St Matthew's CofE Primary School

St Matthew’s CofE Primary School Chadderton Hall Road, Chadderton, Oldham, Lancashire OL9 OBN

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Overall effectiveness Inadequate

Effectiveness of leadership and management Inadequate

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Overall effectiveness Inadequate

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Inadequate

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Overall effectiveness Inadequate

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Requires improvement

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Overall effectiveness Inadequate

Overall effectiveness at previous inspection Requires improvement

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This is an inadequate school

 Since the last inspection, school leadership has been ineffective in preventing a decline in the quality of provision across the school.  Leaders have not given the necessary strategic direction to sustain improvements. They have not set high enough expectations of what pupils can achieve.  The quality of teaching has declined and is inadequate. Staff lack confidence because training and development have been piecemeal and have not resulted in sufficient improvements in teaching.  The governing body has not focused its attention sufficiently on pupils’ outcomes and has not challenged middle leaders on the development of the curriculum and the standards of pupils’ work.  Given their starting points, most groups of pupils across the school are currently making inadequate progress.  The teaching of writing is a particular weakness with errors commonplace in pupils’ books, especially in Key Stage 2.  Activities in lessons do not allow pupils to develop

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This is an inadequate school

skills such as mathematical problem-solving and reasoning.  Teachers’ feedback to pupils is mostly ineffective as it fails to help pupils to improve.  Assessment procedures are haphazard, inaccurate and ineffective. Consequently, the work set for pupils is often too simple and fails to inspire.  Pupils lack pride in their work and present it poorly.  The school’s curriculum is under-developed and does not enthuse pupils.  Provision in the early years is inadequate. Weaknesses in assessment mean that children are often provided with unsuitable learning activities. As a result, they fail to make sufficient progress.  Pupils’ behaviour requires improvement because they show a lack of enthusiasm in their learning which is reflected in their written work.

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The school has the following strengths

 The school is effective in raising awareness among both pupils and staff about how to be safe.  Pupils are cared for well and the school links effectively with its community to ensure their well- being. Attendance is above average.

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Full report

In accordance with the Education Act 2005, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector is of the opinion that this school requires special measures because it is failing to give its pupils an acceptable standard of education and the persons responsible for leading, managing or governing the school are not demonstrating the capacity to secure the necessary improvement in the school.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Urgently improve the quality of leadership and management at all levels, by: providing a clear structure of leadership with well-defined roles and responsibilities ensuring that leaders and teachers have an accurate view of how well pupils are performing ensuring the new leadership team holds middle leaders rigorously to account and provides them with the high-quality training and development they need to make a full contribution to school improvement producing and putting into practice a detailed school improvement plan, focused on outcomes for pupils, and rigorously and regularly checking its impact giving middle leaders increased opportunities to learn the skills of leadership from expert practitioners urgently developing a strategy for assessment so that individual teachers know precisely how well their pupils are learning and use this information to guide them when planning future learning activities.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Improve the quality of teaching in all year groups and so rapidly accelerate pupils’ progress to be good or better across the school, by: ensuring that pupils’ learning activities are closely matched to their levels of ability raising the level of teachers’ expectations of what pupils can achieve, including in the accuracy and care with which they present their work planning and implementing a curriculum programme that meets both the needs and interests of all pupils developing a clear and cohesive policy for writing which improves the quantity and quality of pupils’ written work giving all pupils the opportunities they need to develop skills in greater depth, especially in writing and mathematical problem-solving making sure that pupils know what they need to do to improve their work.

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

 Since the last inspection, the school’s effectiveness has declined significantly. The previous headteacher left in the summer of 2015 and only very recently has a new, permanent headteacher started in post. In the meantime, the school has lacked direction in its management of teaching and learning and, as a result, the progress of many pupils has slowed considerably.  The school’s current evaluation of its performance is inaccurate. Leaders have an overly optimistic view of the quality of teaching at the school and are not ambitious enough about the progress that pupils should make. The school has few records of the monitoring of teaching and learning, and those that exist do not assist teachers in how they can improve their practice. Efforts to secure training for staff have lacked a clear plan and have not assisted them in developing a firm understanding of the curriculum or how it is assessed.

