Collingtree Church of England Primary School

Collingtree Church of England Primary School Lodge Avenue, Collingtree, Northampton NN4 0NQ

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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 Inadequate

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Overall effectiveness Inadequate

Overall effectiveness at previous inspection Good

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This is an inadequate school

 Leadership is inadequate. Standards within the school have fallen rapidly since the last inspection. The leaders have not demonstrated the skills required to halt this decline.  Governance is inadequate. Governors have not been vigilant. They have been ineffective in making sure that leaders maintain a good quality of education for all pupils.  The quality of teaching is inadequate. In too many lessons, teachers do not use information about pupils’ starting points in order to plan for the pupils’ learning. Pupils’ progress is limited as a result.  Leaders do not have an effective assessment system in place to track pupils’ progress. They are not clear about how much progress pupils are making. As a result, they do not provide appropriate support to those pupils who need help to catch up in their learning.  Outcomes for pupils are inadequate. Far too many pupils underachieve and do not gain the greater depth of knowledge and skills of which they are

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This is an inadequate school

capable in reading, writing and mathematics.  Provision within the early years is inadequate. Here also, the leaders do not have a precise and accurate assessment system in place. As a result, learning activities are not matched well to children’s learning needs.  Leaders have failed to manage pupils’ poor behaviour. Too much low-level disruption takes place in lessons and remains unchecked by class teachers.  Leaders have failed to tackle the low attendance of some groups of pupils. Consequently, pupils’ attendance overall has worsened. The attendance of disadvantaged pupils and of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is inadequate.

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The school has the following strengths

 The newly appointed special needs coordinator (SENCo) is beginning to improve the provision for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities.  The school has made some promising appointments with regard to the leadership of English and mathematics.

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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?

 Ensure that effective leadership and governance is in place.  Improve the quality of teaching and learning, so that pupils’ outcomes in reading, writing and mathematics improve significantly, by ensuring that: – an effective system is in place to track and monitor the progress that individual pupils and groups of pupils are making within each class and across each key stage – pupils’ starting points are used by all teachers when planning for learning and that pupils’ knowledge and skills are built upon – the marking policy is used consistently by all teachers, in order that pupils receive guidance that helps them to correct errors and to make progress in their learning – all staff have the highest expectations of what pupils can achieve, and pupils are challenged so that the majority achieve greater depth in reading, writing, and mathematics – low-level disruption by pupils is eliminated and that all pupils show respect to their teachers and to

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

their peers.  Improve significantly the impact of leadership on the pupils’ attendance by reducing the absence of pupils, particularly disadvantaged pupils and those who have special educational needs and/or disabilities.  Improve the leadership of the early years provision by putting in place an effective assessment system, with accurate information, so that children’s learning needs are met and they achieve better outcomes.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

An external review of the school’s use of the pupil premium should be undertaken in order to assess how this aspect of leadership and management may be improved.

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

 The senior leadership of the school is inadequate. Standards within the school have declined. The systems that have been implemented to address this decline are weak and have not had impact.  Leaders have not developed an ethos of high expectations and success within the school or ensured a positive climate for learning for pupils or for staff.  Leaders’ evaluation of the school’s strengths and areas to develop is inaccurate. It is too generous.  A school development plan is in place, but the priorities for improvement identified within it are too vague. For example, no specific actions have been identified in order to address pupils’ underperformance in reading, writing and mathematics.  The assessment, monitoring and tracking of the progress made by pupils is inadequate. Leaders do not review routinely and systematically the progress that individual pupils and groups of pupils make. This means that underperformance is not spotted soon enough and pupils who are falling behind do not

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

receive the support they require.  Leaders who are new to the school are working hard, but lack strategic direction. The management of these new leaders is weak. Their leadership skills are underdeveloped and they are not supported well enough in order to have the impact of which they are capable.  The plans in place to address pupils’ underperformance within mathematics are not strategic enough. The subject leader of mathematics is new to the role. This leader is more than capable of leading this area of work and modelling good practice to others, but she is not being helped to do the work in a strategic way. This means that sometimes her work is focused on the wrong things.  Leaders do not use the pupil premium funding the school receives well. They are unable to account for the impact it has made on the outcomes of pupils who qualify for this government funding.  The primary physical education and sports funding premium is used to promote pupils’ participation in

