Westfield Primary Community School

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

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Mrs Tracey Ralph Headteacher Westfield Primary Community School Askham Lane Acomb York North Yorkshire YO24 3HP

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

Following my visit to the school on 23 January 2018 with Andrew Soutar, Ofsted Inspector, 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 January 2013.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

The leadership team has brought about steady and sustained improvement in the school since the last inspection. Your professional commitment to the community and its children has made a positive contribution to the life chances of many. You have seen pupils flourish from the time they enter school to the time they leave.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

You recognise the potential in staff, giving them leadership responsibility and the opportunity to grow. This means a good number of leaders are available to assist you ably in bringing about improvement. Because leaders regularly check what is happening in the classrooms, and carefully track the progress of each child, they know where the strengths and weaknesses are. You and your team strive continuously for consistency in the quality of teaching, learning and assessment. You identify the right improvement priorities, make ambitious plans and take effective action.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

Following the last inspection, inspectors left two recommendations. The first of these was to improve further the quality of teaching and pupils’ progress. Attainment has improved in both key stage 1 and key stage 2, from a point where it was often significantly below average to being broadly in line with national averages in reading, writing and mathematics. From pupils’ starting points, this represents good progress. You are not complacent, but strive for more pupils to reach the expected standard. You also recognise that more pupils could make stronger progress to reach higher standards than those expected nationally for their age. Secondly, inspectors challenged you to improve the quality of teaching and the curriculum in the Reception classes, and in particular to improve the teaching of writing. I saw some strong provision in Reception classes and children are making good progress, including in their writing development. There remains room for

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

greater consistency in the quality of provision across the early years.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

Leaders have worked hard to improve attendance, which remains a little below the national average. Despite your best efforts, the proportion of parents who take their children on unauthorised term-time holidays is high. This has a disproportionate, negative effect on overall attendance figures.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

Although pupils in this largely monocultural setting show respect for each other and for adults, their learning about a range of cultures and major world faiths is somewhat limited, as is their understanding about gender diversity. You recognise that this aspect of the curriculum needs to improve if pupils are to be fully prepared for life in modern Britain.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

Governance has improved following an external review commissioned by the governing body. The governing body has acted upon the recommendations of this review. Governors identified the skills that would further improve their ability to hold leaders to account and subsequently appointed governors who have the necessary skills. Indeed, governors now bring a wide range of appropriate skills and experience to the table. Governors have become increasingly challenging and perceptive. They visit the school to check that leaders’ assertions are correct. Although the school improvement plan identifies the right priorities and actions, measures of success that emphasise more sharply pupils’ learning and progress would help governors to check even more effectively the impact of leaders’ actions. Furthermore, governors would benefit from a clearer oversight of the relative performance of groups of pupils across the age range.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

The leadership team has ensured that all safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose. The ‘children’s champions’ are highly valued by pupils, who have confidence in these adults to sort out any conflict. Pupils say bullying is rare and that adults are effective at dealing with it so that it stops.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

Adults understand their safeguarding duties, including the duty to be vigilant for signs that a pupil may be at risk of exposure to radicalisation. Staff act on any concerns they have about pupils. You and the ‘children’s champions’ take effective action to make sure pupils who need help receive it as quickly as possible. Records are detailed and thorough, including the central record of the checks made on adults before they take up employment at the school. Governors regularly check the safeguarding arrangements.

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Short inspection of Westfield Primary Community School

Pupils’ positive behaviour in classrooms and around the school contributes to their safety. They learn about how to stay safe, including about essential online safety rules.