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

 Leaders have insufficient grasp of the current progress of pupils. They are not able to articulate where progress is quicker or slower, in which subject or for which group. They have no accurate analysis of pupils’ work in relation to the expectations for their age, nor is there any shared ambition for what the pupils are capable of achieving.  Leaders display little expertise over assessment procedures throughout the school. Teachers are therefore left with limited opportunities to check on how their pupils are achieving. Leaders do not check whether teachers’ judgements of pupils’ attainment are accurate or not.  The newly appointed headteacher brings much experience and already shows a clear understanding of the school’s areas for development. In partnership with a committed governing body, he shows a desire to bring rigour and improved standards to the school. Staff and governors speak of being excited about the future.

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

However, the governing body has not given enough attention to challenging staff over standards in the classrooms.  Leaders show a lack of experience and confidence in articulating school development priorities. Middle leaders do not rigorously make use of focused action plans, nor do they routinely check progress against them. They are willing and keen to develop, but have had only a patchy history of training which has not equipped them for the responsibilities that are required of them. The new headteacher, together with governors, is now making plans for how a re-organisation of roles and responsibilities could address this particular area of weakness.  The school’s curriculum is not being developed effectively. Although a series of plans has been devised, aimed at capturing pupils’ interest and enthusiasm, these have not yet been translated into practice and consequently pupils are not inspired in their learning. However, pupils value a number of enrichment

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

activities that are provided, such as a large choir from the school which performs regularly in the local area.  At the time of the inspection, the school’s website was not relevant to current school practices and did not fully comply with legislation. The new headteacher plans to launch a revised site shortly. A third of parents who responded to Parent View (Ofsted’s survey) did not feel that the school was giving them enough information about their child’s progress.  Leaders agree that the school lacks excellent practice which can be used to model the very best teaching. Despite some efforts from leaders and managers to see best practice in other settings, this has not yet led to improvements. This gives cause for concern about the current capacity of leaders to improve teaching at the school.  The school is able to demonstrate how both the funding for disadvantaged pupils and for the sports premium has been spent and for what purposes. It has devised a recent plan to match spending to

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

outcomes, though it is too early to say how successful this is.  Efforts to prepare pupils for life in modern Britain have led to some positive experiences through trips and good links with the community. Values of tolerance and the respect of law are promoted well. The spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of pupils is, however, hindered by the lack of creative and imaginative learning opportunities in lessons.  The governance of the school The governing body takes its responsibilities very seriously and has had to oversee a transition in senior leadership which has taken up much of their focus. However, it has not been fully aware of the impact of this transition on the progress of pupils. The governing body has tried to secure external support for staff during this period of transition but there is little evidence of any resulting impact on standards, especially this academic year. Despite having the

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

skills and knowledge to hold leaders to account, governors have not challenged leaders enough about the quality of teaching and learning and, as a result, do not have an accurate understanding of its strengths and weaknesses. Arrangements for staff appraisal are in place but the link between classroom performance and pay progression is not sufficiently clear.  The school’s arrangements for safeguarding are effective. The school is a safe environment for staff and pupils. Governors are most aware of current requirements as evidenced by the specific training provided for all members as part of the government’s ‘Prevent’ duty which is aimed at stopping people from becoming or supporting terrorists.

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is inadequate

 Teachers’ expectations of what pupils can achieve are consistently too low. Pupils report that their work is too easy. Inspectors’ observations in lessons and scrutiny of pupils’ books during the inspection support this view.  Teachers lack confidence about the expectations of the revised National Curriculum. Their knowledge of what is expected for each year group is not secure and, as a result, there is often no connection between the activities and lessons they provide. Pupils may learn about an aspect of English grammar in one lesson, but then it is not developed within subsequent writing. Therefore, pupils do not deepen their knowledge.  Teachers are cautious about allowing pupils to extend their learning. Questions and tasks are often very superficial, giving pupils very few opportunities to think and express themselves. As a result, although pupils do as they are told, they display little enthusiasm in the lessons. Other tasks fail to give pupils the

