Setting

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

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Gill Leigh Headteacher Marsh Green Primary School Kitt Green Road Wigan Lancashire WN5 0EF

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Ofsted visit to Marsh Green Primary School

Following my visit with Jackie Stillings, Her Majesty’s Inspector (HMI), to your school on 3 November 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 Marsh Green Primary School

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 Marsh Green Primary School

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 Marsh Green Primary School

During the visit, we spoke to you and the assistant headteacher. 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. 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, an inspection 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 fully to all pupils on 2 September 2020.  Pupils’ attendance is the same as usual for this time of the year. Pupils are expected to attend full time.  Pupils are studying all subjects from the primary national curriculum. In music, teachers are not teaching singing currently.  In all subjects, teachers have checked pupils’ new starting points. Teachers have adapted their planning to cover content which pupils missed during the period when schools were only open to some children due to COVID-19 restrictions. You are planning for pupils to return to the usual curriculum by summer 2021.  Teachers have increased the opportunities for pupils to read and discuss stories. This is because they have found some new gaps in how pupils in Year 3 to Year 6 discuss the meaning of fiction books.  In mathematics, teachers have identified that pupils could not easily remember some of the content that they had learned prior to March 2020.

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

Staff are giving pupils extra practice this term, for example to recall multiplication tables in Year 3 to Year 6.  You plan to provide learning at home for all pupils through the school’s online systems, if it is needed. Staff are giving pupils extra help to learn online safely. Where pupils are unable to study online at home, you have plans to support them with paper resources.

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

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