South Elmsall Carlton Junior and Infant School

South Elmsall Carlton Junior and Infant School Carlton Road, South Elmsall, Pontefract, West Yorkshire, WF9 2QQ

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Overall effectiveness

Previous inspection: Requires improvement 3 This inspection: Requires improvement 3 Leadership and management Requires improvement 3 Behaviour and safety of pupils Requires improvement 3 Quality of teaching Requires improvement 3 Achievement of pupils Requires improvement 3 Early years provision Good 2

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

This is a school that requires improvement.

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 Pupils’ achievement over time has not been consistently good.  There is not enough good or better teaching and this prevents pupils from making consistently good progress.  Teachers’ expectations of what can be achieved in lessons are not high enough with the consequence that lessons sometimes lack challenge for all pupils, particularly the most able.  Marking f does not consistently tell pupils how they can improve. Teachers do not always make sure that pupils follow the advice they are given.  Pupils are not always engaged in their learning and their attention wanders.  Teaching assistants do not regularly make good enough use of questioning to assess pupils’ learning.  There are missed opportunities to share the best practice that exists in the school.  Middle leaders are not yet fully involved in the rigorous checking of the quality of teaching.  Plans for school improvement are not sufficiently

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

well evaluated to ensure they are having an impact upon pupils’ learning.

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The school has the following strengths

 The school is a caring and welcoming community where pupils and staff get on well together.  Children in the early years are taught well and make good progress from low starting points.  Pupils say they feel safe and good systems are in place to ensure their safety.  Senior leaders and the governing body are committed to improving the school further. They know the school’s strengths and have accurately identified areas for further improvement. They have already been successful in improving some aspects of teaching, so that the proportion of good teaching is increasing.

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Information about this inspection

 Inspectors visited 18 lessons or parts of lessons, two of which were observed jointly with the headteacher and deputy headteacher. They looked at a range of pupils’ work and heard a number of pupils from Years 2 and 6 read.  Meetings took place with the headteacher, senior leaders, staff, groups of pupils, the Chair of the Governing Body, other governors and a representative from the local authority.  Inspectors looked at a range of documentation, including the school’s data on pupils’ progress and records relating to pupils’ behaviour, attendance and safeguarding.  Inspectors observed playtime and lunch breaks. Displays around the school and in classrooms were also examined.  Inspectors took into account 18 responses to the online questionnaire (Parent View). They also also chatted informally with some parents. Inspectors took into consideration results of questionnaires carried out by the school.

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Information about this inspection

 The views of staff and pupils were also considered.

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Inspection team

Christine Millett, Lead inspector Additional Inspector

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Information about this school

 Carlton Junior and Infant School is larger than the average-sized primary school.  The very large majority of pupils are of White British heritage.  The proportion of disadvantaged pupils eligible for the pupil premium funding is above that found nationally. The pupil premium is additional funding for those pupils known to be eligible for free school meals and those children who are looked after by the local authority.  The proportion of disabled pupils and those with special educational needs supported through school action is similar to that found nationally as is the proportion supported at school action plus or through a statement of special educational needs.  The school meets the government’s current floor standards which are the minimum expectations for pupils’ attainment and progress in reading, writing and mathematics by the end of Year 6.  Since the previous inspection, there have been many changes in staff, including the appointment of the

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Information about this school

headteacher and deputy headteacher in 2013. A significant proportion of staff, including newly qualified teachers, joined the school at the start of this school year.  Since the previous inspection an external review of governance has taken place  The school is part of a teaching school alliance and works alongside other local primary schools.  The school provides a daily breakfast club for pupils.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Ensure teaching is at least good in order to accelerate pupils’ progress, by:  raising teachers’ expectations of what pupils can achieve in lessons, by increasing the level of challenge for all pupils, particularly for the most able  ensuring that pupils remain on task and focused throughout the lesson  ensuring consistency in the quality of marking to enable pupils to improve and giving them time to reflect and act upon the advice given  sharing the best practice that already exists in the school  providing, as appropriate, additional training and guidance for teaching assistants to enable them to contribute more fully to lessons.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Increase the rigour of the monitoring and evaluation of pupils’ progress, by:  developing the roles of middle leaders so they become more effective in evaluating the quality of teaching and checking pupils’ progress  ensuring action plans have a sharper focus on improving achievement and are evaluated regularly.

