Tachbrook Nursery School

Tachbrook Nursery School Aylesford Street, London, SW1V 3RT

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Overall effectiveness

Previous inspection: Outstanding 1 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

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 The shared vision of leaders and governors has enabled the school to maintain a number of key strengths since the last inspection.  The indoor environment is exceptionally well resourced and the garden provides an inspirational outside area.  Teaching is good overall and the staff promote children’s physical, imaginative, personal and emotional development exceptionally well. These aspects of children’s achievement are particularly strong. Their overall achievement is good.  Staff produce detailed, half-termly reviews of each child’s development and set each child individual targets.  Children’s behaviour is outstanding and they become deeply absorbed in the activities provided.  Children develop trusting relationships with the staff and there are good procedures for keeping them safe.  The leadership of teaching is good. The acting headteacher undertakes detailed observations and staff have good opportunities to develop their skills.

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 The school promotes children’s spiritual, moral, social and cultural development exceptionally well. Children are fully prepared for life in modern Britain.  The school works extremely well in partnership with parents, who express a high level of satisfaction with its work.

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It is not yet an outstanding school because

 The school has not acted on the need to evaluate the impact of its work on children’s attainment and progress identified at the last inspection.  Leaders and governors lack key information with which to evaluate the school’s effectiveness and identify possible improvements.  Teachers’ planning and review meetings do not focus enough on ensuring that all children are suitably challenged.

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Information about this inspection

 The inspector observed a number of learning activities indoors and outdoors, as well as looking at children’s portfolios of work and their half-termly reviews and targets. The inspector sampled two staff planning and review meetings which enabled her to gather evidence about different aspects of teaching and learning.  Meetings were held with the acting headteacher and the senior teacher and with a representative of the governing body. A meeting also took place with the local authority’s early years adviser.  The inspector considered the 30 responses to the online questionnaire, Parent View. She also took into account the 12 completed staff questionnaires.  The inspector observed the school’s work and looked at a range of documentation. This included the school’s self-evaluation and improvement plan; records of children’s behaviour; and evidence of systems for protecting and safeguarding children.

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Inspection team

Margaret Goodchild, Lead inspector Additional inspector

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Information about this school

 Tachbrook is an average-sized nursery school.  The school has full-time places for 20 children, and part-time places for 40. Children who attend part time do so for 16.5 hours per week, attending either morning or afternoon sessions. About half of the children who attend full time have deferred their move to a Reception class to stay on longer at Tachbrook.  The proportions of children of minority ethnic heritage and who speak English as an additional language are both high. They speak a variety of languages.  The proportion of disabled children and those who have special educational needs is broadly average.  The previous headteacher retired in July 2014 after 34 years at the school. The acting headteacher, who previously held the deputy role, took up post in September 2014 and an established member of the teaching staff took on the role of senior teacher. A temporary teacher, with a number of years’

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Information about this school

experience, has been appointed for the current year. At the time of the inspection, the school was advertising for a new permanent headteacher.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Raise children’s achievement and build on existing strengths in teaching by making sure that:  indoor and outdoor learning activities are planned thoroughly to take full account of the learning needs of all groups of children across all the areas of learning to increase the proportion that make outstanding progress.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Strengthen leadership and management by:  producing a clear analysis of children’s attainment on entry to the school, then systematically tracking and analysing the progress of all the children and particular groups to identify how well they are achieving in all areas of learning  using the resulting information to identify where improvements are needed.

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The leadership and management are good

 The acting headteacher, other leaders and governors have a shared vision for the school that has enabled them to maintain the high-quality of the school’s work in a number of key areas since the last inspection. They have created a culture where teachers can succeed and children are expected to behave well. Middle leadership is effective, the staff are very experienced and teamwork is strong.  The school works exceptionally closely in partnership with parents. They are fully involved from the home visits which are conducted before their children start school. They have the opportunity to contribute to their children’s portfolios of work and receive regular information about their learning. Parents who completed the Parent View questionnaire or who wrote to communicate their opinions expressed a high level of satisfaction with the school’s work.  The indoor and outdoor learning environments are the most striking features of the school’s work. The

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The leadership and management are good

indoor area is rich with toys, books and equipment to stimulate children’s interest. Staff have chosen resources very carefully, and they are readily accessible for children to select for themselves. The outdoor area, which consists of a large garden with trees and a range of natural and built structures, provides an inspirational space for the children to play and explore.  Close proximity to the natural world and to exciting experiences such as cooking food on an open fire contribute greatly to children’s spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. The school promotes British values very well: all the children learn the importance of showing tolerance and they learn the difference between right and wrong. The school prepares them equally well for life in modern Britain through its work to prevent discrimination and to promote positive relationships between children from diverse backgrounds.

