Perry Beeches Nursery School

Perry Beeches Nursery School 56 2Beeches Road, Great Barr, Birmingham, B42 2PX

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This inspection: Good 2

Achievement of pupils Good 2 Quality of teaching Good 2 Behaviour and safety of pupils Outstanding 1 Leadership and management Good 2

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

This is a good school.  Children achieve well in this nursery school. They make good progress in all areas of learning, but in their personal, social and emotional development, progress is excellent.  Teaching and learning are good. In teacher- led activities, teaching is often outstanding.  Children behave exceptionally well. They stay focused and learn well in the calm but busy classrooms and outdoor areas.  Children explore the excellent outdoor area with enthusiasm and excitement, finding a host of opportunities to learn and build their self-confidence.  Teamwork is strong and all adults show equally good skills in supporting children in the good start to their education.  School leaders take effective action to ensure teaching and children’s achievement are good, leading to improving standards.  Senior leaders and the governing body have established very effective links with parents and carers and the wider community. A

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

strong emphasis on equality underpins the nursery school’s work.

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It is not yet an outstanding school because

 Although standards are above those expected for their age when children transfer into Reception, there is scope for some to reach even higher levels.  The self-evaluation and development planning process lacks incisive assessment of the nursery school’s performance and challenging targets against which to measure improvement.

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Information about this inspection

 The inspector observed children learning in focused groups and adult-led and child-initiated activities for five and a half hours. These sessions were taught by the two teachers and six nursery nurses.  Three joint observations were carried out with the headteacher.  Meetings were held with members of the governing body, the headteacher, deputy headteacher and staff. The inspector talked to children informally during the observation times. He met with a representative of the local authority.  The inspector looked at a wide range of documentation including improvement plans and self- evaluation, as well as assessment data from the monitoring of children’s progress. Documents detailing the nursery school’s arrangements for safeguarding children were scrutinised.  No views of parents and carers were available in Parent View, but the inspector considered outcomes of a recent school parent questionnaire and comments written in the parents’

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Information about this inspection

comment book. A good number of parents gave their views on the school directly to the inspector at the beginning and end of the school day.  Questionnaire responses from eight staff were considered.

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Inspection team

David Speakman, Lead inspector Additional Inspector

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Information about this school

 The school is similar in size to other nursery schools.  Children attend for 15 hours each week over two and a half days for one year. They start in the September following their third birthday. One group attends on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday morning and the other group for the rest of the week.  Half the children are White British, and the remaining ones come from a range of minority ethnic backgrounds.  The proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is broadly average. A few are at the early stages of learning English.  There are no children known to be eligible for the pupil premium.  The staff make early identification of children who need extra support. Typically, the proportion of children supported through school action is similar to most schools, as is the proportion supported at school action plus. There are currently no children with a statement of special educational needs.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Increase the level of challenge even further, especially for the more-able children during child- initiated activity, so more children reach the higher levels in their learning and development.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Make the process of self-evaluation of the nursery school’s performance and subsequent planning for improvement more robust by:  ensuring that the senior leaders’ evaluation of performance is set against measurable and challenging targets  clearly defining the criteria by which leaders can measure the impact of their work on improving the nursery school’s provision and outcomes  involving the governors more in self-evaluation and strategic planning for improvement.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 On entry to the nursery, children’s skills, knowledge and understanding span a wide range, but overall attainment is similar to that expected for children of this age. Children achieve well during their year in the nursery and by the time they transfer into Reception, almost all have made the nationally expected progress and a significant minority have made more to exceed age-related expectations. However, with more specific targeting and challenge, there is scope to increase the proportion of children reaching the higher attainment bands.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 Children make exceptional progress in their personal, social and emotional development from the very point they join the nursery school. Already, children cooperate well with adults, are showing increased levels of self-confidence, have good social skills and sustain concentration exceptionally well. They are enquiring children, whose behaviour is exceptional.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 Children who require extra support in their learning are identified early. Disabled children and those who have special educational needs achieve well from sometimes low starting points. They are fully included in the learning activities and soon develop enough confidence to become more independent in their learning. Adults keep a watchful eye to ensure they receive support when appropriate.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 Children who speak English as an additional language receive learning support that is well matched to the level of their competence in English language. They make at least good progress with visual activities that use their problem-solving skills very well. On child who speaks very little English, rapidly completed a jigsaw puzzle, with which some other children had previously struggled. This demonstrated his excellent awareness of shape and space.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 Children develop language skills well. They show confidence and clarity when communicating. Vocabulary is developing well and one boy, for example, was able to correctly name a whole range of toy vehicles: truck, bus, fire engine, van and car. Early reading skills are developed well. Children follow pictures in a book logically, understanding the story well enough to be able to say what they think will happen next. A few children are already beginning to write recognisable letters and form them into familiar words such as their own names.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 Early counting skills are secure with many children. They recognise a few small digits and can match these to numbers of objects. They learn quickly about the size of containers and which will hold most water through meaningful play at the water trough.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 Physical and creative development is promoted well in the exceptionally well-planned outdoor areas. Children learn well through the wealth of opportunities for adventure and role play, such as in the pirate ship, on the climbing stack, growing plants in cultivated areas, using the sheds and shelters and travelling safely on tricycles around the many paved pathways. Children really enjoy joining in group songs and playing out simple rhythms using simple instruments. Children quickly picked up the idea of rhythm.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 Progress in developing children’s understanding of the world is good. Children playing in the gravel pit learned about moving gravel from one place to another through experimenting with guttering, building secure early skills in scientific investigation. They quickly gain competent basic computer skills, such as using a mouse to control the movement of objects on screen.

