Mitchell Brook Primary School

Mitchell Brook Primary School Bridge Road, London NW10 9BX

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Overall effectiveness Outstanding

Effectiveness of leadership and management Outstanding

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Overall effectiveness Outstanding

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Outstanding

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Overall effectiveness Outstanding

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Outstanding

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Overall effectiveness Outstanding

Overall effectiveness at previous inspection Good

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This is an outstanding school

 Mitchell Brook is a vibrant learning community. The school motto, ‘Inspiring the minds of tomorrow’ accurately describes daily life at the school.  The headteacher provides inspirational leadership. Her uncompromising drive to ensure all pupils have the very best education permeates the school. All leaders are highly effective. They are very well supported by a knowledgeable governing body. Together, they make sure that high quality teaching is a feature every day, in all subjects, for all pupils.  Pupils excel in their learning and progress. As a result, achievement is outstanding. By the time they leave school, pupils’ attainment is in line with national averages, and for many it is above this.  Children make an excellent start to their education because provision in the early years is outstanding. Their daily experiences are characterised by high quality teaching that secures rapid rates of progress.

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This is an outstanding school

 Teachers regularly and accurately check the academic progress that pupils make. Any pupils at risk of falling behind are identified quickly. The school then provides extra guidance and support to help them catch up.  Pupils enjoy reading and the school library offers them an excellent range of children’s literature, including dual-language books for pupils new to speaking English. Leaders emphasise the importance of reading at home. The school provides books and workshops to support families.  The school’s curriculum provides challenging, varied and meaningful learning experiences for pupils. An excellent range of educational visits, clubs and special events helps bring learning alive. All pupils learn a musical instrument and participate in regular, high-quality physical education.  Pupils’ behaviour is outstanding. They display impeccable manners during lessons, in the playground and towards visitors.

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This is an outstanding school

 Personal development is a key strength. Pupils say that they feel safe and are free from bullying of any kind. They are kind and considerate towards each other and help others in their community.  Parents are overwhelmingly positive about the school. They are proud of the children’s achievements and enjoy visiting the school for coffee mornings, events and workshops.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Improve the quality of presentation in workbooks and raise standards in handwriting so all pupils develop a fluent, consistent style.

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is outstanding

 The headteacher has been highly effective in improving the quality of education since the previous inspection. This has been achieved while the school has increased in size and undergone an extensive building project.  The headteacher has appointed and developed a capable team of leaders. They have a demonstrable and extremely positive impact on safeguarding and outcomes for pupils. As a result, all pupils make rapid progress from their different starting points.  Senior leaders and governors have an accurate view of what the school does well, and of the areas they want to develop further. This is due to the accurate monitoring they undertake of the quality of teaching and pupils’ learning.  All staff are motivated and share the headteacher’s vision and high expectations. They commonly refer to it as ‘The Mitchell Brook Way’. The high quality training and development that staff receive are sharply focused

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is outstanding

on developing their interests and talents, alongside the school’s priorities. Leaders support teachers new to the profession very well. They provide regular coaching to improve teaching practice.  The performance of staff is managed very effectively. All staff have demanding targets linked to pupils’ academic progress, their behaviour and welfare. The school links pay progression, training and development closely to teachers’ targets. One member of staff described their training as ‘professionally challenging’.  The school provides a broad, balanced and exciting curriculum. Excellent opportunities to extend pupils’ mathematical and literacy skills are promoted in all subjects. This can be seen around the school in high quality displays.  Pupils thoroughly enjoy learning in a range of subjects. The curriculum is organised into whole-school themes. Each topic is launched at the start of term with an unusual experience which stimulates and

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is outstanding

motivates pupils’ interest. This term, the theme is ‘Quests’. During the inspection, pupils were seen discovering mysterious objects around the school as they returned from their half-term break. These included treasure maps, unusual artefacts and a hot-air balloon that had landed in the corridor. Pupils were fascinated by their discoveries, promoting much debate. The younger pupils were convinced a dinosaur had visited their classroom during the holidays, leaving behind an egg.  The school actively and successfully promotes fundamental British values. Staff have established a set of beliefs known as their ‘STARS’ values (successful, team focused, aspirational, respectful and spirited). They are an important part of school life and celebrated throughout the day. As a result, pupils demonstrate a high degree of tolerance and respect towards each other. This extends to their charity work in the community. Recently, some pupils spent time at the weekend working in a local supermarket to generate

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is outstanding

donations for the local food bank.  Additional funding provided by the pupil premium is used exceptionally well. It helps all pupils to access all aspects of school life. As an example, pupils were financially supported to attend a residential trip to Belgium. They visited a First World War memorial site to support their learning about conflict resolution and to increase their historical knowledge.  The school develops pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development in many different ways. These are extremely effective. All pupils have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument. Specialist teaching ensures high quality learning in the arts and there is a wide range of enrichment activities and projects. In the summer term, the pupils worked with professional artists and organisations to research, plan, create and perform at a traditional street carnival for their community.  The sports premium fund adds additional value to the school’s extensive provision for physical education.

