Mablethorpe Primary Academy

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

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Miss Catherine Teale Principal Mablethorpe Primary Academy High Street Mablethorpe Lincolnshire LN12 1EW

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

Following my visit to the school on 27 February 2018, 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 June 2014.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

You have high expectations of both your staff and pupils. You undertake frequent checks on the quality of teaching and on pupils’ progress to ensure that the quality of the school’s provision meets these expectations. These checks ensure that you know your school and your pupils well. You have a comprehensive understanding of the school’s strengths and where further improvement is necessary.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

When you identify performance that does not meet your high expectations, you are quick to take effective action. You ensure that pupils who are not making sufficient progress receive the support that they need. You regularly check on the effectiveness of this support. When you identify classroom practice that does not match your high expectations, you and other leaders provide your staff with effective challenge and support. This effective leadership ensures that pupils make good progress, both academically and in their personal development.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

Pupils across all year groups achieve well in mathematics. In 2017, for example, a higher proportion of pupils in Year 6 attained the high standard in this subject than pupils nationally. Pupils are secure in their numeracy skills, including in their ability to use these skills when solving mathematical problems.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

Pupils are not as secure in their reading and writing skills. In recognising this, you have rightly adopted a range of strategies to enable pupils to develop these skills. For example, you have focused on ensuring that pupils study topics that they enjoy and that enable them to broaden the range of vocabulary that they can use when completing their written work. In a lesson I observed, for example, pupils worked together to generate words that they could use to describe how they would feel if they travelled into space. Pupils engaged well with this task, with one pupil writing that he was, ‘shaking with elation’. This focus on developing pupils’ vocabulary has ensured that increased proportions of pupils across all year groups are now on track to attain the expected standard in reading and writing. You recognise that there is still work to do to ensure that attainment in reading and writing is as high as that

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

which pupils achieve in mathematics, particularly for pupils in Years 5 and 6.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

In response to the recommendation of inspectors at the last inspection, you have ensured that parents and carers receive regular opportunities to understand the progress that their child is making. You encourage parents to attend ‘join in’ sessions, when they can come into the school to work with their child in their lessons. You also invite parents to attend celebration assemblies. These occasions help parents to understand how they can help support their child in their learning.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

Your staff regularly receive opportunities to work together to plan pupils’ learning and to check their assessment of pupils’ work. You have also ensured that your staff are able to work with professionals from other schools. This includes schools in the multi-academy trust of which your school is a member, and schools from a local teaching school alliance. As a result, your staff are able to share good practice. They are also secure in their understanding of the age-related expectations for their pupils and in their assessment of pupils’ learning. This has enabled your staff to plan pupils’ learning effectively to ensure that they make good progress.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

In the time that I spent visiting lessons and talking to pupils, it was very clear to me that your pupils enjoy learning and want to do well. I saw this in all of the classes that I visited. Pupils engaged well with the tasks that their teachers had set them. Adults regularly checked pupils’ understanding and provided effective support to help them to become secure in their learning. Pupils also supported each other well, working together to respond to challenging tasks. Pupils responded well to the support and challenge that they received, took full advantage of the opportunity to learn.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

Pupils understand the need to respect all people, including those whose beliefs or values are different from theirs. This is because your staff ensure that pupils receive wide-ranging opportunities to learn about different beliefs, values and cultures. You also have high expectations of how pupils should treat each other. You regularly reward pupils for demonstrating positive behaviour. As a result, pupils fully understand the need to treat each other kindly and with respect. This is preparing them well for life in modern Britain.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

Leaders from the multi-academy trust have a secure understanding of the quality of the school’s provision. They undertake their own rigorous checks on the quality of teaching and on pupils’ progress, to check the accuracy of the information that you provide to them. They work closely with you and other leaders to provide appropriate levels of challenge and support. This includes ensuring that you have opportunities to work with leaders from other schools in the multi-academy trust. Trust leaders share your determination to improve further the quality of the school’s provision, so that the pupils are securely ready for their next steps when they leave the school.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

