Respect yourself' project and visiting speakers, such as from the NSPCC, reinforce important messages about safety. Older pupils also know the contact number for ChildLine by heart and know that they should report incidents if people are hurting them.'

Worry boxes' provide pupils with a mechanism to report their individual concerns, and pupils know that they can offer their views on safety through the pupil representatives in each year group. However, pupils said that they do not offer many ideas, as the school is 'quite safe already'. Pupils have a good understanding of different forms of bullying and know what differentiates bullying from a routine falling out.

They define bullying by the acronym 'STOP' – 'Several times on purpose'. Inspection findings ? Together with your governing body, you have developed an effective and strong executive leadership team. These leaders work across the federation and provide good levels of support to staff and pupils at Worfield.

You have built effective working relationships between the three schools. Federation working has led to increased opportunities for staff training. Worfield staff meet regularly with federation colleagues to discuss and agree teacher assessments and to share ideas and good practice.

All leaders carry out regular checks on teaching and learning and provide helpful feedback to staff to improve their practice. As a result, staff morale is high, and all staff enjoy their jobs and are proud to work at Worfield. Governors visit school to look at pupils' books and liaise with subject leaders.

This provides them with first-hand information and a picture of daily life in the school. Information gathered is regularly shared at governors' meetings. ? Subject leaders are skilled in their roles and make a good contribution to leadership in their areas.

For example, new initiatives have been successfully implemented in mathematics, such as the development of the one-star to five-star approach. This adds increasing levels of challenge to pupils in different tasks. Leaders work directly with small groups of pupils, so have first-hand knowledge of their abilities.

This enables them to pinpoint where further support is needed. Efforts have also focused on engaging parents in their children's education. To this end, a magazine for parents, 'Mathematics special', has been published to inform parents about current methods used in school.

Parent workshops are held to help engage parents further in supporting their children with homework. ? Work in pupils' books shows that calculation and problem-solving skills are practised regularly in mathematics work and are well developed. Resources, such as counters, cubes and other practical apparatus, are used successfully to help support pupils' visualisation skills and enhance their knowledge and understanding.

Support staff are used efficiently during lessons to support learners. Pupils work well with partners and in small groups. Pupils also regularly use their mathematical skills in other subjects, for example topic work and science.

This is a strength. However, although pupils make good progress in early years and key stage 1, their progress in mathematics is not as strong in key stage 2. As a result, some pupils do not reach the levels they are capable of.

This is because pupils' reasoning skills are at an early stage of development, and this limits pupils' abilities to show that they are working at greater depth. You and your leadership team have recognised this and have prioritised this for further development. ? Good use is made of the pupil premium and SEN funding received to provide additional support for eligible pupils.

Pupils who have SEN and/or disabilities are identified early through regular standardised testing and teacher observation. A wide range of tailored interventions is in place, and these are carefully tracked for their impact. The special educational needs coordinator (SENCo) has a detailed knowledge of all pupils who have additional needs and provides good support for staff, pupils and parents.

Additional specialist support is also successfully accessed from external agencies. Occasionally, teaching is not pitched at the right level to meet the learning needs of some pupils who have SEN and/or disabilities. Additionally, where pupils who have additional needs are withdrawn from whole-class teaching for small-group work, they sometimes cover different work from that of their classmates.

For example, although they improve their understanding of number, they do not complete work on other areas of mathematics, such as shape. This leads to gaps in their knowledge and, therefore, their progress is variable and some pupils do not make good progress over time. ? You have taken positive action to improve attendance and reduce the proportion of pupils who are persistently absent, especially disadvantaged pupils and those who have SEN and/or disabilities.

This year, attendance is broadly average, having been below average last year. This is because, together with the early intervention practitioner, you carefully track attendance of all pupils and place a high level of focus on attendance across the school. For example, attendance figures are published in weekly newsletters, and class attendance is displayed prominently outside the school office.

Termly incentives help to motivate and encourage good attendance. Winning classes enjoy rewards, such as ice creams or pizzas, and wristbands are awarded to those with 100% attendance. You work closely with the education welfare officer from the local authority and are not afraid to prosecute parents who stubbornly continue to take pupils on holiday in term time or who fail to bring their children to school regularly.

• The majority of parents have positive views of the school. However, a third of parents who responded to Ofsted's questionnaire would not recommend Worfield to other parents. Additionally, a quarter of parents who expressed views on parent text feel that communication with parents needs improving.

They reported issues in relation to late requests and notice of events, together with errors and incorrect dates on newsletters. You have very recently launched parent mail to send general information out to parents and share information. This is helping to improve channels of communication, but it is too early to judge its impact.

A small number also expressed concern about the lack of senior leadership presence at the school and some staff not dealing with reports of bullying effectively. Evidence gathered shows that governors and leaders feel that they provide equal amounts of time in the federation schools and pupils feel that bullying is not an issue. Other parents commented favourably on their children's enjoyment of school and the approachability of teachers.

As one parent put it, 'Teaching staff are approachable and open to speak with parents, always wanting the best for our children.' Next steps for the school Leaders and those responsible for governance should ensure that: ? work is suitably matched to the needs of disadvantaged pupils and those who have SEN and/or disabilities so that they make consistently good progress ? teaching further develops pupils' reasoning skills in mathematics ? communication with parents is strengthened to develop a positive working relationship with those parents who have negative views of the school. I am copying this letter to the chair of the governing body, the director of education for the Diocese of Hereford, the regional schools commissioner and the director of children's services for Shropshire.

This letter will be published on the Ofsted website. Yours sincerely Heather Simpson Her Majesty's Inspector Information about the inspection During the inspection, I met with you and members of the leadership team from within the Trinity Federation. I also met with members of your governing body and a representative from the local authority.

I discussed the work of the school with you, including the processes and procedures in place for safeguarding. I visited all key stage 2 classrooms with the director of teaching and learning, spoke with pupils about their learning and looked at the work in their books. I talked to pupils during the day to gather their views about the school.

I looked at a range of school documents, including the school's information about pupils' achievement. I reviewed the school's own evaluation of its work, together with the school development plan. I took account of the 48 responses to Ofsted's online questionnaire, Parent View.

Additional information was collected from parents at the end of the school day. There were 13 responses to the staff questionnaire. Their views were fully considered.