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The leadership and management are good

 The curriculum promotes children’s learning exceptionally well in some areas of learning, and generally well in other areas. Learning is enriched by trips into London, including to the Tate Gallery and to a city farm.  The school meets statutory requirements in its safeguarding of the children. It ensures that staff are suitably trained and pays appropriate attention to protecting children. It is in the process of acting on some points for improvement identified in a recent health and safety audit.  The leadership of teaching is good overall. The acting headteacher provides detailed feedback to teachers about their performance, and staff have good opportunities to develop their skills through training.  The last inspection identified the need for leaders to analyse and evaluate the impact teaching had on the progress of all children so that work could be precisely tailored to the needs of individuals and groups. The

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The leadership and management are good

school has not responded effectively to this issue and leaders still do not evaluate the school’s performance as well as they could.  The lack of a system for analysing children’s overall achievement makes it difficult for leaders to be precise in identifying weaknesses and checking whether all children are receiving equal opportunities. It also makes it difficult to check the impact of developments on the quality of teaching and children’s achievement.  The local authority provides good support to the school. The current local authority adviser began working with Tachbrook at the beginning of this academic year. She has identified the need for leaders to capture information about children’s attainment and progress as numerical data and to improve the way they evaluate the school’s effectiveness.  The governance of the school:  Governance is effective and members of the governing body make a good contribution to the school’s

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The leadership and management are good

work. Governors are providing extra support at the moment for the acting headteacher, and financial management is good.  Members of the governing body are strongly committed to meeting the needs of individual children and are well informed about most aspects of the school’s work. The governing body is actively involved in the life of the school and governors conduct regular visits. They gather information for themselves about teaching and learning, and make sure that the appraisal of teachers rewards the most effective practice.  Governors do not have an understanding of data because the school does not collect any but they do receive reports from the acting headteacher about aspects of the school’s performance.

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Behaviour

 The behaviour of children is outstanding. Children greatly enjoy their time at school and engage fully in the activities provided. They readily select from the exciting toys and equipment available, and become absorbed in activities.  Throughout the school, children are significantly ahead of expectations for their age in their ability to persist with their learning for lengthy periods of time. They try very hard and develop a belief in their ability to succeed. They quickly become confident and independent, and develop curiosity about the world around them.  Children play happily together. They develop a wide range of skills in socialising with others and develop a sense of themselves as learners. In their play, there are plenty of opportunities for them to learn to take turns, share and help one another. In the dining room, staff sit with the children in little family groups, encouraging polite conversation and good table manners.

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Behaviour

 Staff are skilled in managing children’s behaviour. The children are generally so deeply involved with their learning that they do not have time to think about behaving inappropriately. Most children attend regularly and the school does its best to make parents aware of the importance of their children not missing any time.

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Safety

 The school’s work to keep children safe and secure is good. Home visits by staff before children join the school and well-established routines help children to feel safe and to settle quickly. Children develop very positive and trusting relationships with the staff, and parents who expressed an opinion said that their children feel safe at school.  The children know that is it important to treat one another with kindness. They show respect and care for each other, which helps to ensure that they are kept safe from bullying.  Children learn to judge for themselves what is safe, for instance, when using the swings and climbing apparatus in the outdoor area or transporting equipment around on the trolleys. Staff conduct risk assessments of the various activities and supervise children well, but attention to safety could be more rigorous at times.

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The quality of teaching is good

 Teaching is good overall and teachers promote some aspects of children’s development exceptionally well.  The staff are highly skilled in fostering children’s imaginative development. Some of the best practice is seen when adults work alongside groups of children developing stories, some of which become sophisticated and go on for a number of weeks or even months.  The staff promote children’s personal, social and emotional development extremely well. They ensure that children quickly grow in confidence and respect the need for them to be allowed to make decisions for themselves.  Teachers provide disabled children and those who have special educational needs with good support and staff often share methods with parents so that they can continue a particular approach at home.  Teachers’ high expectations for the most able children were evident in some activities during the inspection. When a teacher read Bears in the Night to a small group of children, her carefully chosen

