Edith Neville Primary School

Edith Neville Primary School 174 Ossulston Street, London, NW1 1DN

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Overall effectiveness

Previous inspection: Good 2 This inspection: Good 2 Achievement of pupils Good 2 Quality of teaching Good 2 Behaviour and safety of pupils Good 2 Leadership and management Good 2

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

This is a good school.  Pupils make good progress from very low starting points. Their rate of progress is higher than that of similar pupils nationally.  Teaching in the Nursery and in Reception has improved and children now make good progress.  Teaching is good with some that is outstanding. This is because leaders have introduced new systems for checking how well teachers are doing and because of the regular training opportunities they are given.  The headteacher has brought about rapid improvements in pupils’ progress since her appointment and is successfully building up a team of highly enthusiastic leaders and teachers, committed to the vision of the school.  Pupils’ behaviour is good. They are polite and courteous. They have a good understanding of safety. Attendance has improved and is now above average.  The large majority of parents and carers are positive about the school. Leaders are working to increase their involvement in the school.

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 The promotion of pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is good with many opportunities provided for them in a rich and vibrant curriculum.  Leaders, managers and governors have been effective in improving the quality of teaching and the progress pupils make. They are well placed to bring about further improvements.  The governing body is very effective. Members bring significant expertise to their role.

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It is not yet an outstanding school because:

 Overall standards of attainment are below the national average. Standards for more-able pupils are not as high as they could be.  Teachers do not consistently check pupils’ learning in the lesson and then adapt the level of challenge for pupils.  There are not sufficient opportunities for pupils to respond to teachers’ comments on their work to enable them to improve their work and deepen their understanding.

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Information about this inspection

 Inspectors observed 13 lessons, of which four were joint observations with the headteacher and deputy headteacher. In addition they made two shorter visits to lessons to focus on specific aspects of learning.  Inspectors observed the school’s work and examined a range of documentation including the school’s own performance data, records of the monitoring of the quality of teaching, an analysis of the school’s strengths and areas for development, the school’s improvement plan, minutes of governing body meetings and records relating to attendance, behaviour and safeguarding.  Meetings were held with groups of pupils. Inspectors listened to pupils read and discussed their reading with them.  Pupils’ work was scrutinised to evaluate their progress, the quality of marking and feedback provided by teachers.  Discussions were held with the headteacher, subject leaders, teachers, members of the governing body and a representative from the local authority.

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Information about this inspection

 The views of parents and carers were sought at the beginning of the school day. No responses were taken from Parent View, the Ofsted online survey, as no report had been published due to an insufficient number of responses received at the time of the inspection.  The inspectors considered 28 questionnaires completed by members of staff.

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Inspection team

Mirella Lombardo, Lead inspector Additional Inspector David Webster Additional Inspector

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Information about this school

 The school is an average-sized primary school.  The proportion of pupils supported through school action is well above average.  The proportion of pupils supported at school action plus or with a statement of special educational needs is above average.  The majority of pupils come from a minority ethnic heritage. The proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is well above average.  The school does not use any alternative, off-site provision for its pupils.  The school has a children’s centre on site, which is managed by the governing body. It is subject to separate inspection arrangements.  The school supports other schools in the local area in developing pupils’ economic awareness.  The school provides a daily breakfast and after-school club for pupils.  The school meets the current government floor standards, which set the minimum expectations for pupils’ attainment and progress.

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Information about this school

 The current headteacher has joined the school since the previous inspection and took up post in September 2012.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Increase the proportion of outstanding teaching and raise pupils’ attainment by ensuring that:  teachers always check on pupils’ learning in lessons and adapt their teaching accordingly to make sure all pupils are challenged in their thinking throughout the lesson  teachers’ marking of pupils’ work always includes clear guidance on how it can be improved and that pupils are given opportunities to respond to these comments so they can improve their work and deepen their understanding.