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is outstanding

Specialist teaching is effective and partnerships with local schools enable pupils to participate and perform well in competitive events. The school’s approach to physical education also promotes equality between pupils. For example, boys and girls play alongside each other during competitive games at lunchtime and perform together at the Irish dancing club.  Leaders listen carefully to parents’ views. Parents make a valuable contribution to school life and are actively involved in events and workshops. They regularly attend coffee mornings, performances and celebrations. They value the school’s effective approach to setting regular homework. The confidence of parents in the school supports the inspection findings. For example, a typical comment from one parent was, ‘This is an excellent school, teachers are wonderful and children are learning fast’.  The governance of the school The governing body is highly effective. Governors are very well informed by the headteacher and other

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is outstanding

leaders about the quality of teaching, pupils’ learning and progress. This enables them to hold leaders to account and make sure that improvement plans are sharply focused on improving outcomes for the pupils. Governors undertake an annual audit of their skills. This informs their training and development. As a result, they are fully equipped with the relevant skills and knowledge. This helps them to set and check progress against the school’s priorities and fulfil their statutory duties effectively. Governors make a significant and meaningful contribution to life at the school. They visit often and attend events to celebrate the pupils’ achievements.  The arrangements for safeguarding are effective. Leaders make sure all staff receive regular and up-to-date child protection training. The Chair of the Governing Body has forged a link with an organisation that specialises in protecting pupils from female genital mutilation. This is helping to raise awareness and train

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is outstanding

staff about potential risks. Furthermore, the deputy headteacher has devised a working party made up of parents, staff and representatives from the local community to increase awareness about possible risks to pupils from radicalisation.

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is outstanding

 High quality and consistent teaching is typical across the school and in all subjects. Teachers and learning support staff work together in teams. This enables them to share expertise and support each other to improve. Their high quality, professional interactions provide an excellent role model for the pupils.  Teaching throughout the school reinforces high expectations about pupils’ achievement and behaviour, in line with ‘The Mitchell Brook Way’. Teachers ensure that all pupils are challenged and inspired during lessons. This is due to their very good subject knowledge, considered planning and careful preparation. Teachers provide excellent opportunities for pupils to apply their skills in a variety of ways and subjects. For example, pupils solve complex mathematical problems about quantity and money when they are participating in the school’s cookery project.  The impact of high quality teaching is evident in the pupils’ current levels of achievement in reading, writing,

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is outstanding

mathematics and science throughout the school. Occasionally, pupils’ presentation is let down because their handwriting style is not fluent or legible.  Teachers are adept at using questions to deepen and extend pupils’ learning. They check pupils’ progress during lessons regularly. They use this information to intervene if pupils need more help or challenge, so all excel during lessons.  Teachers use a very good range of resources to capture pupils’ imaginations. In particular, high quality children’s literature from around the world inspires pupils to improve their own writing. For example, in Year 1, the story of Anansi, an African folktale character, had clearly motivated pupils to write to a high standard in a range of styles. The school organises visits from authors and guest speakers. The new school library offers an excellent range of books, including dual-language books for pupils new to speaking English.

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is outstanding

 Teachers mark pupils’ work regularly. It is consistent and of high quality across the school. As a result, pupils understand their teachers’ comments. This enables them to make improvements, and consolidate or extend their understanding. Pupils particularly enjoy using their purple pens to respond to their teachers. In doing so, they demonstrate their ability to reflect on their own learning and progress.  Teachers set meaningful and challenging homework to prepare pupils for new learning or to support their reading, writing and mathematical understanding. For example, weekly ‘talk homework’ fosters pupils’ communication skills, including in the early years where children are already becoming very articulate. Pupils enjoyed showing inspectors the models they made during the school holiday. Their achievements were outstanding and included intricate replicas of the Taj Mahal, the leaning Tower of Pisa and the Pyramids.

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is outstanding

 The youngest pupils make rapid gains in their reading. This is because the curriculum provides high quality daily teaching of phonics (how the sounds in words are represented by different letters). Pupils can then use their knowledge and skills about letters and the sounds very effectively when they read and write.