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is inadequate

opportunity to practise and improve their skills; for example, cutting and sticking words or instructions into English books instead of working to improve their writing. This is indicative of a culture where the most-able pupils are not challenged.  The teaching of writing is especially weak. It lacks rigour and, as a result, pupils’ books are littered with spelling and punctuation mistakes which are often not challenged by teachers. There is no whole-school approach to handwriting and pupils’ script is poor, especially among boys.  Pupils progress slowly in mathematics. This is because much of the work is not set at the right level for them and they have insufficient opportunities to develop reasoning skills or to solve more complex problems. Teachers do not demand accuracy, and their own terminology, on occasions, does not set high standards, for example talking of calculations as ‘sum cakes’ or not insisting that a pound sign is drawn correctly.

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is inadequate

 The school’s assessment of pupils’ learning is in urgent need of attention. Current school procedures are not fully understood or used by teachers and therefore learning is not developed as quickly as it could be. Isolated examples of better support for individual pupils are evident, for example with a group of disadvantaged pupils in Key Stage 1. Here, the teacher had a clear plan in place to help these pupils make more rapid progress. However, this is not typical of practice throughout the school.  Teachers’ assessment of pupils’ work is occasionally helpful, but typically ineffective, as pupils do not make use of it to improve their skills or understanding. Teachers often accept mediocrity, especially regarding how pupils present their work.

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Personal development and welfare

 The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is good.  The overwhelming number of pupils and parents spoken to said pupils were safe and well-cared-for.  The school has been active in seeking external support to develop pupils’ awareness of dangers and pressures around them, for example employing their own counsellor. Pupils have a good knowledge of how to be safe online and staff have all attended recent training surrounding the government’s Prevent duty. Bullying is rare and pupils are very certain that staff will attend to their needs should they require support.  The school offers an extended range of activities and links well with its local parish and community to have the school open after school hours for this purpose. At the time of the inspection, a group of pupils won a local table tennis competition and this is typical of the efforts of staff to develop the pupils’ good social skills

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Behaviour

 The behaviour of pupils requires improvement.  Pupils show a lack of enthusiasm for their learning and this is reflected in the lack of pride they show in their work. Books are often scruffy and poorly presented. Handwriting is inconsistent and particularly poor among boys.  In Key Stage 2, pupils are often distracted and lack enthusiasm. This is because the tasks set are unappealing or not matched to their ability. A significant minority of pupils say their attention is distracted by the behaviour of others.  When moving around the building or when in the hall, pupils can be noisy and run around school when told not to. Parents expressed some concerns about behaviour affecting their children’s learning and how this is communicated to them.  Attendance is above average and rising. The school is quick to follow up any isolated cases of long-term absence.

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Outcomes for pupils are inadequate

 The progress of current pupils in the school is inadequate because too few pupils are reaching the standards of which they are capable. Since September, the work in pupils’ books shows that they are making inadequate progress across all year groups. Expectations from teachers of how well pupils can achieve are much too low in all subjects, but especially in writing.  In 2015, pupils left Key Stage 2 with attainment that was slightly above the national figures in reading and mathematics, and slightly below in writing. Although there was an improvement in the rates of pupils’ progress in mathematics and reading, their achievement in writing lagged behind because too few pupils made more than expected progress.  Observations of the work completed by pupils currently on roll show that the majority are only working within age-related expectations. This represents insufficient progress from their starting points on leaving

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Outcomes for pupils are inadequate

Year 2. Progress for pupils has slowed dramatically.  Many of the most-able pupils receive little challenge in lessons, and leaders and teachers cannot say whether they are reaching the standards they should.  In 2015, the performance of disadvantaged pupils was above average in Key Stage 1. However, this was not the case in Key Stage 2 where the attainment of disadvantaged pupils had declined from the previous year in all subjects and was below the national average for all pupils. This represents inadequate progress in Key Stage 2 for these pupils, especially in writing. The school was unable to present evidence to show that this picture had changed and the evidence in pupils’ workbooks indicates that current progress for this group of pupils in Key Stage 2 is also inadequate. However, care must be taken about drawing firm conclusions due to the small numbers within this group.  Progress in 2015 for pupils who have special educational needs or disability was inadequate in all subjects

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Outcomes for pupils are inadequate

from their starting points. The school is unable to analyse information for the current performance of pupils of this group. It is therefore difficult to draw conclusions as to whether any current support given to these pupils is helping them to progress at a faster rate than other pupils in their class.  Pupils are currently not prepared well for the next stage of their education because their writing skills are weak.

