Bishops Cannings Church of England Aided Primary School

School report Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School The Street, Bishops Cannings, Devizes, Wiltshire, SN10 2LD

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Overall effectiveness

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

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 The headteacher leads the school well, providing a clear vision of the school’s strengths and areas for further development. He is well supported by staff, parents and governors.  This is a caring school; senior leaders and teachers know their pupils well. The work and support are skilfully matched to individual needs.  Teaching is good. Staff make good use of assessment information to inform their planning.  Pupils have a very positive attitude to their work. They are very enthusiastic about their learning and know what to do if they get into difficulties.  Pupils’ achievement at the end of Key Stage 2 in reading, writing and mathematics has risen since the previous inspection and is now good. The progress is particularly good in reading and mathematics; however, it is not quite as fast in writing.  Children in Reception quickly settle into the school’s routines; they are taught well and well prepared for

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

Year 1.  The teaching of letters and sounds (phonics) has improved in Key Stage 1 and is supporting well the progress pupils are making in their reading.  Pupils’ behaviour is good both in and around the school. Pupils say the school is very safe and everybody is very friendly and caring.  Pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is central to the school’s core values.  Parents hold the school in high regard and are very positive about the quality of teaching and care.  Governors are very effective. They are rigorous in their approach, providing both support and challenge to hold the school to account for its performance.

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It is not yet an outstanding school because

 It is too early to see the impact of the additional opportunities pupils have had, since the start of the new school year, to develop their writing, including spelling and grammar.  There are some inconsistencies in the quality of guidance to pupils on how to improve their work. Teachers’ marking does not always provide pupils with the next steps to aid their understanding as well as challenge their thinking. Inspection report: Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School, 18 − 19 November 2014 2 of 10

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Information about this inspection

 Inspectors observed parts of 17 lessons, taught by eight teachers, four of which were jointly observed with the headteacher. In addition, inspectors observed small groups of pupils taught by teaching assistants.  Inspectors observed two assemblies.  Inspectors heard pupils from Years 2 and 6 reading and also held meetings with two groups of pupils, including the school council.  Inspectors were shown around the school by a group of pupils who spoke about their learning.  Discussions were held with the Chair and two other representatives from the Governing Body. Inspectors also spoke to parents and staff including senior and middle leaders. A telephone conversation was held with a representative from the local authority.  Inspectors looked at a range of documents, including the school’s data on pupils’ current progress, planning and monitoring documents and records relating to behaviour, attendance and the safeguarding

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Information about this inspection

of children. Inspectors scrutinised the school’s arrangements for spending the additional funding for sports and pupil premium funding.  Inspectors analysed questionnaires from 18 members of staff.  A letter from a parent and 64 responses to the Ofsted online questionnaire (Parent View) were taken into account. Inspectors also used the start of the day to talk to parents.

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Inspection team

Sarah Jones, Lead inspector Additional Inspector

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Inspection team

Alison Hendy Additional Inspector Inspection report: Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School, 18 − 19 November 2014 3 of 10

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Information about this school

 The school is slightly smaller than the average-sized primary school.  Most pupils are of White British backgrounds.  The proportion of disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs supported through school action is below the national average. The proportion of pupils who have a statement of special educational needs is slightly above average.  The proportion of disadvantaged pupils who are known to be eligible for free school meals is below average. Additional government funding known as the pupil premium supports these pupils.  The school met the government’s current floor standards, which set the minimum expectations for pupils’ attainment and progress.  Early years provision comprises of one-form entry for four-year-olds who attend full time.  The school is part of a local cluster of nine local schools that work with and support each other to help raise standards.  The headteacher took up his post in January 2012.

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Information about this school

 The school works closely with an outstanding school called The Mead in Trowbridge to support improvements to teaching and pupils’ learning.  A breakfast club is provided and managed independently by the staff at the pre-school, based on the same site. The school also provides a number of well-attended after-school clubs, which include hockey, judo and art club.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Further improve the quality of teaching to support pupils and raise achievement by:  continuing to provide pupils with opportunities to develop their writing, spelling and grammar across different subject areas  making sure that all teachers give pupils useful advice in their marking on how they can improve their work. Inspection report: Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School, 18 − 19 November 2014 4 of 10

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The leadership and management are good

 The strong leadership by the headteacher, who is well supported by the deputy headteacher and governors, has ensured that staff have a much higher expectation of pupils. As a result both teaching and the achievement of pupils have improved over the last two years.  The school’s self-evaluation is accurate, and clear priorities to support the school to continue to improve are identified in the development plan.  There are rigorous systems in place for checking pupils’ progress. The regular checks enable both senior and middle leaders to effectively assess how all pupils are doing and put in additional support for those who may be underachieving.  Leaders regularly check the quality of the teaching. The monitoring of teaching and progress pupils make has been used to rid the school of any weak teaching. Staff have taken advantage of the regular training opportunities and work with schools within the local cluster to bring about further improvements to their

