Lapage Primary School and Nursery

Inspection of a good school: Lapage Primary School and Nursery Barkerend Road, Bradford, West Yorkshire BD3 8QX

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Outcome

Lapage Primary School and Nursery continues to be a good school.

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What is it like to attend this school?

This is a caring and welcoming school. Pupils are friendly, polite and courteous. Leaders and staff encourage all pupils to aim high and do their best, both in lessons and in their personal development.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils enjoy learning a wide range of subjects and taking part in many school trips. Children in the early years quickly develop their early reading skills. Their phonics lessons are exciting and well organised. Pupils work hard and achieve well. Some could still do better in reading by the end of key stage 2.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils say that the ‘Lapage code’ helps them to behave well. They listen carefully to one another and respect each other’s views. There is hardly any unkind behaviour or bullying. Pupils are proud of their ‘active citizenship’ project. They organise donations to local food banks, visit care homes and make a valuable contribution to the ‘Bradford Cathedral Bells’ project. They are excellent ambassadors for the school.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils feel safe in school. They understand how to stay safe when using the internet. Governors, staff and parents are proud of their school and its place within the community. As one parent said, ‘The school works really hard to provide the best possible support and education for children.’

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What does the school do well and what does it need to do better?

Leaders, governors and the trust put the needs of pupils at the heart of all decisions they make. Teamworking is strong across the school. This clearly demonstrates the school’s ethos, ‘working together we achieve.’

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What does the school do well and what does it need to do better?

Leaders have thought carefully about the subjects they want pupils to learn. Learning extends beyond the well-planned curriculum in some subjects. Pupils benefit from many interesting visits, visitors and exciting projects. Pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is a strength of the school. 21–22 January 2020

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The leadership and teaching of mathematics are strong. Pupils’ work shows that teachers have high expectations. They check pupils’ previous learning and build on it carefully. Year 6 pupils use their prior learning and knowledge of mean, median and mode well when calculating averages in real-life scenarios.

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Teachers also build well on what pupils already know and can do in English. In some subjects, however, teachers do not build well on pupils’ understanding. For example, in history and geography, the curriculum does not demand enough of some pupils. Pupils do not always deepen their understanding as well as they should.

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Phonics is taught effectively. Pupils in the key stage 1 and early years classes reach high standards in reading. This strong progress slows for some pupils when they join key stage 2. The leader of reading has put successful strategies in place to raise the profile of reading. Pupils say they love reading, even if they find it difficult. One Year 5 pupil said, ‘I didn’t used to read but I got the ‘Birthday Boy’ book and I cannot stop reading it.’ Pupils talk confidently about how they use inference, prediction and retrieval to help them answer challenging questions.

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Children get off to a flying start in the early years. The ambitious curriculum is delivered effectively by enthusiastic staff. Activities are well organised to excite children. They were captivated by an experiment to identify which objects float in water. Staff praise children often and encourage them to be independent. Staff provide helpful support to develop children’s vocabulary. Children are busy, happy and settled.

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Leaders and staff are ambitious for all pupils. Disadvantaged pupils, those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) and pupils with English as an additional language (EAL) achieve well. Staff get high-quality training. This means they know how to nurture and support these groups of pupils effectively. Pupils improve their knowledge and understanding successfully.

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The school has an inclusive and respectful ethos. Adults listen carefully to pupils and manage their behaviour well. There is very little disruption in classes or around the school. Leaders work tirelessly with families to ensure that attendance remains a priority. Despite this, some issues of poor attendance remain. Some pupils miss out on school due to extended, unauthorised absences. Pupils’ current attendance is too low.

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Pupils are responsible and know how to keep themselves healthy. They enjoy attending clubs, including running, dance and football. Pupils are proud to become members of the pupil leadership team.

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The trust, governors and leaders pay great attention to the well-being and mental health of staff and pupils alike. Staff say their roles are valued by their sensitive headteachers. Initiatives such as the staff ‘shout out’ board and secret buddies are much appreciated. Support for newly qualified teachers is particularly effective. Staff morale is high. 21–22 January 2020

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Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

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Safeguarding

The school promotes a culture of safeguarding. Parents say that their children are safe in school. Staff vetting arrangements are robust. This helps to ensure that pupils are protected. Staff are well trained and vigilant. They know how to identify pupils at risk. Leaders contact specialist agencies where required in a timely manner. They secure appropriate intervention and support for vulnerable children. Staff value the constant safeguarding training, particularly the quizzes, and rewards. One teacher’s view matched others when she said, ‘Children’s safety is paramount in this school.’

