Send CofE Primary School

St Bede’s Church of England Aided Junior School Bush Lane, Send, Woking, GU23 7HP

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Overall effectiveness

Previous inspection: Satisfactory 3 This inspection: Requires improvement 3 Achievement of pupils Requires improvement 3 Quality of teaching Requires improvement 3 Behaviour and safety of pupils Requires improvement 3 Leadership and management Requires improvement 3

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This school requires improvement. It is not good because:

 Pupils’ progress is not yet rapid enough. This is because not enough teaching has been consistently good or outstanding.  Some teachers do not have high enough expectations of pupils and set work that is often too hard for the less able or too easy for the more able.  Pupils have too few opportunities to use and apply their mathematical skills to solve problems across other subjects.  Some marking does not show pupils how to improve their work. Teachers do not check enough that pupils act on the advice they are given.  Pupils have too few opportunities to write at length to develop their skills in grammar, punctuation and spelling.  Pupils’ behaviour and attitudes to learning are not good enough, especially where teaching is not sufficiently challenging or exciting.  Leaders and managers are not sufficiently rigorous in checking the quality of teaching so that pupils can make good progress in all subjects.

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This school requires improvement. It is not good because:

 Leaders’ judgements about the school have been too positive over time because information on school performance has not always been robust.  The roles of those who have responsibility for different subjects and age groups are underdeveloped.  Until recently, the governors have not done enough to challenge senior leaders and to hold them to account for the progress the pupils make in English and mathematics.

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The school has the following strengths:

 Recent actions taken by leaders have started to improve teaching and pupils’ achievement, especially in reading.  The school promotes pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development well.  Pupils are happy and enjoy school. They are polite and courteous.  There are strong positive relationships between staff and pupils. Pupils feel safe and say that bullying is rare.

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Information about this inspection

 The inspectors observed 13 lessons or parts of lessons. Several lessons were observed jointly with the headteacher and senior leaders.  Discussions were held with a range of pupils, the headteacher and other senior leaders, members of the governing body and representatives of the local authority. Telephone discussions were held with an educational consultant who works with the school.  There were 42 responses to the Ofsted online questionnaire, Parent View. Inspectors also considered letters sent to them by parents and carers during the inspection.  Discussions were held with a small number of parents and carers at the beginning of the school day.  The inspectors looked at a number of documents, including the school’s data about pupils’ current progress. In addition, the inspectors looked at documents relating to safeguarding, governance, behaviour and attendance.  Inspectors looked at a range of other evidence, including wall displays, the school’s website and

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Information about this inspection

evidence of the school’s wider achievements beyond the classroom.

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Inspection team

Sonja Joseph, Lead inspector Additional Inspector Jonathon Shields Additional Inspector

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Information about this school

 The school is an average-sized primary school.  The large majority of pupils come from White British backgrounds.  The proportion of pupils from minority ethnic backgrounds is average. The proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is also average.  The proportion of pupils for whom the school receives the pupil premium is below average. This is additional government funding for particular groups, such as pupils eligible for free school meals and those in local authority care.  The proportion of disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs supported at school action is below average. The proportion supported at school action plus or with a statement of special educational needs is above average.  The school meets the government’s current floor standards, which set the minimum expectations for pupils’ attainment and progress in reading, writing and mathematics.

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Information about this school

 The executive headteacher was appointed in September 2012.  The school is part of a hard federation with Send First School. The headteacher is executive headteacher of both schools.  Since the time of the previous inspection, there has been significant staff long-term absence and staff turnover, particularly at senior leadership level.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Improving the quality of teaching so that it is consistently good or better, by ensuring that:  teachers have the highest expectations of what pupils, particularly the most-able, can achieve  teachers give pupils work that is at the right level of difficulty and sufficiently challenging to extend their learning  marking makes clear to pupils how they should improve their work and that teachers check that pupils follow the advice they are given to correct their mistakes  teaching engages and motivates pupils so that they always sustain good behaviour in lessons and do not lose focus.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Raise achievement in writing and mathematics by:  providing pupils with regular opportunities to write at length in all subjects, to develop their knowledge of grammar, punctuation and spelling and their understanding of writing for different audiences and purposes  developing pupils’ reasoning and thinking in open-ended problem-solving tasks in mathematics and providing them with opportunities to apply their mathematical skills in other subjects.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Strengthen leadership and management by ensuring that:  checks on the school’s work are summarised more sharply and consistently, to provide a more accurate picture of how well the school is doing and where improvements need to be made  the school improvement plan is sharpened so that it is clear what individual leaders have to achieve and how their success will be measured  leaders’ checks on the quality of teaching and learning focus on what and how well pupils are learning, and that weaknesses identified are resolved quickly  those leaders in charge of subjects or year groups regularly check the quality of teaching and learning in their areas to ensure progress for all pupils is consistently good or outstanding  governors fully understand the national expectations for progress and use information about how well the school is doing more effectively to challenge the school’s performance so that all

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

An external review of governance should be undertaken in order to assess how this aspect of leadership and management may be improved.