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The leadership and management requires improvement

 During what has been a period of significant change, senior leaders, in spite of determined efforts, have not yet secured enough effective teaching to enable all pupils to make good progress.  The headteacher has an accurate view of the school’s strengths and areas for development. However, plans to raise standards, although linked to checks on the quality of teaching and pupils’ progress, do not have a sharp enough focus on pupils’ achievements. Leaders are not evaluating sufficiently the impact of their plans, and so are not as clear as they could be on what is working well.  Procedures for monitoring the quality of teaching across the school are undertaken regularly and because the headteacher and deputy headteacher have a secure understanding of the requirements for judging teaching to be good, the quality of teaching is improving.  School leaders use the information from lesson observations and scrutiny of pupils’ work to identify areas

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The leadership and management requires improvement

for further improvement. For instance, last year leaders identified weaknesses in the teaching of phonics (letters and the sounds they make) and mathematics. These weaknesses are now being followed up with professional development for all staff. Newly-qualified teachers are well supported and appreciate the help they are given. However, not all middle leaders have had sufficient opportunities to check on the quality of teaching and learning and so are not contributing as much as they could to school improvement.  The school reviews all aspects of its work regularly and has systems in place to track and monitor pupils’ progress termly. Senior leaders use information about pupils’ progress to set teachers targets which are linked to pay. Staff are supported by opportunities for training to help them improve.  The subjects taught provide an interesting range of activities that pupils find enjoyable and which promote

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The leadership and management requires improvement

their spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. For example, pupils benefit from trips and visitors to school, such as the Bible group and the theatre group, residential visits and musical opportunities. Pupils regularly lead morning assemblies.  The primary school sports funding is used to increase opportunities for inter-school competitions and to extend participation in after-school clubs to all pupils from Year 1 upwards, ensuring greater equality of opportunity and benefit to all pupils’ health.  The school has valued and benefited from the local authority’s effective help and support in the form of training and consultancy. The school also works closely with a number of local schools.  The governance of the school  Governors have responded positively to the challenge facing the school and recognise where further improvement is needed. They have an understanding of the data on pupils’ progress and how well the

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The leadership and management requires improvement

school is doing compared with others. Governors are supportive and visit the school regularly. They are increasingly well informed about the quality of teaching and pupils’ achievement. They have good procedures in place for the performance management of the headteacher and to check teachers’ pay and progression. The school’s budget is effectively managed and governors oversee the spending of the primary school sports funding and the pupil premium provided for disadvantaged pupils, ensuring that the money is used for the purpose for which it is intended. Governors ensure that they fulfil their statutory duties for safeguarding and child protection requirements.

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The behaviour and safety of pupils requires improvement

 The behaviour of pupils requires improvement.  Although behaviour around school is generally calm and orderly a small number of pupils do not have positive attitudes to learning or pride in their work. A few pupils are slow to settle in lessons because teachers’ expectations are not high enough.  Around school and in the playground, pupils from a range of backgrounds and year groups play well together. Pupils willingly take on responsibilities, such as classrooms monitors and playground helpers. The democratically elected school council, acting upon suggestions from their classmates, work to improve the school environment. For example, large, outdoor play equipment is now a very popular fixture in the playground.  Most pupils are able to discuss their ideas with a partner and so develop social skills.  The atmosphere at the well-attended breakfast club is harmonious and all pupils get on well together. It is

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The behaviour and safety of pupils requires improvement

a very social occasion that gives pupils a good start to the school day.  Attendance is average. The school makes sure that parents understand the contribution good attendance makes to learning.  The school’s work to keep pupils safe and secure is good. Pupils know how to keep themselves safe, for example, when using the internet.  Pupils take part in regular anti-bullying events and as a result learn about the different types of bullying that could occur. They say that bullying does not take place but if they had a problem they would know to whom they could turn for help and are confident that any issues would be resolved quickly.  The overwhelming majority of parents said that their children were safe at school. All staff were of a similar opinion.

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The quality of teaching requires improvement

 Over time, teaching has not been good enough to ensure that all groups make good progress, and in some aspects, it continues to require improvement. Teachers do not always have high enough expectations of what pupils can achieve in lessons and work is not always sufficiently challenging. As a result, pupils’ attention sometimes wanders, they do not focus on the tasks set and the rate of progress slows.  Staffing is now more stable than in previous years. The headteacher has focused strongly on improving teaching and has given clear direction to staff. Various strategies have been put in place to improve the quality of teaching and these are beginning to have a positive impact. Inadequate teaching has been eliminated.  Overall, teaching assistants are used effectively to support pupils and enable them to join in lessons. However, there are occasions when the support pupils receive in order to improve is not as helpful. For

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The quality of teaching requires improvement

example, the style of questioning used sometimes relies too much on one word answers and does not always encourage pupils to think deeply or give reasons for their responses.  Teachers’ marking praises what pupils have done. However, it does not always explain what pupils need to do to improve their work. Pupils do not always have the opportunity to respond to the advice they are given and mistakes sometimes go uncorrected.  Pupils say that they enjoy their lessons and particularly like the visits that ‘help learning’. They also spoke enthusiastically of the ‘top tips’, including for multiplication, that help them to remember important facts.  Where learning is most effective, staff use good subject knowledge to give clear explanations when correcting misunderstandings and to introduce new ideas. A good example of this was seen in a Year 6 mathematics lesson, where pupils were using differences in temperature to further their understanding of

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The quality of teaching requires improvement

negative numbers.  When work captures their interest, pupils remain engaged in their learning, as seen in Year 1 where well thought out group activities built on pupils’ previous learning and secured their understanding of adjectives. Pupils were keen and proud to read out their vivid descriptions of characters from a story of ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’.  There are limited opportunities for staff to benefit from sharing ideas and observing the effective teaching that takes place in school.  Homework is set regularly and supports learning. The school has recently provided every pupil with a ‘homework pack’ which contains everything they may need in order to complete tasks. This approach has seen an improvement in the quantity and quality of homework and has been appreciated by parents.