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The quality of teaching is good

 Teaching is good overall. During the inspection, all teaching seen was either good or outstanding. It is good during sessions where children choose their own activities, but in the sessions that are focused and led by teachers or teaching assistants, the quality of teaching and learning is mostly outstanding. All adults are equally skilled, and whether children are being taught by a teacher or by a teaching assistant, the quality of provision is equally good.

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The quality of teaching is good

 During child-initiated sessions, adults have high levels of interaction with children and promote communication skills, particularly speaking and listening, well. They endeavour to make sure that children are fully occupied, but occasionally some children lose focus and spend time without being actively engaged in a learning activity. This sometimes goes unnoticed and the pace of learning for these children slows.

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The quality of teaching is good

 The range of focused activities led by adults is good and effective in meeting children’s learning needs. For example, the bilingual teaching assistant informally assessed a new Asian child’s English language skills in order to assess his needs. All aspects were taken into account and the fact that he was mixing with an English speaking child successfully, helped her form a realistic view of his needs. Similar close observation of children’s progress helps staff identify those who may be in need of extra support through special educational needs provision at a very early stage.

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The quality of teaching is good

 Adults have a good understanding of how young children learn. Progress of individual children through the Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum is tracked and teachers use this to plan the next steps for learning. They engage children in conversation, asking questions to make them think and develop their spirit of enquiry. The activities planned are purposeful and meet the new Early Years Foundation Stage statutory framework, including all the areas of learning in balance.

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The quality of teaching is good

 Effective monitoring of teaching has identified teachers’ and teaching assistants’ strengths and any areas that need to be improved. All adults working with children are subject to this scrutiny and to the professional development arranged to raise their skill level. Consequently, both teachers and teaching assistants have the skills to ensure children achieve well.

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The behaviour and safety of pupils is outstanding

 Even at this early stage in the term, children’s behaviour is outstanding, both indoors and when learning through play outside. Parents spoken to are very positive about what the nursery school does for their children’s behaviour. The mother of one boisterous child said, ‘The staff have quickly managed to calm him down,’ while the mother of a quiet and withdrawn child said, ‘The nursery has brought him out of himself.’

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The behaviour and safety of pupils is outstanding

 Children concentrate well and usually stay focused on their learning. They engage confidently in conversation with adults, talking freely about what they have found out. At this early stage in the school year, relationships between children are beginning to form and children play and learn quite happily alongside and with others. They are beginning to make choices, although a few take time to decide which of the many learning activities to join in child-initiated work.

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The behaviour and safety of pupils is outstanding

 Children feel very safe in the nursery. Children are confident to take risks in the outdoor area, but listen carefully and respond to adults when they feel children are entering an activity that is potentially risky.  Children cooperate exceptionally well with adults. At change of activity, they have already started to help ‘tidy up’ and this time runs very smoothly and efficiently. If they move to another room, for small group work such as story time, they line up very quickly and calmly. This level of cooperation with adults supports the smooth running of the day and cuts down time slippage, of which there is very little.

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The behaviour and safety of pupils is outstanding

 Children’s spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is outstanding. It is supported through the strong ethos of care and equality of opportunity for all children to be included and succeed. Children already know how to behave properly, showing concern and consideration for others. Children of different ethnicities and abilities work and play harmoniously, showing full acceptance of diversity. Children already have the spirit of enquiry, showing curiosity in the way they engage in the many opportunities to find things out for themselves.

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The leadership and management is good

 Senior leaders have very high ambitions for the work of the nursery school and what it provides for the community, its children and their parents and carers. Teamwork is very strong and the inspection questionnaire shows staff are fully supportive of the work of senior leaders.