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The achievement of pupils requires improvement

 Pupils do not make consistently good progress in English and mathematics because the quality of teaching varies too much across the school. Consequently, pupils make good progress in some classes but slower progress in others.  Although standards by the end of Year 6 were in line with national figures in 2013, too few pupils made or exceeded the expected rates of progress, from their high starting points, compared with their peers nationally.  The progress of disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs, pupils from minority ethnic backgrounds and those who speak English as an additional language is uneven and directly reflects the inconsistencies in the quality of teaching over time. Recent changes to the organisation of teaching for these pupils are speeding up their progress.  More-able pupils do not make as much progress as they could, particularly in writing and mathematics, because work is not always hard enough to challenge and extend their thinking to

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The achievement of pupils requires improvement

reach the higher levels.  In writing, pupils have had too few opportunities to write at length for a range of audiences or purposes, or to develop their understanding of grammar, punctuation and spelling.  Progress is not fast enough in mathematics and so not all pupils achieve well. There are too few opportunities for pupils to use and apply their mathematical skills in a range of subjects to solve problems and find things out for themselves.  Pupils are making faster progress in reading because regular guided reading sessions are helping pupils to understand and interpret correctly the meaning of words across all subjects. More effective teaching of the links between letters and sounds is helping younger pupils to read unfamiliar words with accuracy. Some individual pupils have made over a year’s progress in just two terms.  In 2013, the pupils in Year 6 supported by pupil premium funding were the equivalent of four

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The achievement of pupils requires improvement

terms behind their classmates in mathematics and writing and two years behind in reading. Leaders acknowledged that these gaps in achievement were much too wide. Support for small groups of pupils in English and mathematics is ensuring that gaps are rapidly closing for these pupils. School records show that eligible pupils are now only a term behind in mathematics and broadly in line with their classmates in writing and reading. This demonstrates the school’s commitment to equality of opportunity.  Primary school sports funding has been used effectively to broaden the range of competitive sports and physical exercise that pupils participate in and promotes well their health and physical well-being.  Some parents and carers expressed concern that their children do not make good progress. Inspectors agree.

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The quality of teaching requires improvement

 Teaching requires improvement because over time it has not been consistently good enough to make sure that all pupils achieve well.  Teachers do not always have high enough expectations of what pupils know and can do. As a result the work they set is not always at the right level of difficulty, being too easy for more-able pupils. In addition, work is sometimes a little too hard for less-able pupils. Consequently, learning slows, pupils become less active and engaged and do not make the progress of which they are capable.  In mathematics, too little time is allowed for pupils to learn and find things out for themselves through problem-solving activities. As a result, some of the more-able pupils do not acquire the reasoning skills they need to reach the higher levels.  Pupils’ progress in developing their skills in grammar, punctuation and spelling is not consistently good because teaching provides too few opportunities for pupils to write at length for a range of

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The quality of teaching requires improvement

purposes and in a variety of styles across all subjects.  Teachers mark pupils’ work regularly. However, often their comments do not show pupils what they need to do to improve their work. Where teachers do give this advice, they do not always make sure that pupils act on it. Consequently, the same errors are sometimes repeated in pupils’ work.  Reading is being taught increasingly well because regular guided reading sessions are helping pupils to read a wide range of texts with increased understanding.  Pupils learn best when work set is at the right level of difficulty and when teachers and teaching assistants use questions exceptionally well to help them explain what they are learning and to draw conclusions from their work. For example, in an English lesson, the teacher used pupils’ own work to demonstrate good examples of English grammar and the use of descriptive vocabulary to write about a character. All adults used skilful questioning to enable pupils to

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The quality of teaching requires improvement

make rapid progress in their understanding of persuasive language through improving the choice of words in their own and others’ writing. Consequently, pupils produce high-quality written work.

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The behaviour and safety of pupils require improvement

 The behaviour of pupils requires improvement because sometimes pupils do not concentrate well, are less enthusiastic to learn and engage in off-task chatter when teachers set work that is too hard or too easy. This means that their progress is not always as good as it should be.  Pupils say they enjoy school. Older children commented on how the school has improved and say that lessons are now more interesting. These attitudes are reflected in attendance figures, which are above the national average.  Pupils are polite to adults and respectful to each other. They hold doors open, greet adults and listen attentively when other pupils speak during classroom discussions. They move sensibly around the school and behave well at play and break times. This is reflected in school records, which show that the number of incidents of poor behaviour has declined over time.  The school’s work to keep pupils safe and secure is good. Pupils say bullying is rare and that if it

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The behaviour and safety of pupils require improvement

does happen it is tackled well by adults and that there is always someone to talk to if they have a worry. They understand that there are different forms of bullying, such as name calling and repeatedly being unkind, and can explain clearly the dangers of cyber bullying, recognising how it can affect others.  There have been no permanent exclusions over recent years. The school has good strategies to help those pupils who find managing their own behaviour difficult. Small-group work in a dedicated space known as ‘The Nest’ helps pupils to deal with their feelings, and the use of additional agencies ensures that pupils whose circumstances might make them vulnerable are effectively supported.