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The achievement of pupils requires improvement

 Across the school, pupils’ levels of achievement are inconsistent, mainly as a result of the variable quality of teaching over their time in the school and expectations which are too low in some teaching. Pupils, particularly the most able, are not achieving as well as they might.  The proportion of pupils reaching the required standard in last year’s Year 1 national check on phonics (letters and the sounds they make) was lower than in previous years because of inconsistencies in the quality of teaching. However, the vast majority of pupils who did not meet the standard in 2013 had done so by the end of Year 2.  Standards by the end of Year 2 in reading, writing and mathematics are improving slowly but remain broadly average. The most recent test results show that the proportion of pupils reaching the higher levels is below average.  Over the last three years, standards at the end of Year 6 in reading and writing have been improving from

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The achievement of pupils requires improvement

well below average in 2012 to similar to the national average in 2014. Mathematics was also improving until this year when results in the end of Key Stage 2 tests dipped unexpectedly.  There is insufficient challenge in lessons for the most able pupils. Too few pupils reached the higher levels in writing and mathematics at both Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 in 2014. The amount of progress made by this group across Key Stage 2 was no better than expected.  Most recent test results show that from their different starting points, by the end of Year 6, the proportion of pupils making expected progress in reading and writing is similar to that found nationally. Progress in mathematics is slightly lower. The proportion making better than expected progress is lower than that found nationally.  Over time, as a result of the effective use of the pupil premium funding, disadvantaged pupils made similar levels of progress as other pupils in the school and the gap between disadvantaged pupils and their

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The achievement of pupils requires improvement

classmates had started to close. However, in 2014 it reopened. Disadvantaged pupils were two terms behind other pupils in school in reading and writing and half a term behind in mathematics. In 2013, disadvantaged pupils were three terms behind all pupils nationally in all three subjects.  Improvements in the quality of teaching are starting to have an impact on the achievement of pupils throughout the school. Work in pupils’ books and the school’s own assessment records show that progress in reading, writing and mathematics in all classes is starting to show signs of improvement with some pupils now making good progress.  The proportion of disabled pupils and those with special educational needs in each class is small, therefore, year-on-year results fluctuate according to specific needs. However, overall this group of pupils are making similar levels of progress as their classmates because of the support they receive.

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The achievement of pupils requires improvement

 Pupils enjoy reading. Those pupils who were heard to read were keen and engaged and made use of a range of skills in order to work out unknown words. A wide range of reading books is available to all pupils in the school. On instruction from the teacher, pupils choose their next book themselves, thus developing independence and learning to make the right choices.

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The early years provision is good

 Most children start in the Nursery classes with skills and knowledge that are well below those of children of a similar age. The school’s system to track progress shows that children make good progress during their time in the early years. By the time they leave the Reception classes, most children have caught up and have reached a good level of development. They are well equipped to make the transition into Year 1.  Disabled children and those with special educational needs also make good progress because their needs are identified early and they receive well-targeted support from all staff. There are also many opportunities for the most able children to achieve well.  Children are familiar with daily routines and are happy to mix with other children and adults. Teachers plan activities to help children develop confidence with the result that they are keen to join in activities and engage visitors in conversation.

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The early years provision is good

 Children are taught to recognise letters and the sounds they make and enjoy listening to a wide range of stories. There are various opportunities to develop writing skills and writing equipment is readily available.  Children learn to count through discussions about numbers and singing songs. However, the opportunities to develop their skills in number in the activity areas are not as many as those for writing.  Children make good progress when playing in the extensive outdoor area. They become involved in their games using an attractive range of equipment to develop imaginative play. They extend their physical skills that include painting, digging, building and climbing, as well as learning to share and follow instructions.  Staff are experienced and work to ensure children’s progress and well-being. Progress is tracked and as soon as any specific needs are identified, plans are put in place and the school works with parents and

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The early years provision is good

external professionals. Detailed records are kept in children’s individual folders called ‘learning journeys’ and these are shared with parents.  The early years is well managed. Staff are knowledgeable and well trained. They work well together to plan what is going to be taught, as well as discuss the progress children are making.  There are good links with staff in Year 1 which ensure the move from the early years to Key Stage 1 goes smoothly.

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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 failing

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Grade Judgement Description

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 130866 Local authority Wakefield Inspection number 431650

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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 Primary School category Community Age range of pupils 3–11 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 364 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Wendy Evans Headteacher Craig Mills Date of previous school inspection 19 September 2012 Telephone number 01977 723805 Fax number 01977 723805 Email address headteacher@carlton.wakefield.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 and 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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