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Early years provision is inadequate

 Assessment of children’s abilities and progress is uncertain and inaccurate. Consequently, the expectations of children in the early years are too low and provision is weak. This results in children not making sufficient progress.  Leadership and management in the early years are inadequate because of a lack of rigour in how children are assessed and in how this information is used to modify practice and develop learning. There is no evidence of how the school monitors standards of teaching in the early years.  Children join the Reception classes from a wide variety of nursery settings. Judgements about the level of children’s skills when they start Reception are inaccurate. As a result, the programme of learning put in place does not meet their needs. The school agrees that its own evaluation of provision in the early years is overly generous.  The proportion of children reaching a good level of development last year was above the national average

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Early years provision is inadequate

but evidence from current work shows that children are making inadequate progress from starting points which are at least typical for their age. As a result, children are not well prepared to start working in Year 1.  Teaching lacks focus. Adults do not intervene sufficiently well to question children, develop their language or assist with their play. Too much time is spent by children moving from one learning area to another as they lose concentration and this is not recognised by adults. Staff do not always model the correct sounds that letters make in words and this hinders children’s progress in learning to read.  The indoor environment is bright and safe, typified by an engaging Chinese-themed area in which the children enjoyed their role play. Safeguarding is effective and staff have the welfare of children as a high priority.  The school’s partnership with parents is underdeveloped. Parents receive basic information but there are no

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Early years provision is inadequate

initiatives which aim to develop the partnership with school or improve teachers’ knowledge of children’s particular interests, strengths or weaknesses. Similarly, staff do not check on the progress of particular groups, for example the progress made by disadvantaged children.

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School details

Unique reference number 105709 Local authority Oldham Inspection number 10002217

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School details

This inspection 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 420 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Mr Lee Spratt Headteacher Mr Martin Moore Telephone number 0161 624 9829 Website www.stmatthewschadderton.co.uk Email address info@st-matthews.oldham.sch.uk Date of previous inspection 2–3 October 2013

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Information about this school

 This school is a larger than the average-sized primary school.  The proportion of pupils eligible for pupil premium (additional government funding for pupils known to be eligible for free school meals and for children looked after by the local authority) is lower than average.  The proportions of pupils from minority ethnic backgrounds and those with English as an additional language are lower than average.  The number of pupils at the school who have special educational needs or disability is average.  The previous headteacher left the school in summer 2015. The deputy headteacher was acting headteacher until the appointment of the permanent headteacher who took up his post at the start of January 2016.  In 2015, the school met the government’s floor targets which set out the government’s minimum standards for attainment and progress in English and mathematics for pupils at the end of Key Stage 2.

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Information about this inspection

 Inspectors observed teaching in the vast majority of classes across the school. Several of these observations were made jointly with senior leaders. They also observed an assembly.  Inspectors heard pupils read in Year 2 and had a discussion with a group of Key Stage 2 pupils about reading.  Inspectors held meetings with the headteacher; deputy headteacher; middle leaders; members of the governing body, including the Chair of the Governing Body and the Vice-Chair; and a representative of the local authority.  Meetings were held with pupils in Years 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6. More informal discussions took place with pupils at lunchtime, during playtime and during lessons.  Inspectors analysed a variety of documents relating to the current progress of pupils, the school’s own evaluations and plans, records of the monitoring of teaching and behaviour, and documents related to the safety of pupils and the support for disadvantaged pupils.

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Information about this inspection

 Several parents spoke to inspectors on the playground. In addition, 50 responses to Ofsted’s Parent View questionnaire on were taken into account.  Twenty-seven responses to the Ofsted questionnaire for pupils were taken into account.  Twelve responses to the Ofsted questionnaire for staff were also taken into account.

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Inspection team

Jeremy Barnes, lead inspector Ofsted Inspector Doris Bell Ofsted Inspector Michelle Ravey 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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