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The leadership and management require improvement

 Long-term staff absence and changes in leadership, including at senior leadership level, have hindered the drive for improvement and leaders have not been able to secure consistently good teaching and good progress over time. New systems to improve teaching and track pupils’ progress have not yet had enough time to have a sustained impact on pupils’ attainment and progress. Consequently the school is developing slowly its role as part of the federation with Send First School.  The process for checking the school’s performance was previously not robust and the school’s judgements on the quality of its work were too generous. Information on how well pupils were learning was not always accurate in relation to national expectations of progress.  Discussions in school show that the current leadership has an accurate and realistic view of how well the school is doing and what it needs to do to improve. Nevertheless, improvement plans do

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The leadership and management require improvement

not yet clearly show the specific roles of leaders and managers, or reflect how success will be measured. Leaders, including governors, recognise that checks on the school’s work must be summarised more sharply and consistently to provide a more accurate picture of how well the school is doing.  Those leaders responsible for subjects or age groups, some of whom are new to their role and work across both schools in the federation, are not always clear about their roles and responsibilities. They have had too few opportunities to check the quality of teaching and learning in their areas of work to ensure that the progress of all pupils is consistently good or better. This limits their ability to drive improvements in their areas. Systems to ensure that increases in teachers’ pay are linked with improving teaching and raising pupils’ achievement have been introduced, but are not yet fully up and running in order to hold staff to account for

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The leadership and management require improvement

pupils’ achievement.  Leaders have not checked the performance of teachers rigorously enough and weaknesses in teaching have not been eliminated. As a result, the quality of teaching still varies too much across the school. However, the executive headteacher and senior leaders are now tackling underperformance with enthusiasm and determination. The weakest teaching has been tackled vigorously and is now considerably reduced.  Effective training provided by leaders and the local authority to develop specific aspects of teaching has improved its quality. Pupils are now beginning to make better progress than in the recent past. All staff are eager to ensure that they contribute fully to improving pupils’ achievement. This demonstrates the school’s capacity to improve.  School leaders check the impact of pupil premium funding closely. They review the allocation of funding to ensure that it brings about better learning. This approach is supporting faster

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The leadership and management require improvement

progress for eligible pupils because expectations of their achievement are higher and improved arrangements to support them are in place.  The curriculum provides a good range of activities which pupils find enjoyable. A wide range of trips, including residential camps, musical, sporting and extra-curricular activities, enriches the curriculum and enhances the pupils’ knowledge and understanding of the wider world.  The school uses this curriculum well to promote spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. Pupils are taught to have respect for one another and to value each other’s feelings. Through their links with a school in Kenya, pupils find out about other cultures and religions, and develop an understanding and respect for others whose lifestyle may differ from their own.  Equality of opportunity is at the heart of the school’s work and discrimination is not tolerated. Leaders realise that more has to be done to ensure all pupils, particularly the more able, attain

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The leadership and management require improvement

the highest levels and make progress similar to, or above, the national expectations.  The school has used the extra primary school sports funding appropriately to appoint a specialist physical education teacher to ensure effective teaching and provide training for staff. Participation in physical exercise is good across the school.  The school has received good support from the local authority, which has helped to improve teaching through personalised support and training and in reviewing key aspects of school performance.  The governance of the school:  Overall, since the previous inspection, governors have not held senior leaders fully to account for pupils’ achievement and the quality of teaching, accepting too readily information given to them about the school’s effectiveness. Although governors have looked at some published data, they do not yet have a secure understanding of national expectations of progress to

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The leadership and management require improvement

challenge senior leaders for the progress pupils are making to ensure that this is consistently good. Governors are ambitious to see improvements and have made good use of training, including through the local authority, to increase their skills so that they can ask questions that are more challenging about how well the school is performing. Members of the governing body have supported the headteacher in redefining the management structure of the school and ensuring that salaries are more clearly linked to improvements in pupils’ progress and teachers’ performance. They understand clearly the current quality of teaching and have supported well the executive headteacher in tackling the weakest teaching. They carefully monitor the school’s finances, including how the pupil premium and sports funding is used and know that these have contributed well to pupils’ recent improvements in progress. Governors

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The leadership and management require improvement

ensure, along with senior leaders, that safeguarding arrangements meet national requirements. All other statutory duties are met.

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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 125218 Local authority Surrey Inspection number 431052

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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 Junior School category Voluntary aided Age range of pupils 7–11 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 240 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Tony Shutt Headteacher Judy Harris Date of previous school inspection 19–20 October 2011 Telephone number 01483 222143 Fax number 01483 224176 Email address head@stbedes-junior.surrey.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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