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Personal development and welfare

 The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is outstanding.  Pupils are confident, sociable and friendly. They are eager to talk to visitors about their experiences at school and link these to their STARS values. They are proud to share their achievements and make a valuable contribution to their community by organising fund-raising events.  The effective pastoral team maintains effective systems to ensure the welfare of all pupils. They work closely with parents and other organisations to support pupils whose circumstances might make them vulnerable and to maintain good attendance levels. Supervision is excellent in the playground, so the start of the day and playtimes are enjoyable and happy experiences.  Pupils say they feel safe and are free from bullying of any kind at school. They are aware of different forms of bullying that they may encounter and confident that staff would resolve issues should they occur. They

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Personal development and welfare

value their counselling service, which provides a private space for pupils to speak to trained staff should they have any concerns or worries. Pupils know that they can regularly pop in or make an appointment.  Pupils’ views are taken very seriously by the school. Pupils are provided with opportunities to explain what they would like improved. They relish the additional responsibilities on offer. For example, many pupils act as good-will ambassadors. Currently they are working to keep the school grounds litter free. Pupils have played an important part in some aspects of the school’s improvement. Notably, they have transformed lunchtimes by creating their STARS Diner. It is complete with healthy eating posters, baskets of fresh bread, tablecloths, new cutlery and a comfortable reading corner. One pupil told inspectors that lunchtime was their favourite time of the day because, ‘We make friends and it is like a restaurant’.

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Behaviour

 The behaviour of pupils is outstanding during lessons, in the corridors and on the playground. Pupils display impeccable manners, hold doors open for visitors and are kind and respectful towards each other. This creates a calm, welcoming and caring environment.  Pupils strive to succeed academically. They set themselves challenges at the start of lessons. This helps them to remain motivated, focused and engaged in their activities. They are able to work extremely well both independently and alongside their classmates. The schools’ accreditation recognising pupils’ effective teamwork is fully deserved.  Pupils’ attitudes to all aspects of school life are exemplary. They are proud of their STARS values and are routinely praised by staff when they achieve these. For example, the school recognises classes with the best attendance and celebrates pupils who attend regularly. As a result, attendance rates have risen since the

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Behaviour

previous inspection.  Learning spaces and furnishings are attractive and maintained to a high standard. Corridor and classroom displays are engaging, informative and reflect the pupils’ high levels of achievement in all subjects. This all contributes to a very calm, purposeful and orderly learning environment.

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Outcomes for pupils are outstanding

 All pupils, including those who are disadvantaged and most able, make at least good progress from their relatively low starting points when they join the school. Many make excellent progress. This is consistent in reading, writing, mathematics and other subjects, including science.  Outstanding progress means that pupils excel in their learning, and attainment is at national averages by the time they leave school. The most-able pupils reach extremely high standards. Consequently, pupils are very well prepared for secondary school.  In all year groups, achievement is outstanding. The schools’ assessment information confirms this and it can be seen in the current pupils’ exercise books.  Children make rapid progress in the Nursery and Reception classes. The proportion of children who leave Reception class with a good level of development is above the national average. As a result, the children are

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Outcomes for pupils are outstanding

very well prepared when they start Year 1.  Pupils continue to make rapid gains in their early reading skills throughout Year 1. Pupils use their knowledge and skills about phonics (letters and the sounds that they make) when they read and write. The proportion of pupils achieving the expected level in the phonics check is well above the national average for Year 1 pupils.  Disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs make good and often exceptional progress from their individual starting points. This is due to outstanding leadership characterised by careful and closely monitored plans for individual pupils. Effective partnership work with a range of specialists in the field ensures the correct support is put in place at the right time for these pupils.  Pupils from different ethnic backgrounds make similarly excellent progress. Pupils who are new to speaking English learn the language quickly and then make the same outstanding progress as their classmates.

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Early years provision is outstanding

 Children in the early years make an excellent start to their education. Their daily experiences are characterised by high-quality teaching to support all aspects of their learning and development.  The proportion of children who leave the Reception classes with a good level of development is above the national average. This represents exceptional progress for the vast majority of children who join the school with levels below those typical for their age.  Children are taught important personal, social and emotional skills very effectively. This enables them to share and take turns when they play together, tidy up and socialise at snacktime. When children eat their packed lunches together in the Nursery, they work in teams to place their wrappers and peelings in the bin. They remind each other how to avoid spillages by placing their cups and cartons carefully on the table.  The curriculum develops basic reading, writing and number skills extremely well. Children receive high-