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The leadership and management are good

teaching.  The school has used the last 12 months to put in place changes to the curriculum to include topics pupils enjoy to help develop their reading, writing and mathematical skills further. The school strongly promotes pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development which ensures good relationships between pupils and with staff.  Opportunities provided through visits and visitors to the school help develop their understanding of British values and prepare them well for life in the wider national community. Senior leaders ensure that all pupils have equal opportunities to take part in activities. Pupils can learn how to play a musical instrument and could speak about the composer of the month, Hildegard Von Bingham. Many pupils spoke with enthusiasm about the child the school sponsors in the Dominican Republic.  The interactive displays in the corridor ensure learning continues throughout the school day. They are

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The leadership and management are good

enjoyed and well used by pupils both during lessons and at break times.  The school has revised the new approach to assessment without levels; these ideas have been shared with the cluster schools to ensure the most appropriate approach has been implemented. It is too early to measure the effectiveness of this.  The school works very well with parents and keeps them well informed about their children’s learning and work of the school, including through the highly effective website. An overwhelming majority of parents thought the school was well led and appreciate the teachers’ openness and availability. One parent reported: ‘Teachers always make themselves available, the office staff are friendly and helpful and the headteacher always engages with us when we see him. He has a real presence in the school.’  The school has made very good use of the additional primary sports funding to promote the development

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The leadership and management are good

of healthy lifestyles and encourage further participation, particularly for the girls, in a wider range of sporting activities. The funding has been used to employ specialists from the local secondary school to work alongside and develop the skills of the class teachers. There are also opportunities for pupils to experience a range of different activities and participate in local competitions, including tag rugby and hockey leagues.  There are good links with the local secondary school which help support pupils when they move on to the next stage of their school career. There are opportunities to share facilities and pupils particularly enjoyed the chance to work at the secondary school during Science week and were eager to talk about their experience.  The local authority and a neighbouring outstanding school have helped bring about the positive changes in teaching at the school, by working alongside staff and providing opportunities for staff to make visits to

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The leadership and management are good

other schools in the area to observe good practice.  The school’s arrangements for safeguarding pupils meet statutory requirements. Staff and governors receive up-to-date training and are clear about the procedures.

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The leadership and management are good

 The governance of the school:  The governing body makes a strong contribution to the quality of education the school provides. Discrimination of any sort is not tolerated. Governors have a range of expertise that they use effectively to hold the school to account. There is an ongoing programme of training provided by both the local authority and the diocese. All governors access training, including those new to the role, to ensure they are well prepared to both challenge and support the school. The local authority uses the expertise of the Vice Chair of the Governing Body to run safeguarding training for governors in other schools within the area. Governors regularly visit the school, spending time in classrooms talking to pupils, and Inspection report: Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School, 18 − 19 November 2014 5 of 10

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The leadership and management are good

working with children as observed in the Reception class, as well as meeting with staff. They understand school performance data and are aware of the school’s priority to continue to improve. Governors set challenging targets for the headteacher and understand the link between teachers’ pay and their performance. They manage the school’s finances well, for example the expenditure of the pupil premium and additional sports funding.

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Behaviour

 The behaviour of pupils is good. Pupils have a positive attitude to their work; they enjoy working together and sharing ideas, as well as working on their own.  Pupils are very proud of their school and enjoy coming to school. A group of pupils took an inspector on a tour of the school and spoke about their learning experiences and other opportunities they value, such as the new house system introduced by the headteacher. They particularly like the inter-house competitions.  Pupils like to take on extra responsibilities and the school council is very keen to be further involved in the developments at the school.  Pupils appreciate the facilities at the school, including the recently resurfaced playground. However, they would like more activities at break and lunchtime, especially as they are not able to go on the field during the winter months.  Behaviour is not outstanding as on a few occasions, some pupils call out in lessons and can interrupt the

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Safety

 The school’s work to keep pupils safe and secure is good.  The pupils describe the school as a caring school and they look after each other in accordance with the golden rule of the school, ‘treat others the same way you want them to treat you’. Pupils have a good understanding of different types of bullying and the different forms that it can take. An assembly was observed during the inspection which focused on Anti-bullying week. Pupils could distinguish between the different types of bullying.  Pupils report there is no bullying at the school and they know who to talk to if there was ever a falling out between friends. They are confident that teachers would sort the problem out. Pupils have lessons on safety when using the internet and are aware of its potential drawbacks and dangers when using it.  The attendance of pupils is good; over the last year it has improved further and it continues to improve.

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Safety

There are clear procedures in place to monitor both punctuality and attendance. There have been no permanent exclusions for the last three years.