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The achievement of pupils is good

 Children enter the Early Years Foundation Stage with skills and knowledge that are well below the levels expected for their age, particularly in communication and language skills. The majority of children are at the early stages of speaking English.  The school’s recent assessment data and the work in children’s ‘special books’ show that children are now making good progress. This is because teaching in the Nursery and in Reception has improved and is now good. Adults plan engaging indoor and outdoor learning and there is a strong focus on developing children’s language and mathematical skills.  In Key Stages 1 and 2 pupils make good progress from their starting points in reading, writing and mathematics. Test results for Year 6 pupils in 2013 show that their rate of progress in these subjects has improved compared to 2012 and were well above those of similar pupils nationally. However, attainment at the end of Key Stages 1 and 2 was below the national average,

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The achievement of pupils is good

particularly for pupils who are more able.  Pupils in Year 1 performed well above average in the 2013 national phonics screening check. They enjoy reading the wide range of books available in the school and demonstrate good skills in tackling words they do not know.  More-able pupils make good progress, although sometimes work in lessons is not challenging enough for them to do the best they could. Some of the interventions the school is now putting in place are focused on supporting these pupils to reach the higher National Curriculum levels and are providing good support for these pupils, for example, developing skills to solve problems in mathematics.  The school is committed to promoting equal opportunities by making sure that individuals and different groups make good progress. Recently, more effective systems have been put in place to help staff check on the progress children are making and to identify earlier on the extra

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The achievement of pupils is good

support children may need.  Disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs make better progress than their peers nationally. This is because they are given extra support in the class as well as outside the lesson to help them catch up.  Pupils who speak English as an additional language make progress well above their peers’ nationally. This is because the school employs dual speaking staff and provides extra support to them in class. However their attainment is below average.  Leaders and governors make sure that the pupil premium funding is used effectively so that pupils who are eligible for this funding make good progress. Their attainment compared to that of their peers improved considerably between 2012 and 2013. In tests at the end of Key Stage 2 in 2012 the gap in attainment represented just over two terms progress in mathematics and English. However in the 2013 tests there was no significant difference in performance.

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The quality of teaching is good

 Teaching across the school is good because there are strong systems in place to check on its quality and because leaders work well together to make sure there is good support for teachers who are new to the profession.  Teaching in the Nursery and Reception classes provides good opportunities for children to develop their language and mathematical skills. For example, in the Nursery the teacher encouraged children to use words to describe position as the children placed members of a family in the dolls’ house. In the Reception class, children explored patterns in the environment and some pupils made their own sequences and described the patterns confidently. For example one child described the alternating colours in the cubes she had put together and was able to add another colour cube to the sequence, repeating the pattern she had noticed.  Teachers manage their teaching assistants well and they give good support to pupils, particularly

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The quality of teaching is good

disabled pupils and those with special educational needs. For example in a Year 1 class, the teaching assistant modelled how sentences describing a character should be structured so that pupils were then able to write their own sentences.  Classrooms are well organised and tidy. Displays are stimulating and are used by pupils to help them with their work, for example by displaying words they need in their topic work.  Teaching is characterised by lively ways of teaching children key skills. For example in a Year 3 class, pupils played ‘adverb charades’ to deepen their understanding. In a Year 4 class, pairs of children acted out an extract from a book and this led to pupils discussing how they could improve their writing by imagining how it would be acted out.  Teachers make good reference to previous learning to deepen pupils’ understanding. For example in a Year 6 lesson, the teacher encouraged pupils to work out percentages and to make

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The quality of teaching is good

links with fractions and decimals, reinforcing what they had learnt in previous lessons.  Reading is taught well and teachers make good use of a range of resources to engage pupils and improve the progress they make. For example, in a Year 1 group the teacher used a range of objects to help pupils distinguish between different sounds and by the end of the session pupils were able to produce a list of words using the new sound they had learnt.  In some lessons, teachers do not check on how well pupils are doing and this means that some children spend time on work they can do already and do not move on to work that is more challenging until later in the lesson.  Teachers’ mark pupils work but they do not always provide enough guidance on how they can improve it. Sometimes there are few opportunities for pupils to respond to the written comments to help them improve their work and deepen their understanding.

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The behaviour and safety of pupils are good

 The behaviour of pupils is good. Pupils told inspectors that children in the school were kind to each other and that bullying was rare. They said that playground ‘buddies’ make sure children do not feel left out and that they were confident adults in the school would deal with incidents quickly if they occurred.  Pupils are quick to settle to their work at the start of lessons. They listen attentively and do not call out or interrupt learning. They care about their school environment and look after it. Classrooms and the shared areas of the school are clutter-free and well looked after, with many interesting displays for children to look at.  Pupils are polite and courteous. They enjoy coming to school as reflected in the improvements in their attendance, which is now above average.  The school’s work to keep pupils safe and secure is good this is because the school provides a range of opportunities to develop their understanding, for example, using drama to learn about