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The leadership and management is good

 Monitoring of teaching by the headteacher is effective. She identifies accurately what teachers and teaching assistants do well and their impact on children’s learning. She identifies where improvement can be made, and school monitoring records show honest feedback and subsequent follow-up. This results in a competent staff who enable children to learn well.

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The leadership and management is good

 The overall monitoring and evaluation process for improvement is less robust. In response to the recommendations of the previous inspection, the headteacher has devised a systematic monitoring schedule. This details the focus for the monitoring process for each month of the school year. Consequently, the headteacher has a thorough knowledge of provision and this is reflected in the nursery school’s self-evaluation. However, self- evaluation is less detailed in evaluating the impact of the work of the nursery school on outcomes and identifying the degree of improvement needed in the areas identified.

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The leadership and management is good

 The development plan is based on action points identified in self-evaluation, but lacks sufficient detail. There is not enough detailed focus on children’s progress and raising their attainment by the end of the Nursery Year. Although there are intended outcomes in the form of success criteria, it is difficult to measure the impact of actions taken because criteria lack any procedures against which to measure effect.

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The leadership and management is good

 The local authority assesses this nursery as one not in need of external support and uses this setting as an example of good practice. Since the local authority has cut back its support to schools, the leaders of Perry Beeches have continued to buy in local authority partnership. The local authority provides appropriate support to the nursery and has helped with ongoing improvement.

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The leadership and management is good

 The governance of the school:  has good levels of involvement and a secure knowledge and understanding of the nursery school’s strengths and weaknesses  has high aspirations for the nursery school and challenges senior leaders effectively but is not sufficiently involved in the monitoring and evaluation process and the setting of improvement targets  ensures all statutory requirements are fully met and that children are kept safe while at nursery.

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The leadership and management is good

 Links with the community are strong and this helps the transition into the nursery school for both children and parents. They run a successful babies group for mothers and their babies to meet. Stay-and-play sessions and the music group effectively introduce young children and parents and carers to nursery life. Staff support young mothers in breastfeeding their babies so mothers get to know staff before their children start school. A group for children with Down’s Syndrome and their parents is held in the soft play room and blind children from the school for the blind, on the same campus, visit the school each week.

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Grade Judgement Description

Grade 1 Outstanding An outstanding school is highly effective in delivering outcomes that provide exceptionally well for all its pupils’ needs. This ensures that pupils are very well equipped for the next stage of their education, training or employment. Grade 2 Good A good school is effective in delivering outcomes that provide well for all its pupils’ needs. Pupils are well prepared for the next stage of their education, training or employment. Grade 3 Requires improvement A school that requires improvement is not yet a good school, but it is not inadequate. This school will receive a full inspection within 24 months from the date of this inspection. Grade 4 Inadequate A school that has serious weaknesses is inadequate overall and requires significant improvement but leadership and management are judged to be Grade 3 or better. This school will receive regular monitoring by Ofsted inspectors. A school that requires special measures is one where the school

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Grade Judgement Description

is failing to give its pupils an acceptable standard of education and the school’s leaders, managers or governors have not demonstrated that they have the capacity to secure the necessary improvement in the school. This school will receive regular monitoring by Ofsted inspectors.

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School details

Unique reference number 103123 Local authority Birmingham Inspection number 400584

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School details

This inspection of the school was carried out under section 5 of the Education Act 2005.

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School details

Type of school Nursery School category Community Age range of pupils 3–4 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 52 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Moya Cotton Headteacher Jackie Lewis Date of previous school inspection 5 May 2010 Telephone number 0121 360 2199 Fax number 0121 360 4467 Email address enquiry@perrybn.bham.sch.uk guidance ‘raising concerns and making complaints about Ofsted', which is available from Ofsted’s website: www.ofsted.gov.uk . If you would like Ofsted to send you a copy of the guidance, please telephone 0300 123 4234 , or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk .

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School details

You can use Parent View to give Ofsted your opinion on your child’s school. Ofsted will use the information parents and carers provide when deciding which schools to inspect and when and as part of the inspection.

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School details

You can also use Parent View to find out what other parents and carers think about schools in England. You can visit www.parentview.ofsted.gov.uk, or look for the link on the main Ofsted website: www.ofsted.gov.uk

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School details

achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children's social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, work-based learning and skills training, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for looked after children, safeguarding and child protection. Further copies of this report are obtainable from the school. Under the Education Act 2005, the school must provide a copy of this report free of charge to certain categories of people. A charge not exceeding the full cost of reproduction may be made for any other copies supplied. If you would like a copy of this document in a different format, such as large print or Braille,

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School details

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School details

T: 0300 123 4234 Textphone: 0161 618 8524 E: enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk W: www.ofsted.gov.uk

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