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Inspection findings

 Leaders have identified all of the most able pupils in school, including those who previously have not demonstrated high standards in their earlier learning. You make sure these pupils are included in staff discussions and in the checks leaders make on teaching and pupils’ progress. Targets for these pupils are appropriately ambitious. For example, leaders are looking for progress in key stage 2 that is consistent with that of the top 20% of pupils nationally. Pupils’ work shows that teachers largely challenge the most able pupils well in reading, writing and mathematics, so that the proportion of pupils demonstrating learning at greater depth is increasing.  The extent to which teachers stretch the most able pupils’ thinking in subjects other than reading, writing and mathematics, such as in geography and history, is more variable. Sometimes, the prescriptive way in which teachers ask these pupils to record their learning limits their ability to think more deeply. In science,

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Inspection findings

pupils have opportunities to develop and practise a range of scientific enquiry skills, but opportunities to apply this knowledge in more challenging ways is limited. Pupils write in a range of subjects, but often the writing tasks lack audience and purpose so are less challenging than they might be for this group of pupils.  Since the previous inspection, the proportion of children reaching a good level of development by the end of the early years has increased year on year so that it is now in line with the national average. Furthermore, more children are beginning to exceed the early learning goals, including in writing and in reading. Adults help children to use their growing knowledge of letters and sounds to attempt to read and spell words. Children learn to hold a pencil correctly and form letters properly so that most are ready to make quick progress in Year 1.  The majority of adults in the early years are particularly adept at joining in

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Inspection findings

children’s role play and exploration to enhance learning. They ask open questions that help children to develop their talk. They model the vocabulary children most need to learn. They notice when some children are less engaged in learning and skilfully re-engage them. Children are often absorbed in their activities. They sustain interest and concentration and often challenge themselves. A few adults are less alert to the waning interests of some children, who consequently do less learning. Some of the learning activities for children to choose from are less enticing and do not make sufficient demands of them.  Last year, by the end of Year 2, attainment in reading was not substantially below the national average, but you and governors recognise the importance of reading and the need to increase the number of pupils who reach at least the expected standard. Just about all pupils meet the expected standard in the

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Inspection findings

phonics screening check before they join Year 3, and most do this by the end of Year 1, but a minority do not develop all the reading comprehension skills they need. Some of these pupils catch up in key stage 2. A minority of pupils in Year 2 are still at a deficit in terms of the breadth of their experience that they bring to reading and in their language comprehension. Your renewed emphasis on making sure pupils receive a varied and rich curriculum and the effective way in which key stage 1 teachers develop children’s language skills is addressing these issues.

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Next steps for the school

Leaders and those responsible for governance should ensure that:

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Next steps for the school

 the proportion of pupils that reach higher standards and greater depth in reading, writing and mathematics by the end of each key stage is at least closer to or above the national average  the work given to the most able pupils in all subjects, alongside reading, writing and mathematics, helps them to achieve a greater depth of understanding in their learning  all teaching in the early years is as good as the current most effective practice  the success measures in school improvement plans better help governors to keep a track of the impact of actions on pupils’ learning and progress and that information given to governors helps them to judge more clearly the progress of groups of pupils across the age range.

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Next steps for the school

I am copying this letter to the chair of the governing body, the regional schools commissioner and the director of children’s services for York. This letter will be published on the Ofsted website.

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Information about the inspection

Inspectors briefly visited classes in all year groups, accompanied mostly by senior leaders, to observe the quality of teaching and learning. They examined a representative sample of pupils’ workbooks, also with senior leaders. One of the inspectors listened to a few Year 3 pupils read. Various documents were scrutinised, including the school’s written self-evaluation, school improvement plans, notes of the checks leaders make on the quality of teaching, and minutes of the governing body meetings. Safeguarding documents were scrutinised along with records relating to attendance and behaviour. One of the inspectors held a meeting with three governors, including the chair and the vice chair. Inspectors listened to what pupils had to say about what it is like to be a pupil at the school, and took account of the 63 responses to Ofsted’s online pupil survey. Inspectors observed the behaviour of pupils as they played and socialised at lunchtime. One of the

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Information about the inspection

inspectors chatted with parents at the beginning of the school day and took account of over 250 responses to the online survey, Parent View. Several written responses from parents were considered. The 26 responses to Ofsted’s staff survey were also considered.

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