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The quality of teaching is good

 Teaching is consistently good. Teachers have good subject knowledge and use this along with their knowledge of pupils’ progress to plan lessons to help develop pupils’ understanding of all subjects to ensure pupils’ progress in reading, writing and mathematics is good or better.  Teachers have high expectations. The effective teamwork between teachers and teaching assistants makes a strong contribution to the pupils’ learning. Teachers use a range of resources to support the pupils’ learning. This was seen in a Year 6 religious education lesson when a piece of music, ‘Ava Maria’, was used effectively to encourage pupils to reflect on and understand Christian values in relation to an everyday situation.  The relationships between the pupils and adults are good. Pupils are both respectful and polite. Pupils are confident they can ask for help, should they struggle. One class spoke about the three ‘B’s ‘brain, book,

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The quality of teaching is good

and buddy’ and the process they go through to try and work out a problem for themselves, before asking an adult for help. Pupils appreciate the learning walls in the classroom and how they help when they are working on their own.  Teachers use questioning effectively to assess pupils’ understanding and provide further guidance or the next steps in their learning. Pupils also question each other, for example during a science experiment when pupils used a range of different liquids and egg shells (to represent teeth) to predict the damage different drinks could have on their teeth. This ensured they understood the effects of different drinks on their teeth. Pupils enjoyed working together to share ideas and their understanding of the experiment. Inspection report: Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School, 18 − 19 November 2014 6 of 10

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The quality of teaching is good

 There is good provision for pupils who are disabled and those who have special educational needs. They are taught well, either in the class or occasionally in small groups with teaching assistants, who are well aware of their needs and support pupils well. These pupils make good progress.  Pupils enjoy the challenges presented to them, whether individually or in groups, and would like even further challenges in their work.  Most teaching ensures that both verbal and written feedback helps pupils become aware of their next steps in their learning. This is not consistently the case across the school and at times pupils are not aware of how to improve their work, or not given the time to complete the task.

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is good

 Pupils achieve well and have continued to make good progress from their different starting points. This progress has continued as a result of regular checks on pupils’ progress and revised support for those who need it. External moderation in 2014 confirmed the accuracy of the school’s internal assessments.  The achievement pupils made in Year 2 was good, particularly in reading and mathematics; the progress was not as rapid in boys’ writing. The school has put into place further opportunities for boys to practise their writing through topic work. Topics such as ‘outer space’ have captured their interest and there is evidence of an improvement since the start of term.  The achievement of pupils at the end of Key Stage 2 has continued to improve with a further improvement in pupils’ progress in 2014, in reading, writing and mathematics. A growing proportion of the most able pupils are now reaching higher levels particularly in mathematics. The outcomes for the

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is good

grammar, punctuation and spelling assessment in 2014 were below average. The school’s analysis showed this was due to a weakness in spelling. The school has addressed this with additional daily sessions and observations indicate pupils’ progress is rapidly improving.  The achievement of Year 1 pupils in the national screening check for reading declined in 2014; the school could explain this was a result of poor teaching. There is now evidence of rapid progress in the recent internal assessments. Teachers and teaching assistants observed model the sounds letters make accurately to support pupils’ understanding.  Pupils enjoy reading. Pupils could talk about their choice of books and what attracts them to particular authors. Their interest and enthusiasm reflect the school’s drive to improve reading in all year groups.  Disabled pupils and those with special educational needs receive skilled, targeted support to aid their

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is good

progress. As a result, their progress is either in line with or faster than their peers.  The attainment of pupils who are eligible for the additional funding is improving in relation to other pupils, particularly in reading. However, as there are only a small number of pupils who are eligible, the statistics need to be considered with caution. In 2014, Year 6 pupils were two terms behind other pupils in writing and one and half terms behind in mathematics. However, compared to pupils nationally Year 6 pupils were behind by half a term in reading and mathematics and one and half terms for writing. The school has put in a range of effective interventions to support these pupils and both are making good progress.

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is good

 The leadership and management of the Reception class are good.  Before children start in Reception, visits are made to local pre-schools to meet the children and make early assessments, so as to plan activities in relation to children’s differing abilities. Children start in Reception with a range of different skills, some starting with limited speaking and listening skills; however, they quickly settle into the routines and make good progress, due to the early assessments made.  Teachers, teaching assistants and a volunteer governor work together well. They help create a highly effective team to provide children with a range of learning experiences when they start school. Learning in a safe and caring environment helps develop children’s self-esteem to make sure they are more confident to move to Year 1.  There are clear routines and children settle quickly and with confidence, knowing what is expected of

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is good

them. Teachers and teaching assistants provide a good level of care and support. Safeguarding is effective and the procedures in place ensure children know how to keep themselves safe.  The quality of teaching is good. The teaching of letters and sounds (phonics) is modelled well to help children at the early stages of reading to understand the letters and their sounds. Outstanding practice was observed. Inspection report: Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School, 18 − 19 November 2014 7 of 10

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is good

 Staff assess children’s learning constantly and this is recorded in individual ‘learning journeys’. The progress children make is well documented. The children enjoyed talking to the inspectors about their work and looking at the photographs to see the progress they had made.  Parents say they are very happy with the care and support their children receive and that staff are very approachable. One parent said to an inspector: ‘My child is happy and has settled very quickly into the Reception class.’ Inspection report: Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School, 18 − 19 November 2014 8 of 10

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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. Inspection report: Bishops Cannings Church of England (Aided) Primary School, 18 − 19 November 2014 9 of 10

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School details

Unique reference number 126395 Local authority Wiltshire Inspection number 449191

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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 Voluntary Aided Age range of pupils 4−11 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 208 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Nick Bancroft Headteacher Jonathan Barber Date of previous school inspection 28−29 June 2011 Telephone number 01380 860 633 Fax number 01380 860 633 Email address www.bishopscannings.wilts.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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