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Store Street Manchester M1 2WD T 0300 123 1231 www.gov.uk/ofsted

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Jessica Humphrey Executive Headteacher Kings Ash Academy Pimm Road Paignton Devon TQ3 3XA

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Ofsted visit to Kings Ash Academy

Following my visit with Jennifer Gibbs, Her Majesty’s Inspector (HMI), to your school on 1 October 2020, I write on behalf of Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills to confirm the visit’s findings. Thank you for the time you made available to discuss your actions since September 2020, when the government expected all schools to open fully to all pupils.

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Ofsted visit to Kings Ash Academy

This visit was conducted under section 8 of the Education Act 2005 (as amended) and in accordance with Ofsted’s published procedures for visiting schools while routine inspections are temporarily suspended.

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Ofsted visit to Kings Ash Academy

Ofsted’s visits to schools during the autumn term are not inspections. We are not giving graded judgements. We did not undertake the usual range of inspection activities and were unable to check other sources of evidence, such as visits to lessons or looking at pupils’ work. The content of this letter gives an overview of our discussions about what has happened in your school this term.

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Ofsted visit to Kings Ash Academy

During the visit, we spoke to you, the head of school, the senior leadership team, the early reading leader, the deputy designated safeguarding lead, the nurture leader and the special educational needs coordinator. We did not speak to pupils because of the protective measures in place.

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Context

Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills is leading Ofsted’s work into how England’s education system is managing the return to full education for pupils following an extended break in formal schooling due to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic.

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Context

In undertaking this focused work, HMI are visiting a broad range of schools. HMI will visit a sample of:

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Context

 approximately 1,200 schools across all Ofsted grades (outstanding, good, requires improvement and inadequate)  maintained schools, academies and free schools, special schools and centres of alternative provision, including those in cities, and coastal, town or rural communities.

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Context

The information from this visit will feed into Ofsted’s national reporting so that the insights can be shared with the government and the education sector. We did not find any significant concerns during the visit. In such a case, a different report would be published on our website and available to parents and carers.

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Context

We did not consider your response to COVID-19 during the spring and summer terms 2020, when the school was not open to all pupils.

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

 The school opened to all pupils on 7 September 2020.  Pupils’ current attendance rate is broadly in line with the normal attendance for this time of year.  All pupils are studying the full curriculum.  Leaders have given reading a high priority since all pupils returned to school. Teachers have assessed the gaps in pupils’ phonics knowledge and adapted their planning accordingly. Initially, teachers are focusing on decoding before moving on to develop fluency. Pupils in Reception to Year 2 now have two sessions of phonics each day.  In mathematics, pupils continue to be taught in smaller mixed-ability groups across each year group ‘bubble’. Although they are staffing them differently than before, in order to maintain the security of each bubble, leaders are using these groups to identify and address gaps in pupils’ mathematical knowledge that are a result of the COVID-19 lockdown.  Pupils study all the subjects of the wider curriculum, although the order of

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

the topics they study has been changed in some of them. In physical education, for example, the curriculum has been reordered so that pupils are currently doing activities that can be done outside. In French, the use of streaming technology has enabled more pupils to learn this language.  In addition to regular assessment in the classroom, leaders have scheduled a number of tests for later in this half term in order to assist them in their identification of gaps in learning caused by the lockdown.  Leaders have plans in place to ensure that the curriculum can be delivered remotely to individual pupils or groups of pupils, should this be needed as a result of COVID-19. To help them in this, leaders have conducted a survey of families’ access to the internet. Leaders intend that any pupils who are learning remotely will follow the same curriculum as if they were physically in school.

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

Thank you again for contributing to this important national work. The views and experiences you have shared will help to inform future policy.

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

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

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