Setting

Aviation House 125 Kingsway London WC2B 6SE T 0300 123 1231 F 020 7421 6855 enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk www.ofsted.gov.uk

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Ms J Marland Cavendish Primary School Cavendish Road West Didsbury Manchester M20 1JG

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bullying practice in schools

Thank you for your hospitality and cooperation, and that of your staff and pupils, during my visit on 26 September 2011, as part of our survey of schools’ work to create a positive school culture and prevent and tackle bullying.

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bullying practice in schools

The visit provided valuable information which will contribute to our national evaluation and reporting. Published reports are likely to list the names of the contributing institutions but individual institutions will not be identified in the main text without their consent.

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bullying practice in schools

This letter briefly summarises our discussion at the end of the visit.

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Strengths of this aspect of the school’s work

 The implementation of the ‘Good to be Green’ behaviour policy and its associated work has had a positive impact on behaviour in the school.  Despite the difficulties of your Victorian site and buildings, behaviour is very well managed. Play, the use of dining spaces and the movement of pupils in and out of classrooms is orderly and very well supervised. Pupils know what to do and cooperate willingly with staff and each other.  Most pupils clearly feel safe in school and they are very confident that if they raise concerns with staff over bullying or behaviour, that those concerns will be treated seriously.  Good staff training, for teaching and support staff, has helped the school’s response to any bullying or behaviour issue that arises to be prompt and effective.  Pupils appreciate the playground pals and peer mediators, although they have not yet started their roles this early in the academic year.

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Areas for improvement, which we discussed, include:

 ensuring that staff and pupils are made aware that the school can continue to apply new strategies to resolve bullying issues, even if the first attempt is not successful, and consider developing some examples, such as through role play in assembly, or illustrated in posters, to help pupils to have the confidence to be persistent  making a stronger link between the school’s vision statement and the behaviour policy and making the ‘golden rules’ easier for pupils to remember and understand. The school should also ensure that vision and rules are clearly visible and explained, both inside and outside classrooms  creating a clear plan to show when and how assemblies contribute to the development of a positive school culture.

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Areas for improvement, which we discussed, include:

I hope that this visit has been useful in the further development of this aspect of the school’s work.

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Areas for improvement, which we discussed, include:

As explained previously, a copy of this letter will be published on the Ofsted website. It may be used to inform decisions about any future inspection. A copy of this letter is also being sent to your local authority.

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