Burnley Casterton Primary School

Burnley Casterton Primary School Thames Avenue, Burnley, Lancashire BB10 2PZ

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Effectiveness of leadership and management Inadequate

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Inadequate

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Personal development, behaviour and welfare Inadequate

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Overall effectiveness at previous inspection Good

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 Leaders have not been rigorous enough in implementing improvements across the school. They do not monitor the quality of teaching and pupils’ learning and progress closely enough. As a result, pupils make insufficient progress across the school.  The safeguarding of pupils is ineffective. Policies and practices are not up to date. Weak record keeping means procedures to tackle potential bullying issues are not wholly effective.  The curriculum lacks breadth and depth. Pupils’ opportunities for learning in subjects such as history and geography are limited.  The quality of teaching is too variable. In some classes, teaching does not meet the needs of pupils. The work of teaching assistants does not help pupils to make the progress they should during lessons.  Assessment procedures are not rigorous enough to ensure current progress information is accurate. This is because leaders do not monitor standards of written work regularly.

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 The additional funding for disadvantaged pupils is not used effectively. Its impact is poorly monitored. Disadvantaged pupils are not making enough progress in all subjects to enable them to catch up with other pupils nationally.  Governors and the headteacher are not holding senior leaders to account. Improvement plans have been ineffective in informing the work to tackle weaknesses in pupils’ progress and attainment.  Pupils drift off task when teaching fails to catch their attention.  There are significant weaknesses in the early years provision. Children are too reliant on adult direction; assessment practice is weak.

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 Children’s achievement in the early years has improved recently and pupils’ phonics scores are now in line with the national average.  Sports funding is used well across the school. Provision for improving pupils’ levels of fitness and developing positive attitudes to keeping fit and healthy is strong.  Breakfast provision for disadvantaged pupils provides a healthy and positive start to the day.  Relationships with parents are strong. Parents value the availability of the headteacher and staff before and after school. Children are happy and enjoy school.

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Full report

In accordance with section 44(1) of 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 strengthen safeguarding procedures by: – improving systems to record behaviour incidents so that staff know what to record and leaders check and respond swiftly and effectively to this information – ensuring that safeguarding practices and policies are up to date and reflect best practice.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Improve the effectiveness of leadership and management, including governance, by: – ensuring that governors hold leaders at all levels fully accountable for their work to improve outcomes for pupils – ensuring that systems are in place to allow leaders to check closely the accuracy of assessment information – implementing more rigorous checks on the quality of teaching and learning to help teachers improve their practice and accelerate pupils’ progress – ensuring that action planning is focused on improving pupils’ outcomes and enables leaders and governors to keep track of the impact of leaders’ work – ensuring that the curriculum provides pupils with appropriately broad and challenging learning opportunities – ensuring that subject leaders check on the quality of teaching and learning in their subject areas more effectively – ensuring that pupil premium funding is effective in improving outcomes for

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

disadvantaged pupils and that the impact of this funding is monitored carefully.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Improve the quality of teaching and learning across the school in order to raise pupils’ achievement by: – ensuring that pupils’ work is sufficiently challenging and matches the abilities of different groups, especially the most able pupils – raising teachers’ expectations about pupils’ abilities so that they are challenged fully, engaged in their learning and time is used more effectively – ensuring teaching assistants are effective in supporting learning and helping pupils to make rapid progress.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Improve provision in the early years so that: – children become less reliant on adult support and become more confident in exploring, playing and learning by themselves – assessment information effectively identifies what children can and cannot do, and staff use this information to plan further learning activities – best use is made of the redeveloped outdoor provision in order to provide children with well-planned and engaging learning opportunities.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

An external review of governance should be undertaken in order to assess how this aspect of leadership and management may be improved.