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

physical activity. The funds also support teachers to develop their skills in teaching physical education by working alongside a professional sports coach; however, leaders do not evaluate the impact of the spending of this funding. There is little analysis regarding the number of pupils or groups of pupils these funds benefit, or how funds could be redirected to benefit pupils further.  Leaders have not made sure that the curriculum supports all pupils to make the progress that they should, or that the pupils are excited by their lessons and develop their knowledge to a greater depth. The curriculum is providing pupils with a range of experiences within school and opportunities to learn outside of school and in the community; however, the curriculum is not being used to address the significant underperformance in the majority of year groups.  Leaders have not made sure that school policies are followed by all staff. Record-keeping is often chaotic,

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

and classroom practices, such as marking and feedback, are inconsistent across the school.  A number of policies have not been communicated well enough and this has led to confusion both for staff and for parents. Relationships between the headteacher and some parents have been negatively affected as a result.  The headteacher has received support from the local authority and from the Peterborough Diocese. The support from the local authority to the headteacher, when she joined the school in 2014, was too irregular and so not helpful in enabling the headteacher to be effective. More recently, the support from the local authority has been frequent, intensive and more helpful.  Leaders have introduced performance management arrangements, and individual targets are being set with teachers. These developments are too recent to have had an impact on the quality of teaching.  The leader with responsibility for pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is new to

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

the role but is making a positive difference. The quality of the pupils’ individual education plans has improved and there are now closer links between parents of these pupils and the teachers.  Leaders and teachers promote the spiritual and cultural development of pupils well and a number of activities take place to promote the pupils’ understanding of different faiths and how children in other parts of the world live. Pupils learn about the importance of playing a role in their school community, and values such as democracy, kindness and respect are upheld.  Newly qualified teachers may not be appointed to the school.  The governance of the school – Governance of this school is inadequate. – Governors have not provided effective challenge and support and have been slow to recognise, and then halt, the decline in the quality of leadership. – The local authority has recently undertaken a review of governance arrangements. The review

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Effectiveness of leadership and management is inadequate

highlighted significant failings. This review should have happened sooner.  The arrangements for safeguarding are effective. Records are stored appropriately, but some elements of record-keeping need to be improved. The detail in the records is appropriate, but they are badly organised.  Staff have received training in safeguarding and so they know what to look for and how to raise any concerns they may have. Pupils told inspectors that they felt safe in their school and that they were treated with care by their teachers.  Pupils are taught how to keep themselves safe in a variety of situations and about the potential risks posed by extremism and the internet.

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is inadequate

 The quality of teaching is inadequate in many classes. There is significant underperformance in the majority of year groups. This means that too many pupils are not making the progress of which they are capable and, in some cases, are not developing the skills they need in order to move to the next stage in their education.  Teachers’ planning for learning is not precise enough. The teaching does not build upon the things that the pupils know, can do and understand already. This is the case for all pupils, but is an issue particularly for the most able pupils and pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities.  The most able pupils are badly let down. There are many pupils within this school that have prior attainment that suggests that they are academically very able. These pupils are not challenged sufficiently and not enough thought is given to ways in which their knowledge can be deepened or their

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is inadequate

skills tested. As a result, far too few pupils make even expected progress.  Many pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities receive specific intervention to support their learning. Teachers do not ensure that the skills these pupils learn during these extra sessions are practised and reinforced back in the classroom. Valuable opportunities to support the learning of these pupils are lost.  Teachers’ feedback to the pupils does not help pupils to identify and correct their mistakes or help them to improve their work. Inspectors saw work in books where poor spelling and punctuation were not addressed and pupils’ use of grammar was incorrect.  Teachers’ expectations of the pupils are not high enough and, as a consequence, pupils do not take enough care. In the books seen by inspectors from pupils in Year 1, Year 2 and Year 3, it was clear that pupils took little pride in their work.