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The behaviour and safety of pupils are good

how to deal with bullying and the local ‘City Learning Centre’ to learn about how to keep safe when using the internet.  Pupils welcome the responsibilities they are given as school council members and the decisions they are able to make, for example, in making improvements to the toilets and in running a stall at school events to raise money. There are regular opportunities for pupils to discuss their feelings and develop the harmonious ethos of the school. For example in a Year 5 lesson, pupils took part in an active session, moving around the classroom, to find out what common things they enjoyed doing.  A recently introduced behaviour policy provides staff with clear guidance on the management of behaviour and all staff who responded to the staff questionnaires agree that behaviour and safety are good in the school.  When inspectors spoke to parents and carers in the morning, all of them were positive about the

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The behaviour and safety of pupils are good

behaviour in the school during lesson times but a few raised concerns about behaviour and safety in the playground.  Behaviour is not outstanding because there are a few isolated instances of inappropriate playground behaviour and some pupils in lessons do not yet typically show responsibility for their own learning.

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The leadership and management are good

 The headteacher provides strong leadership and has brought about a number of changes since taking up the headship of the school in her drive to bring about further improvements. These include more effective systems to check the quality of teaching.  Leaders, managers and governors have high expectations for their school and its role in the community and are determined to develop and maintain a culture in which good teaching and good behaviour can flourish.  Subject leaders have a good understanding of the strengths of the school and the areas for development. They are involved in supporting teachers with their planning, checking on the quality of teaching and holding teachers to account for the progress children make in the lesson.  Performance management is effective and teachers say they feel well supported. Systems have been put into place to make clear to each teacher what the expectations are for the progress of

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The leadership and management are good

the pupils in their class. Good links with the children’s centre help to provide a range of opportunities for parents and carers to come into the school and play with their children. To further develop relationships with parents and carers, the school has employed a Bengali family liaison worker and this has encouraged more parents and carers to attend events at the school.  The promotion of spiritual, moral, social and cultural skills is strong and with good opportunities to develop pupils’ awareness of diversity and their appreciation of music, art and sport.  The curriculum provides pupils with a wide range of experiences, for example, working in the British Library, looking at historical maps of the area with historians and in Year 3 pupils are currently involved in a ‘Kings Cross Detective’ project, working with an art college to find out about the local history. There are many visitors to the school. These include regular visits by a

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The leadership and management are good

Nobel Prize winner to promote scientific debate and opera and drama companies. There are a wide range of clubs including computer coding, choir, textiles and Bengali and Somali clubs.  There is strong promotion of pupils’ economic awareness and the school has recently achieved the Centre of Excellence in Financial Education Award.  The school has good plans in place to use the new primary sports funding. Specialist coaches work alongside teachers to develop their skills. As a result there has been an increase in the number of pupils taking part in gymnastics and a ‘Healthy Packed Lunch’ policy has been developed. The most recent audit carried out by the school showed that the majority of packed lunches are now healthy.  The local authority provides light touch support to this school. It uses the school to support others in promoting economic well-being and in developing the teaching of mathematics through

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The leadership and management are good

professional development opportunities as part of the Mayor of London Schools’ Excellence Project..  The governance of the school:  Governors have high expectations for all pupils in the school. They have a strong understanding of the school’s strengths and provide effective support in challenging the school to continue to improve further, for example, they question leaders on what the school is doing to improve attainment. They are highly skilled and bring a wealth of experience to their role, including in the areas of finance and human resources. They consider carefully how to use their skills to be as effective as possible. They have worked with the headteacher to bring about changes in how teaching assistants work across classes, using performance management effectively to bring about improvements in teaching and ensure that the school provides support for teachers new to the profession. They are very clear about how financial

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The leadership and management are good

resources are being spent, including the use of the primary school sports funding. They ensure they are kept up to date with regular training, for example on safer recruitment and analysis of data, and take part in training run by the local authority. All statutory arrangements with regard to safeguarding are securely in place.

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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 is

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Grade Judgement Description

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 100013 Local authority Camden Inspection number 440434

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School details

This inspection was carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. The inspection was also deemed a section 5 inspection under the same Act.

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School details

Type of school Primary School category Community Age range of pupils 3–11 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 241 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Esther Caplin Headteacher Amanda Szewczyk-Radley Date of previous school inspection 21–22 June 2012 Telephone number 020 7387 7158 Fax number 020 7388 1202 Email address admin@edithneville.camden.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, please

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School details

telephone 0300 123 4234, or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk . You may copy all or parts of this document for non-commercial educational purposes, as long as you give details of the source and date of publication and do not alter the information in any way. To receive regular email alerts about new publications, including survey reports and school inspection reports, please visit our website and go to ‘Subscribe’.

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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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