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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 Inadequate

 Since the last inspection, the pace of improvement has been too slow. The headteacher has not had effective support from other key leaders to help him identify and address areas for improvement. As a result, the leadership team has not worked together to drive improvements quickly enough. Where changes have been made, senior leaders have not monitored or evaluated their impact effectively. Too many of the school’s systems and procedures are insecure, meaning there is limited capacity for improvement.  Improvement plans are weak. Plans do not provide clarity with regard to the key priorities which need to be addressed to move the school forward. The effectiveness of any action taken cannot be measured because the plans are too general and do not identify which specific aspects need to be improved or how leaders will know when they have been successful. The action plans are not effective in helping to drive up

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Effectiveness of leadership and management Inadequate

standards or tackle the underperformance of key pupil groups.  The pupil premium funding plans are similarly weak. The majority of the additional funding is allocated to extra staff employed at the school without a clear plan for what their impact will be or how it will be measured. As a result, there are no effective plans in place to improve outcomes for disadvantaged pupils.  Since his appointment, the headteacher has reviewed the effectiveness of the leadership team and made some changes. However, these changes have not improved the overall effectiveness of school leadership. This is because the headteacher and governors are not holding other leaders to account for the work they do.  Senior leaders do not carry out rigorous monitoring of teaching and learning to help them to identify areas for improvement, to help teachers to improve or to hold teachers accountable for their work in the classroom. When monitoring does occur,

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Effectiveness of leadership and management Inadequate

feedback is too positive and does not help teachers to improve outcomes for pupils. Consequently, leaders have an overly positive view of the overall effectiveness of the quality of teaching in the school. Professional development opportunities and arrangements for teachers’ performance management have failed to improve the quality of teaching.  Leaders do not monitor the learning and progress of different groups of pupils from their starting points. The use of assessment information does not provide leaders with the information they need to tackle any underperformance. Leaders do not check information to ensure that it is accurate and, as a result, some inaccuracies in information are recorded.  There are significant weaknesses in the overall quality of the curriculum. Pupils do not receive a broad and balanced curriculum offer because insufficient time is given to some subjects, such as art, geography, history and music. Pupils told inspectors that

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Effectiveness of leadership and management Inadequate

they missed having more opportunities to do their favourite subjects. When these subjects are taught, coverage lacks depth and challenge. Subject leaders are not given time to monitor their subject areas effectively and so have had too little impact on improving the quality of the curriculum.  Pupils’ understanding of British values requires strengthening. For example, pupils knew some information about the monarchy and the importance of laws. They were able to name the prime minister, but had little understanding about the job that Members of Parliament actually did.  The school promotes pupils’ social, moral, spiritual and cultural development effectively. Pupils enjoy taking part in fundraising activities, such as for a cancer research charity. They also show empathy for other people, both in their local community and in the wider world.  Pupils who have special needs and/or disabilities are supported well. Leaders check

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Effectiveness of leadership and management Inadequate

that support is appropriate and meet regularly with parents to keep them informed and listen to their views. The leader for pupils who have special needs and/or disabilities reviews individual plans termly, carries out observations, monitors progress and checks on the quality of support. Consequently, extra funding for special educational needs is spent well.  Additional funding to provide sporting activities is used well. Strong leadership ensures that pupils receive daily opportunities to complete a one-kilometre run and take part in a range of sporting activities. Close links between sport and health and well-being ensure that pupils are well informed about how to keep fit and healthy. Pupils benefit from a good range of extra-curricular sports clubs. Leaders’ monitoring shows that attendance at these clubs is rising. Pupils enjoy their physical education lessons and are developing positive attitudes to keeping fit.

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Effectiveness of leadership and management Inadequate

 Leaders work well with parents. Parents speak positively about how they are encouraged to talk to staff and feel that they are listened to. They appreciate the approachable manner of the headteacher.

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Governance of the school

 Governance is ineffective. Governors are not holding leaders to account for school improvement work because they cannot measure how effectively plans are being implemented. As a result, governors rely too much on information provided by the headteacher without having necessary checks in place.  Governing body minutes show that governors are not challenging leaders effectively. There is a strong focus on budgets rather than on improving outcomes for pupils. Where governors have scrutinised published information on progress, they have not asked challenging questions or checked that effective action is being taken to bring about positive change.  Governors’ overview of whether the pupil premium spending is having a positive impact is poor. Governors do not know how effectively the extra funding is being used to improve standards and rates of progress for disadvantaged pupils.  Governors have relied too heavily on external reviews, which have been too positive

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Governance of the school

about the quality of education in the school. This has contributed to the lack of challenge for leaders from governors.  Governors do not have a good enough overview of safeguarding. They have failed to check that safeguarding procedures and practices meet statutory requirements.  Governors have provided a good level of support for the headteacher and recognise that he has had to make some challenging decisions.

