Setting

Store Street Manchester M1 2WD T 0300 123 4234 www.gov.uk/ofsted

p.1

Emily Newton Headteacher King Athelstan Primary School Villiers Road Kingston upon Thames Surrey KT1 3AR

p.1

Following my visit to the school on 14 March 2017, I write on behalf of Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills to report the inspection findings. The visit was the first short inspection carried out since the school was judged to be good in October 2011.

p.1

The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. Your impressive leadership style shows strong moral purpose in making a real difference to pupils’ life chances. Your skilful senior leaders share your passion and commitment to inspire excellence for all.

p.1

Parents and carers are full of praise for the school and the commitment you and your team have shown to meet the learning needs of all pupils. You have ensured that all classrooms have greater rigour and robust expectations on what all groups of pupils should be achieving. Senior leaders are available in the playground before and after school and this open access to staff is much valued by parents.

p.1

Governors have a wealth of experience and skills and they display a commitment to the school community that creates a highly effective partnership with your leadership team. They provide the correct level of challenge to ensure the school has a strong and realistic understanding of its strengths and areas of development.

p.1

The classrooms are bright and attractive learning environments that reflect the rich diversity of the community. Pupils identify strongly with their school and are very proud of their achievements. One member of the school council reported, ‘This is a school full of passion for learning, knowledge and skills.’ Pupils report that they feel safe in school and that they are listened to. Attitudes to learning are very positive and pupils show each other courtesy and respect. Pupils’ well-being is a very important aspect of school life and the school runs very successful nurture provision offering support to pupils.

p.1

At the time of the last inspection, inspectors identified the need for pupils to have greater opportunities to apply mathematical skills within independent activities. Inspectors also reported a need for more focused activities to develop and consolidate knowledge and key skills across the curriculum. The school has responded well to these recommendations and has redesigned its curriculum to ensure that all pupils have sufficient challenge. This is having a strong impact on the outcomes for disadvantaged pupils.

p.2

You and your assessment leader keep detailed tracking information on the progress of all groups of learners. Pupil progress meetings take place every six weeks to ensure that all pupils meet their targets and make expected progress. All pupils who are not making expected progress have access to additional support to meet their learning needs. The most able pupils are challenged to make more rapid progress through a focus on reasoning to deepen their thinking and understanding.

p.2

You, your leadership team and governors have ensured that all safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose and records are detailed and of a high quality. You and your team are highly effective in managing initial safeguarding concerns and referring them where relevant to external agencies. Checks on the suitability of staff to work at the school are detailed and complete.

p.2

All staff have received training on keeping children safe and this has given staff the confidence to identify and report issues of concern. Staff have been trained on local and national priorities and are confident in identifying potential risks.

p.2

Pupils are very clear on the behaviour policy and are confident that staff deal with rare incidents of name-calling effectively.

p.2

Inspection findings

 Inspection evidence shows that you have worked well to strengthen the outcomes for all learners since the last inspection.  We agreed on three lines of enquiry to be the basis of our inspection trail to test whether the school remained good.  My first line of enquiry was reading, as we wanted to find out if all groups of pupils were making good progress. Pupils are taught their letter sounds well and are given daily opportunities to read high-frequency words.  Pupils are skilfully guided to choose books that scaffold and extend their reading development. Clear progression in the teaching of reading is seen in pupils’ outcomes in guided reading sessions. Pupils have strong support in the development of key reading skills through a wide range of comprehension activities. The school has a clear focus on developing the vocabulary of all pupils and is promoting this through ambitious choices of classic texts.

p.2

Inspection findings

 Pupils’ reading progress is tracked rigorously and intervention programmes are available for additional reading support for less confident readers. There is clear continuity and progression across the school in the development of reading skills.  My second line of enquiry was writing. We wanted to see if all groups of pupils were being challenged and were making good progress. Pupils are immersed into writing using a creative approach to build up skills and confidence through stories, shared writing experiences and writing for assessments.  There is strong evidence of the progression of key skills in each year group and progress over time is clear. Upper key stage 2 benefit from opportunities to rehearse key writing skills through extended pieces of writing. This approach is being introduced into lower key stage 2. The most able pupils are also being challenged to deepen their writing experience through the skills of reasoning,

p.3

Inspection findings

evaluating and analysing information.  The themed curriculum allows pupils to transfer and apply their writing skills across all subjects. Writing targets are set to ensure that teachers’ planning meets the variation of learning needs and the assessment team are robust in the tracking of writing progress for all pupils.  My final line of enquiry was about pupils’ attendance. The most recent data indicated that pupils with an education, health and care plan or statement of special educational needs have higher absence and persistent absence than is the case nationally.  I met with you, your inclusion leader and your attendance leader to scrutinise the detailed records that the school keeps to track medical absences. This is managed well and first day calling is in place when an absence occurs.  Parents and carers of pupils with persistent absence are invited to meet with you, the attendance leader and the educational welfare officer to agree an attendance

p.3

Inspection findings

contract. There are clear and effective systems in place to monitor and improve attendance.

p.3

Next steps for the school

Leaders and those responsible for governance should ensure that:

p.3

Next steps for the school

 opportunities are in place to further develop key vocabulary  pupils in lower key stage 2 are given more opportunities to develop their skills through extended writing. I am copying this letter to the chair of the governing body, the regional schools commissioner and the director of children’s services for Kingston upon Thames. This letter will also be published on the Ofsted website.

p.3

Information about the inspection

During this inspection, I carried out the following activities:

p.4

Information about the inspection

 meetings with the headteacher, deputy headteacher and two assistant headteachers, one of whom is the inclusion manager  meetings with the middle leaders responsible for English and the early years  meetings with the designated safeguarding leaders and the deputy safeguarding leader to scrutinise the school’s safeguarding procedures  meetings with governors and a representative from the local authority  meetings with the school business managers and the attendance lead to look at systems to track pupil absences. I also met with parents and carers informally in the playground before school.

p.4

Information about the inspection

Senior leaders accompanied me on my visits to the classrooms. I talked to pupils about their learning, looked at their books and listened to a range of pupils read in Year 2 and Year 6.

p.4

Information about the inspection

I viewed the responses to Ofsted’s online questionnaire, Parent View. I also looked at the online surveys completed by staff and pupils.

p.4