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is inadequate

 Time is not used well in lessons. Frequently, inspectors saw pupils marking time while they waited for others to catch up. This slows progress.  Grammar is not taught systematically or frequently. Pupils do not have enough time in lessons to practise their handwriting, grammar, punctuation and spelling. There is little evidence of pupils being guided to produce writing that is of high quality independently of support from the teacher. Writing remains an area of weakness across the school.  The teachers do not take enough care to ensure that pupils read frequently and often. The monitoring of pupils’ reading is weak. Pupils are, however, keen to read. The library has been restocked with a range of books to encourage this love of reading. Inspectors spoke with pupils who had read their books enthusiastically, but had been waiting to change the books for over three weeks.  As a result of the teaching of mathematics, too few pupils are making progress in the subject above that

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment is inadequate

expected for their age and too few are achieving knowledge at a greater depth. These issues are not being addressed.  More effective teaching and learning was seen in Year 5 and Year 6 than in other year groups. For example, in Year 5, the teacher cleverly enthused the class, while teaching them the skills they required to produce a high-quality piece of writing. These pupils were lapping up the learning.  Leaders and teachers have been involved in a variety of activities to improve the accuracy of teachers’ assessment. This involves working closely with partner schools. The assessment of writing in key stage 2 has been judged to be accurate by the local authority.

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Personal development and welfare

 The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is inadequate.  Pupils’ understanding about how to be a successful learner is impeded because of the poor quality of teaching that they receive. Pupils are not set a good enough example by staff and are not encouraged to take pride in their work.  When teaching is weak, pupils show a lack of respect for the teacher and for others within the class. They begin to shout out inappropriate answers to the teachers’ questions and do not listen to the responses of their peers. Inspectors saw pupils in Year 1, Year 2 and Year 3 spending too much time off-task, ignoring their teacher and behaving poorly.  Pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural welfare is generally catered for well and pupils told inspectors that they felt safe within the school. They told inspectors that they had someone to whom they could go if they had a problem, and that these problems would be resolved quickly.

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Personal development and welfare

 Pupils who spoke with inspectors were polite and articulate. At playtime and at lunchtime, pupils cooperated with each other and played together harmoniously.  Pupils are able to explain how to keep themselves safe from harm in a variety of situations. Those taking part in ‘bikeability’ sessions during the inspection spoke enthusiastically about how to keep safe and share the road with other users.

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Behaviour

 The behaviour of pupils is inadequate.  When teaching is weak and fails to engage pupils’ interest, pupils’ behaviour is poor. In some lessons, this is unsurprising because pupils are bored by the low-level tasks they are being set by their teachers.  The leadership arrangements for monitoring and improving pupils’ attendance are inadequate. Leaders do not have an effective system in place to track the attendance of individual pupils and groups of pupils. This means that leaders are unaware when certain groups, for example disadvantaged pupils, attend less well than others in the school. As a result, there is no effective intervention in place to address the attendance of groups of pupils who are absent more regularly than others.  The percentage of pupils who are absent from school is increasing and the strategies in place to address this issue are not working.  The SENCo is working diligently to gain a comprehensive overview of the pupils who have special

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Behaviour

educational needs and/or disabilities. She has produced an analysis of the attendance of these pupils. This analysis revealed that pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities attend much less well than others within the school. Currently, there is no intervention in place to address this.  In Year 5 and Year 6, pupils were observed by inspectors behaving well, collaborating with each other and being respectful to their teachers. They spoke enthusiastically about the recent residential adventure which they had enjoyed, and how grateful they were to the teachers for providing it for them.

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Outcomes for pupils are inadequate

 The progress of the pupils is inadequate. As a result, the pupils’ attainment in national tests and assessments is too low in all key stages.  Leaders’ information and overview of the progress that pupils and groups of pupils make within each class and key stage are inadequate. Leaders do not have an accurate view as to how well pupils in the school are achieving. Analysis of how well girls, boys, disadvantaged pupils and those from minority ethnic groups are achieving was completed by the headteacher during the inspection. Some of the outcomes of these calculations came as a surprise to the headteacher.  Pupils’ workbooks across the school show that pupils of all abilities are not making good progress currently in reading, writing and mathematics. The expectations of what pupils can achieve are often too low. Inspectors saw too much evidence in books of pupils repeating similar tasks without building on their

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Outcomes for pupils are inadequate

skills in order to deepen their knowledge.  From their starting points, the most able pupils are making inadequate progress. The current assessment data available within the school indicates that at the end of key stage 1 and the end of key stage 2 these pupils are not achieving as they should. This includes those pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities whose prior attainment suggests they are of higher ability.  There are too few disadvantaged pupils in each year group to report on their progress compared to their peers nationally. As a group within the school, the data available indicated that these pupils make less progress than others. The progress these pupils make in writing is particularly poor.