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Safeguarding

 The arrangements for safeguarding are not effective.  Staff are not rigorously following the school’s system for recording behaviour and bullying issues. Leaders are not collating the information that is recorded to provide an overview of any bullying incidents over time. Teachers typically respond to concerns but do not always record incidents. Consequently, they do recognise the early warning signs of bullying. This means that senior leaders are not made aware of any ongoing bullying issues swiftly enough. Once the headteacher is made aware of these issues, he does takes effective and rapid action. Despite the headteacher’s positive response, weak recording and a lack of urgency in reporting concerns means that the system to keep pupils safe from bullying is poor.  During the inspection, leaders had to take immediate action to provide appropriate recruitment information for recently appointed staff members. No systems are in place

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Safeguarding

to ensure that those responsible for safeguarding make sure that all checks are in place before staff are appointed. This illustrates a lack of rigour and consistency in the way that governors and senior leaders follow the correct procedures for staff recruitment as set out in ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education 2016’.

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Inadequate

 The quality of teaching, learning and assessment is inadequate because not enough checks are in place to ensure that assessment information is secure. Leaders do not carry out monitoring checks to match what they see in books to the progress information provided by teachers. As a result, there is a mismatch of assessment information across the school, particularly in mathematics. Teachers do not provide activities which meet pupils’ needs, and pupils do not receive the support they need to make strong progress across different subjects.  Assessment procedures are still being developed. They provide information on attainment outcomes and measure progress over the academic year. However, they lack precision because leaders do not check on the progress that pupils make from their different starting points. Some information produced during the inspection suggested improvements in rates of progress for disadvantaged pupils in the current

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Inadequate

Year 6. However, because leaders do not rigorously check this information with evidence in pupils’ work, they cannot be certain of how accurate it is. Similarly, inspectors saw no evidence of monitoring for mathematics for this academic year and when they sampled work in books, they saw no examples of pupils working at greater depth, or making rapid progress. This did not match the school’s current assessment information.  Teachers do not match work appropriately to the needs of all pupils within their class. Some pupils spend too long on time-filling activities during lessons, finish quickly and are not given appropriate follow-up activities to do. In other lessons, teachers provide work that is of an easier standard to the most able pupils, while other pupils are directed to work of a higher standard. This demonstrates that some teachers do not use ongoing assessment information to plan effectively and do not have high enough

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Inadequate

expectations of what the most able pupils can do.  Teachers typically provide pupils with success criteria linked to the current lesson, so that pupils know what is expected of them. However, teachers fail to pick up on repeated basic errors over time. As a result, pupils were seen using more complex techniques, such as ‘fronted adverbial clauses’, but at the same time were making very basic errors in accurately using capital letters and full stops.  The use and impact of teaching assistants is inconsistent across the school. Where support is less effective, teaching assistants do not aid pupils in their learning but jump in too quickly, before pupils have had a proper chance to try a problem themselves. On other occasions, teaching assistants are not clear about what the children are learning and, as a result, create confusion through weak explanations and unclear direction. However, some teaching assistants are highly effective and work with groups to ensure

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Inadequate

that pupils understand what they are being asked to do and to demonstrate effective questioning skills. Leaders are aware of the stark differences between the levels of performance of support staff, but not enough has been done to close this chasm.  In mathematics, pupils have limited opportunities to extend their problem-solving skills. The sequence of some of the work showed that key steps have been missed in the teaching of subtraction and pupils have been moved on without understanding what they were doing. This demonstrates that teachers are not following the calculations policy correctly and are not secure in their own knowledge of mathematics. Because leaders have not monitored mathematics books, they do not pick up or address these inconsistencies.  Some guided reading books do not match the pupils’ abilities and result in less-able pupils finding the text too challenging. Teachers are implementing new reading

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Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Inadequate

systems. However, there is too much focus on following the guidance and not enough on what the pupils are actually learning from the sessions.  The teaching of phonics is now secure. Pupils use their phonics skills well to help them tackle unknown words. As a result, phonics outcomes are strong and improving.