All staff are highly vigilant of pupils’ welfare. They know that any concern that they may have about a pupil’s well-being, however small, is a concern that they must share with the safeguarding leaders. Staff receive regular safeguarding training and updates. These ensure that all staff understand their safeguarding responsibilities and know the signs to look out for when checking on pupils’ welfare.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

Safeguarding leaders take timely action when they are concerned about a pupil’s welfare. They work closely with parents and local agencies to ensure that the pupil receives the right level of support. You have ensured that all safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose and that your safeguarding records are detailed. You use these records well to keep a close check on the welfare of pupils who are in receipt of any ongoing support.

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Short inspection of Mablethorpe Primary Academy

Pupils say that they feel safe at the school. They say that they have adults to whom they can speak if they are upset. They are confident that adults will take effective action to help support them. You are sensitive to issues in the local area that may affect the welfare of your pupils and ensure that they receive appropriate support to know how to keep safe. As well as learning to be safe online, pupils also learn to stay safe living in their local community. They learn, for example, about being safe around water and when on the beach. You also ensure that pupils understand how to keep themselves safe when they are out in the town during the holiday season, when there are many tourists present.

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Inspection findings

 You have been quick to establish why Year 6 pupils’ attainment in writing was below national levels in 2017. The timely action that you have taken as a result has ensured that greater proportions of pupils across all year groups in key stage 2 are now on track to attain at least the expected standard in this subject.  You use additional government funding effectively to support disadvantaged pupils in their learning and in their personal development. You regularly check that the support that you provide to these pupils is having the necessary positive effect. Where it is not, you are quick to change the support.  Across reading, writing and mathematics, the difference between the attainment of disadvantaged pupils and that of other pupils nationally continues to diminish. This is because of the well-targeted support that these pupils receive.  You are quick to identify the individual learning needs of pupils who have special

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Inspection findings

educational needs (SEN) and/or disabilities. This is particularly the case for any such pupils who arrive at the school during the academic year. You ensure that these pupils receive appropriate support to help them to grow in confidence and to become more secure in their knowledge, skills and understanding.  You regularly check pupils’ attendance. When you identify an emerging pattern of absence for any pupil, you provide timely and effective support to ensure that the pupil attends regularly. Because of this, the previously high levels of absence are now reducing significantly. You are intent on improving pupils’ attendance further, so that it is at least in line with the national average.

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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

 they further develop the teaching of reading and writing, so that pupils’ attainment in both subjects, particularly in Years 5 and 6, matches the high levels that pupils achieve in mathematics  levels of absence continue to reduce, so that all pupils’ attendance is at least in line with the national average.

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Next steps for the school

I am copying this letter to the chief executive officer or equivalent of the multi- academy trust, the regional schools commissioner and the director of children’s services for Lincolnshire. This letter will be published on the Ofsted website.

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Information about the inspection

During the inspection, I met with you, senior leaders, a selection of staff, and leaders from the multi-academy trust. I visited learning across all year groups, including with you, in your role as headteacher. During this time, I spoke with children and looked at their books. I also spoke with pupils when I observed their behaviour at breaktime and lunchtime, and when I met formally with a group of pupils from Years 3, 4, 5 and 6. I met with parents at the beginning of the school day. I listened to three pupils read. I examined a range of documents, including those related to safeguarding, pupils’ attainment and progress, and the school’s use of the pupil premium funding. I also took into account the school’s self-evaluation and its improvement plan. I scrutinised the school’s recruitment procedures and records of the checks made on new staff and volunteers. There were too few responses to Ofsted’s online survey for parents, Parent View, for me to consider.

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Information about the inspection

However, I took into account the six responses to the free-text service. There were no responses to Ofsted’s online surveys for staff and for pupils. I did take into account the school’s own recent surveys of parents’ and pupils’ views. At the end of the day, I gave feedback to you, other senior leaders and leaders from the multi- academy trust.

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