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Early years provision is inadequate

 Leadership within the early years is inadequate. The leaders do not have an effective overview of the progress that children are making within this provision. Some of the information about individual children is inaccurate.  Children within this provision are keen and eager to learn. They are not provided with learning experiences that make the best of this enthusiasm. Although teachers plan a range of activities for children, not enough attention is paid to identifying the learning that will happen as a result. Children appear happy but they are capable of learning much more.  In 2015, the percentage of children achieving a good level of development was above the national average. The school information available about the percentage of children achieving a good level of development in 2016 indicates that fewer will achieve this standard than in 2015, with boys achieving much less well than girls.

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Early years provision is inadequate

 Information from assessments is not used well enough to enable children to make the progress that they should. Child-led activities lack challenge and too many activities do not build on prior learning. Indeed, some of the activities seen by inspectors did not engage children’s interest. Some children were completing activities without having an understanding as to why.  Leaders do not ensure that enough opportunities are taken for children to develop their writing skills or apply mathematics. Teachers’ and assistants’ questioning does not always extend children’s understanding or challenge their thinking. This means that some children are not well enough prepared for learning within Year 1.  When teacher-led activities take too long, children begin to shuffle, to fidget and to lose interest. Inspectors saw examples of this during a phonics (the sounds that letters make) session. Too many children left this session not learning the correct words and sounds because their attention had

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Early years provision is inadequate

wandered.  Partnerships with parents and within the community are good. On the day of the inspection, a member of the community had visited the provision to speak with children about nursing. Some children with whom inspectors spoke said that they had enjoyed this.

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School details

Unique reference number 122107 Local authority Northamptonshire Inspection number 10003207 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

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 190 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Rachel Coull Headteacher Halina Sikabofori Telephone number 01604 761469 Website www.collingtree.northants.sch.uk Email address head@collingtree-ce.northants-ecl.gov.uk Date of previous inspection 2 December 2011

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Information about this school

 The school is smaller than the average-sized primary school.  The proportion of pupils known to be eligible for pupil premium is well below the national average. This funding provides extra support for pupils who are known to be eligible for free school meals or who are looked after by the local authority.  The proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is well below average.  The proportion of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is below the national average.  The headteacher joined the school in September 2014.  The school meets the national floor standards for key stage 2 achievement.  The school meets requirements on the publication of specified information on its website.

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Information about this inspection

 Inspectors observed 14 lessons. Three of these were joint observations involving the headteacher and a senior leader. An inspector observed an assembly.  Inspectors looked at the work of pupils in all year groups to gain a view of the impact of teaching over time.  Meetings were held with the headteacher, the chair of the governing body and a governor, the teaching and learning leader, and the SENCo. Meetings were also held with the leader of the early years provision and the subject leaders for both English and mathematics. The lead inspector spoke with a local authority representative and with a representative of the Diocese of Peterborough.  Inspectors spoke formally with a group of pupils to gain their views of their school. Pupils were also spoken with informally at lunchtime, at playtime and in lessons. Inspectors heard a group of pupils read.  The inspectors looked at a range of documents, including the school’s self-evaluation, the school

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Information about this inspection

development plan, minutes of governing body meetings, local authority reports about the school and information relating to the safeguarding of pupils. A range of documentation relating to pupils’ achievement and attendance was seen and discussed with the headteacher.  Inspectors took into account the views of staff, parents and pupils through the online surveys and during the inspection.

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Inspection team

Jayne Ashman, lead inspector Her Majesty’s Inspector Caroline Evans Ofsted Inspector Harkireet Sohel 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

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Inspection team

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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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