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Personal development and welfare

 The school's work to promote pupils' personal development and welfare is inadequate because ineffective systems to recognise persistent poor behaviour and potential incidents of bullying leave some pupils feeling vulnerable.  The systems in place are not sufficiently effective to enable teachers and leaders to pick out any regular patterns and thus quickly identify potential bullying issues. As a result, recurring incidents have not been picked up and the seriousness of the incidents not recognised. Not all incidents have been recorded, so leaders have not been aware of their frequency. Records are not kept centrally and do not give a full picture of events over time. Although the headteacher responds effectively when fully aware of any bullying issues, the time taken to reach this point is too long.  Most parents say that their children are happy and safe in school. Pupils say that they feel safe, although some did say that there were some incidents of bullying and rough-

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Personal development and welfare

play at breaktimes. Pupils have a sound understanding of how to keep themselves safe when using the internet. They are also aware of road and fire safety.  Key members of staff attend meetings for potentially vulnerable pupils, including those who have been referred to social services. In the vast majority of cases, the school acts as the lead professional. Detailed notes are kept, but leaders are not tenacious enough in following up records of meetings quickly enough.  The breakfast club provided free for disadvantaged pupils provides a happy, relaxed and informal start to the day. Pupils enjoy the range of fruits and snacks on offer and start school ready for learning.

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Behaviour

 The behaviour of pupils requires improvement.  Where pupils are engaged in learning, they demonstrate positive attitudes and quickly apply themselves to tasks. However, this is not always the case. Where the pace of work is slow or tasks are ill-matched to their abilities, pupils tend to lose interest and become disengaged.  Pupils are polite and courteous. They open doors, smile and greet visitors. Most pupils speak positively about the behaviour of others. However, a small minority of pupils say that they have been bullied and some name-calling takes place. Some expressed concerns that behaviour at breaktimes was not as strong as in most lessons.  Attendance rates are above average. Attendance for pupils who have special educational needs/and or disabilities is lower than that seen nationally. However, many of these pupils have recognised medical needs, and this affects their attendance.

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Outcomes for pupils Inadequate

 For too long, standards of achievement in reading, writing and mathematics have been too low, and there has been an overall decline since the school’s previous inspection. This has particularly been the case for pupils at the end of key stage 2. In 2016, attainment in reading was significantly below the level found in other schools nationally, with less than half of the pupils in Year 6 reaching the expected standard. This meant that many pupils left the school ill-prepared for the next stage of their education.  Outcomes for the most able pupils across the school are inadequate. Over time, very few of the most able pupils have reached the higher standards in writing. This pattern was repeated in 2016, when no pupils reached the higher standard in writing in key stage 1, and a well-below average proportion achieved better than the expected standard in key stage 2. The picture for pupils currently in the school is similar. Work in

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Outcomes for pupils Inadequate

pupils’ books shows that, while most pupils are making progress, too few are making the accelerated progress needed to reach the higher standards and greater depth in their learning.  The attainment of disadvantaged pupils is consistently well below that of other pupils nationally and there are too few indications that these differences are diminishing quickly enough. In 2016, progress for disadvantaged pupils in reading in key stage 2 was significantly below that of other pupils nationally. By the end of key stage 1, very few of the most able disadvantaged pupils were working at greater depth in reading, writing or mathematics. Current tracking shows that some disadvantaged pupils are now making better progress than other pupils at the school, but this progress is not rapid enough for them to catch up with other pupils nationally. This indicates that leaders are not using pupil premium funding well enough to improve the achievement

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Outcomes for pupils Inadequate

of disadvantaged pupils.  Progress seen in mathematics books shows that pupils are not making enough progress because teachers are not providing opportunities for pupils to apply their skills in problem-solving activities. Pupils regularly practise key skills which they have already mastered but then are not provided with enough opportunities to apply these skills before moving on. In contrast, some pupils are being moved on too quickly without being given time to secure their understanding of the work they have just completed.  Weaknesses in assessment practice mean that data about pupils’ progress and attainment does not consistently match the evidence seen in pupils’ work. Leaders do not adequately check to make sure that there is a strong match between pupils’ assessment information and the typical standard of their work. This is having a negative impact on pupils’ progress because gaps in their knowledge and