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Early years provision is outstanding

quality phonics teaching, which motivates them to choose books when they settle down on their own in the cosy reading tent. There are plenty of opportunities for children to explore learning in other areas. For example, they enjoy counting to 10 when they tidy away the farm animals. In the summer, they make apple and elderflower juice, using fruit they pick from the Nursery garden.  All staff model the use of rich and varied vocabulary when they play alongside the children. This is rapidly developing children’s communication and social skills. Some children are, consequently, very articulate when they explain their thinking and learning.  The contribution that families make to children’s learning is valued by the school. Staff make home visits to develop a good understanding of children’s strengths and interests before they join the school. This means that children settle in very quickly. Partnerships with parents and carers are further strengthened through a

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Early years provision is outstanding

wide offer of drop-ins and workshops throughout the year.  Teachers plan exciting activities that are tailored to meet children’s interests and developmental needs. They cover the full range of learning. The plans are flexible and reviewed regularly so activities can be adapted – based on the children’s learning and progress.  Clear daily routines and organised learning spaces promote children’s safety and welfare. Children are provided with high-quality equipment, games and toys. The children enjoy their outdoor area, which includes a good range of equipment to support their physical development  The children’s behaviour is exceptionally good. They are learning to listen, share and take turns very well indeed.  Leadership is outstanding. It has successfully secured improvements since the previous inspection to meet high standards in all areas of learning. The provision is now recognised as a centre of excellence for the local

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Early years provision is outstanding

authority. Due to this, leaders have a wider impact on young children’s learning when they provide training and development for other schools.

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School details

Unique reference number 101524 Local Authority Brent Inspection Number 10001285 This inspection was carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. The inspection was also deemed a section 5 inspection under the same Act.

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School details

School category Community Age range of pupils 3–11 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 567 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Sasha Field Headteacher/Principal/Teacher in charge Theresa Landreth Telephone number 020 84591392 Website www.mbrook.brent.sch.uk Email address admin@mbrook.brent.sch.uk Date of previous inspection 7–8 October 2010

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Information about this school

 This is a larger than average-sized primary school. The school has expanded since the previous inspection. There are now three classes in each year group, except Years 5 and 6, where there are two classes.  Since the previous inspection, the leadership team has been developed to include four assistant headteachers.  The school has a number of awards including Achievement for All and Science Quality Marks. They were winners of the 2015 Fair Play Award.  There are 35 places in the school’s nursery with all children attending on a full-time basis. Reception children also attend full time.  Over half of the pupils are disadvantaged and known to be eligible for the pupil premium. This is above the national average. The pupil premium is additional funding which the school receives from the government to provide extra support for pupils looked after by the local authority or pupils known to be eligible for free school meals.

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Information about this school

 The proportion of pupils attending from a range of minority ethnic groups is high compared to the national average.  A high proportion of pupils speak English as an additional language and of these, some join the school with little or no spoken English.  The proportion of disabled pupils or those who have special educational needs is above the national average.  The school meets the government’s floor standards, which set out the minimum expectation for pupils’ attainment and progress in reading, writing and mathematics by the end of Year 6.

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Information about this inspection

 Inspectors observed teaching and learning in 20 lessons or parts of lessons, including joint observations with the senior leaders.  Inspectors listened to pupils read and observed them at other times of the school day including during play and lunchtime.  A range of recent work by pupils was examined, including in their exercise books and their work on display.  Inspectors spoke to pupils and parents to gain their views about the school. They took account of 30 responses from parents to the online questionnaire, Parent View.  Inspectors scrutinised a range of documents including those related to improvement planning, safeguarding and the school’s information for checking pupil’s academic progress.  Meetings were held with leaders, the Chair of the Governing Body, members of the school staff and a representative from the local authority.

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Inspection team

Kirstie Fulthorpe, lead inspector Her Majesty’s Inspector Shelley Davies Ofsted Inspector Diane Buckle Ofsted Inspector James Hollinsley Ofsted Inspector Mirella Lombardo Ofsted Inspector guidance 'Raising concerns and making a complaint about Ofsted', which is available from Ofsted’s website: www.gov.uk/government/publications/complaints-about-ofsted . 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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Inspection team

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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Inspection team

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.gov.uk/government/organisations/ofsted

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Inspection team

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, further education and skills, 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. If you would like a copy of this document in a different format, such as large print or Braille, please telephone 0300 123 1231, or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk . You may reuse this information (not including logos) free of charge in any format or medium, under the terms of the Open Government Licence. To view this licence, visit www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence , write to the Information Policy Team,

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Inspection team

The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: psi@nationalarchives.gsi.gov.uk .

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Inspection team

Interested in our work? You can subscribe to our monthly newsletter for more information and updates: http://eepurl.com/iTrDn .

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Inspection team

T: 0300 123 4234 Textphone: 0161 618 8524 E: enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk W: www.ofsted.gov.uk

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