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(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

 New initiatives and additional support are helping pupils who are not yet fluent in reading. However, leaders understand that there is more work to do to ensure that all pupils make strong progress in reading, particularly in lower key stage 2. Leaders should make sure that the reading curriculum challenges pupils effectively. Leaders should check carefully to make sure that all pupils who are capable of doing so are reaching the higher standards in reading.  Some pupils who are capable of doing so do not develop their knowledge and apply it to more demanding aspects of the curriculum. Subject leaders should ensure that teachers check pupils’ existing knowledge and understanding systematically. Leaders should ensure that the curriculum is sufficiently demanding and planned effectively to deepen pupils’ understanding as soon as they are ready.  Leaders are starting to strengthen links with parents to make sure that no pupil is

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(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

disadvantaged by regular and/or extended absence. Leaders should continue to improve rates of attendance for persistent absentees to ensure that no pupil is disadvantaged by poor attendance.

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Background

When we have judged a school to be good we will then normally go into the school about once every four years to confirm that the school remains good. This is called a section 8 inspection of a good school or non-exempt outstanding school. We do not give graded judgements on a section 8 inspection. However, if we find some evidence that the school could now be better than good or that standards may be declining, then the next inspection will be a section 5 inspection. Usually this is within one to two years of the date of the section 8 inspection. If we have serious concerns about safeguarding, behaviour or the quality of education, we will convert the section 8 inspection to a section 5 inspection immediately.

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Background

This is the first section 8 inspection since we judged the predecessor school, Lapage Primary School and Nursery, to be good on 29–30 January 2013. 21–22 January 2020

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How can I feed back my views?

find out what other parents and carers think. We use Ofsted Parent View information when deciding which schools to inspect, when to inspect them and as part of their inspection.

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How can I feed back my views?

The Department for Education has further guidance on how to complain about a school.

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How can I feed back my views?

If you are the school and you are not happy with the inspection or the report, you can complain to Ofsted .

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Further information

You can search for published performance information about the school.

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Further information

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. 21–22 January 2020

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School details

Inspection number 10119933 Type of school Primary

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School details

Headteacher Richard Ballantine (executive headteacher), Shabana Khan (headteacher), Shameem Akhtar (headteacher) Website www.lapageprimaryschool.co.uk/

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School details

Date of previous inspection 29–30 January 2013

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Information about this school

 This is the school’s first inspection since it converted to become an academy as part of the Nurture Academies Trust. There have been significant leadership and staff changes since the predecessor school’s previous inspection in 2013.  The early years classes include three-year-olds who attend part-time.  The school runs before- and after-school provision.

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Information about this inspection

 Inspectors held meetings with the chief executive officer, executive headteacher, headteachers, senior and middle leaders, including the special educational needs coordinator.  The lead inspector met with members of the governing board and held a discussion with the chair of the Nurture Academies Trust.  Inspectors did deep dives in these subjects: early reading, mathematics, science and history. In the deep dives, we held discussions with senior leaders and subject leaders 21–22 January 2020

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with responsibility for those subjects, undertook lesson visits, looked at pupils’ work and held discussions with pupils and teachers.  Inspectors looked at a range of policies and documentation related to school improvement planning, at the quality of provision in early years and planning in the wider curriculum across the whole school.  Inspectors looked at safeguarding procedures and records of safeguarding and behaviour. Inspectors spoke to staff and pupils to evaluate their understanding of safeguarding procedures and checked pupils’ attendance.  Inspectors observed pupils’ behaviour in classrooms and around school. They spoke to pupils about their school life and took account of the 30 responses to Ofsted’s pupil survey.  Inspectors spoke to parents and took account of 32 responses to Ofsted Parent View, Ofsted’s online questionnaire.  Inspectors met with teachers and took account of the 35 responses to Ofsted’s staff

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Inspection team

Cathy Morgan, lead inspector Ofsted Inspector

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Inspection team

Dimitris Spiliotis Her Majesty’s Inspector 21–22 January 2020

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regulates and inspects to 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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