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Outcomes for pupils Inadequate

understanding are not being consistently identified and addressed.  In 2016, outcomes in reading, writing and mathematics for pupils who have English as an additional language were broadly in line with those for other pupils in the school across key stages 1 and 2.  One area in which outcomes have improved is in phonics, where the proportions of pupils achieving the expected standard at the end of Year 1 and Year 2 rose to be in line with the national average. This is because the teaching of phonics is now more consistently effective across year groups.

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Early years provision Inadequate

 Leaders have not ensured that safeguarding arrangements for the whole school, including the early years, are effective. This means that the early years provision is inadequate.  Weaknesses in leadership of the early years mean that early years staff are not routinely encouraged to reflect on or improve their practice. As a result, there are significant gaps in staff members’ understanding of how young children learn. Too many activities are directed by adults, while there are too few opportunities for children to try new things or work at activities they have chosen themselves. Consequently, when children do access the wider provision available they are often unsure of what to do or where to work, and staff do not then intervene effectively to support learning.  Leaders and staff do not check carefully enough to ensure that children are making enough progress. Learning journals provide a range of photographs with short captions

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Early years provision Inadequate

detailing what children are doing. Some links to assessment are provided, but the journals are not used effectively to inform planning. This lack of focus slows children’s learning.  The headteacher has been instrumental in securing improvements in the outdoors area for early years. It provides a wide range of interesting enhancements to learning, including a music area. However, not all Reception children have regular access to this reinvigorated area. When they do work outdoors, their learning is restricted because adults are too quick to tell children what to do and do not give them adequate opportunities to play and explore.  Work in writing books provides evidence of progress in writing and phonics. Children apply their phonics knowledge to help with their writing of stories and captions. However, there is a lack of challenge for the most able, and the learning environment does not effectively encourage children to practise and develop their writing skills

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Early years provision Inadequate

independently.  The early years team successfully establishes effective working partnerships. The team works well with other early years providers and quickly develops a positive relationship with parents. However, weaknesses in assessment and monitoring procedures mean that leaders are overly reliant on support from the local authority to check and verify their judgements of children’s outcomes.  Standards over time have risen. The proportion of children who achieve a good level of development by the end of Reception is in line with the national average. Disadvantaged children are now making similar rates of progress to other children. As a result, an increasing proportion of children are ready for the move into Year 1.  Children are happy and enjoy coming to school. Many can confidently talk about what they have been doing and almost all respond well to adult instructions, such as when it is time to tidy up.

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School details

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

Appropriate authority The governing body

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School details

Email address head@casterton.lancs.sch.uk

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School details

Date of previous inspection 7 March 2013

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Information about this school

 The school meets requirements on the publication of specified information on its website.  The school is of similar size to most primary schools nationally.  The proportion of pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities is lower than the average nationally.  The proportion of disadvantaged pupils is higher than the national average.  The proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is higher than the national average.  The school meets the government’s floor standards, which are the minimum expectations 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 across the school. They spoke to pupils and examined the work in their books.  Meetings were held with senior and middle leaders, governors (including the chair of the governing body), a representative from the local authority and two groups of pupils.  Inspectors considered the 28 responses to Parent View, including 14 free-text responses. Inspectors also spoke to parents informally before school. Inspectors took into account 25 responses to the staff survey.  Inspectors examined documents relating to governance, self-evaluation, school improvement planning, pupils’ progress, behaviour, the curriculum and safeguarding.

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Inspection team

Janet Lunn, lead inspector Her Majesty's Inspector

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Inspection team

Michelle Beard 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

In the report, 'disadvantaged pupils' refers to those pupils who attract government pupil premium funding: pupils claiming free school meals at any point in the last six years and pupils in care or who left care through adoption or another formal route. www.gov.uk/pupil-premium-information-for-schools-and- alternative-provision-settings .

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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 children looked after, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspection team

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 .

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Inspection team

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, 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.gov.uk/ofsted

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