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The quality of teaching is good

questions kept them totally focused so that they thought deeply about the author’s choice of words and of how to sequence a series of phrases they had seen in the story.  Equally good learning was evident when a group of children played for an extended period of time at the water tray with the guidance and encouragement of an adult. A range of containers and other equipment provided a wealth of opportunity for tipping and pouring, finding out about capacity and developing hand- to-eye coordination. The adult continuously increased the children’s awareness of the possibilities, showing them new skills and extending their vocabulary.  Teachers provide children with regular opportunities to draw and make marks, to become familiar with fiction and non-fiction books, and to develop a love of stories. Many activities promote children’s communication well, though some sessions do not promote the language development of children learning

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The quality of teaching is good

English as an additional language as well as they could. Children take books home and the school has involved parents in producing story sacks in home languages to support children of minority ethnic heritage.  Awareness of numbers, shape, space and measures is included in many activities, and children have good daily opportunities to solve problems for themselves. The staff provide a variety of practical experiences that develop children’s knowledge of mathematical vocabulary, and set some challenging mathematical targets for individual children.  The school has identified the need to improve the link between assessment, planning and practice for children who speak English as an additional language, disabled children and those who have special educational needs, and for summer-born children.  Although there is a good amount of excellent practice, teaching is not outstanding because planning throughout the school is not as strong as it should be. This results in some variation in the amount of

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The quality of teaching is good

progress different children make from one session to another. Apart from listing which children will take part in which activities, there is currently no written plan for this half term indicating what learning opportunities will be provided. Past half-termly plans have important gaps relating to some areas of learning.  While learning priorities are produced half termly for each child, these often focus only on one area of learning, for instance, mathematical development or the promotion of physical skills. The twice-daily review meetings which involve all the staff, while valuable, do not concentrate as much as they should on how all the children can be suitably challenged.

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is good

 The staff build up a picture of each child over a whole term rather than assessing their skills when they first join Tachbrook. There is, therefore, no clear information about children’s attainment on entry but their skills at the outset appear to be broadly typical for their age, though about a quarter are at the early stages of learning to speak English.  Children’s achievement is particularly strong in physical, imaginative, personal, social and emotional development. By the time they leave the school, the large majority of children exceed the attainment typically found for their age in these areas of learning. Some activities also promote their language development very well.  In the garden, children develop their physical skills and strengthen their muscles, for example, through climbing, balancing, carrying logs, and adapting natural resources for use in their play. Indoors, they develop fine control with their hands by joining construction materials together, making things in the

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is good

workshop, cooking, painting and drawing.  Through developing stories, children make swift progress in their ability to express themselves and to communicate their imaginative ideas. During the inspection, a group of children worked with a member of staff in the garden to create a story of their own invention, called ‘The Three Robbers’ House’. Fortnightly sessions with a storyteller are helping them to learn about Greek myths and to explore and re-enact the stories.  Evidence suggests that children’s attainment in reading and writing is broadly typical for their age by the time they leave. Children make marks that increasingly resemble letters of the alphabet. They learn that text carries meaning, develop a love of books and listen carefully to stories. They gradually recognise some whole words from familiar stories and are beginning to identify the initial sounds in some words, though their knowledge of letters and the sounds they make (phonics) is not developed as systematically

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is good

as it could be.  In mathematics, children complete jigsaw puzzles and fit various shapes together to make elaborate constructions. They count and learn to recognise numbers to 10, and develop a wide vocabulary to describe the position of objects and to compare different sizes. Through cooking and exploring the capacity of various containers, they begin to learn about different quantities.  The most able children learn at a similar rate to their classmates. By the time they move on to Reception class at primary school, they are able to read simple books and write some words for themselves. During the inspection, they successfully ordered a series of phrases from a story with some prompting, and they work with adults to produce ‘instruction manuals’ on how to make models. Their mathematical development appears to be rather more advanced than their writing, based on half-termly reviews and the contents of children’s learning journals.

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is good

 Disabled children and those who have special educational needs achieve well. The staff provide them with sensitive support and work closely with therapists and other agencies to meet their academic and personal needs. Children who speak English as an additional language make good progress in increasing their knowledge of English, though there are times when a wider a range of activities would better support their developing vocabulary.  In the absence of any system for analysing the progress of all children and particular groups, it is not entirely clear whether some children make better progress than others. However, children are clearly well prepared for the next stage of their education.

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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 101104 Local authority Westminster Inspection number 448077

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School details

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

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School details

Type of school Nursery School category Community Age range of pupils 3–5 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 59 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Rachel Armitage Headteacher Elizabeth Hillyard Date of previous school inspection 16 November 2011 Telephone number 020 7641 8725 Fax number 020 7641 8726 Email address office@tachbrooknursery.co.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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