Nancledra School

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

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Mr Rick Gill Headteacher Nancledra School Nancledra Penzance Cornwall TR20 8NB

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Short inspection of Nancledra School

Following my visit to the school on 20 November 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 your predecessor school was judged to be good in June 2015.

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Short inspection of Nancledra School

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

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Short inspection of Nancledra School

You ensure that there are high expectations across the school. The focus is firmly on ‘learning for life’, creating independent and curious learners. A strength of the school is the rich curriculum which helps to make learning interesting and challenging. For example, music is valued and there is a very well attended school choir. All pupils who responded to an online survey said that the school encourages them to be independent and all would recommend the school to a friend. Parents are also positive. All who responded to the survey agree that the school is well led and managed and that their children make good progress. Parents spoke of their children being ‘inspired to learn’.

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Short inspection of Nancledra School

You are, however, not complacent and ensure that the school continues to question and improve the quality of teaching and learning. You have recently reorganised leadership roles in the school. This is because you are currently supporting several other local schools in the Truro and Penwith Academy Trust. You are pleased that this new arrangement allows more staff to take on leadership responsibilities and promotes greater sharing of teaching and learning strategies between schools.

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Short inspection of Nancledra School

At the previous inspection, there was a recommendation to ensure that the monitoring of teaching and learning is rigorous and leads to improvements across the school. Following your monitoring of mathematics teaching last year, you led a drive to ensure that there is challenge in mathematics lessons. This is because you noticed that, too often, teachers asked pupils to complete several similar questions, even if they were getting these all right. Supported by the trust, and researching further afield too, there are now new approaches that promote higher expectations in lessons and greater challenge to ‘do it, secure it and deepen it’. In lessons, pupils apply their mathematical knowledge to help them to reason and solve problems. They thrive on this challenge.

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Short inspection of Nancledra School

There was also a recommendation to share the school improvement plan with governors and to ensure that governors hold the leadership team to account for the work of the school. The trust provides regular challenge through school improvement visits from an education director. The chief executive officer knows the school well and works closely with governors to ensure that they understand their roles and responsibilities. Governors discuss the school development in detail at their meetings. They visit the school frequently and are proud of its achievements. They are quick to challenge you. For example, they investigated the reasons for a recent dip in outcomes in key stage 1 reading.

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Short inspection of Nancledra School

This is a welcoming, nurturing school where staff know pupils and their families very well. There is a strong culture of safeguarding. Leaders ensure that all safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose. Recruitment processes are thorough. A new system for recording and monitoring any concerns about pupils ensures that staff can share and respond to them quickly. Staff receive a good range of safeguarding training. The designated safeguarding lead ensures that staff and governors understand additional local risks, such as dangers from criminal exploitation or ‘county lines’.

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Inspection findings

 We agreed to look at some key issues to confirm that the school remains good. The first was to explore why attendance remains stubbornly just below the national average. Attendance at the school is affected by some families who take holidays during term time. You work closely with families, both to understand the pressures they face, particularly with seasonal working patterns, but also to challenge them to ensure that pupils attend as well as they can. However, improving attendance is a key priority in the school development plan.  I also explored how you ensure that pupils achieve well and how learning is adapted to take account of the different learning needs. For example, there are currently far more girls than boys in most year groups. Staff maintain high expectations and lessons are interesting and engaging. Learning engages all pupils of either sex. There is an inclusive ethos. Teaching assistants support

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Inspection findings

learning well, working alongside teachers. Pupils are encouraged and supported to do as well as they can and to be resilient. As a result, outcomes are consistently strong, and pupils leave the school well prepared for learning at their next school.  I looked at reading, particularly in key stage 1. This is because, last year, there was a slight decline in reading outcomes in Year 2. Staff have looked closely at the teaching of reading. Fresh initiatives to excite pupils to read are having an impact. Pupils enjoy reading and understand that the school expects them to read every day. Teachers are positive about exploring additional strategies to teach reading. For example, there are more lessons where classes explore and enjoy texts together.  We also discussed how you make checks to ensure that improvements to teaching, learning and assessment are consistent and effective across the school. You encourage professional discussion about what works in lessons. As you visit

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Inspection findings

learning around the school, you gather evidence of what you see and discuss this after lessons with the teachers. This immediate and frequent feedback supports the continual improvements that take place. All the staff who responded to our survey strongly agreed that leaders do all they can to ensure that the school has a motivated, respected and effective teaching staff.

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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

 pupils’ attendance improves  the new leadership arrangements are successful, and that staff continue to drive forward the school’s priorities for improvement.

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Next steps for the school

I am copying this letter to the chair of the board of trustees and the chief executive officer, the regional schools commissioner and the director of children’s services for Cornwall. This letter will be published on the Ofsted website.

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Information about the inspection

During the inspection, we had several meetings and visited learning across the school. I had a meeting with a group of governors and the chief executive officer of the trust. I met with pupils to discuss their work and we looked at samples of pupils’ books. I scrutinised a range of school documents including the school development plan, the school’s evaluation of its effectiveness and records of the monitoring of teaching and learning. I also looked at the single central record and discussed safeguarding with senior leaders. I listened to parents’ views at the start of the day and took account of the 19 responses to the online survey, Parent View. I also looked at the 18 responses to a pupil survey and the seven staff responses.

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