Lane Green First School

Inspection of Lane Green First School Bilbrook Road, Bilbrook, Wolverhampton, West Midlands WV8 1EU

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Inspection dates: 21 and 22 September 2022

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Overall effectiveness Requires improvement

The quality of education Requires improvement Behaviour and attitudes Good Personal development Good Leadership and management Good Early years provision Good Previous inspection grade Good 21 and 22 September 2022

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What is it like to attend this school?

Lane Green is a school where all pupils are genuinely welcomed. There are highly positive relationships between staff and pupils, and it is clear how much pupils are cared for. Pupils are happy to come to school and they feel safe.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils now achieve well in reading and mathematics. However, the quality of education is not the same in all subjects. Sometimes, the work pupils complete does not build on what they have done previously. This is because the curriculum in these subjects is not designed well enough.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Leaders have established high expectations for pupils’ behaviour and attitudes. Pupils understand these and most behave well in lessons and on the playground. Staff give reminders and effective support to pupils who need it. Pupils say that bullying does sometimes happen. They also say that staff take action to make it stop. Records of bullying, and parents’ comments, support this view.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils have an increasing number of opportunities to develop their talents and interests. They enjoy sports clubs, coding and forest school. Through their roles in the eco-committee and the school council, they become active citizens.

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better?

Lane Green is on a journey of improvement. It is led with passion and determination by the headteacher, who is well supported by governors. In a short space of time during the COVID-19 pandemic, the curriculum was redesigned. The aim of the curriculum is to ensure that all pupils develop academically and personally to reach their full potential. Subject leaders have embraced the change. They have systems to check the quality of learning in their subject and have developed actions in response to their findings. However, they have not made sure that all staff have the subject-specific knowledge they need to teach all subjects equally well.

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better?

Children make a good start in early years. Leaders have thought carefully about the knowledge they want children to know and remember in all areas of learning. Staff have a good understanding of how children learn. They have designed the environment to support the curriculum and to focus on what is most important.

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better?

Reading is central to the revised curriculum. Children listen to and join in with stories in Nursery. Staff read in a way that excites and engages children. This continues in the Reception Year. There is a new school library with high-quality resources ready to use this year. Pupils develop a love of reading through engaging in clubs such as ‘Story Rangers’. Leaders introduced a new phonics curriculum last year. Staff received training and have secured the expertise they need to teach early reading. Books are well matched to the sounds pupils are learning. Staff use assessment to identify pupils who need extra support. Additional work, including hearing the pupils read every day, helps pupils to read with increased fluency and confidence. 21 and 22 September 2022

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In mathematics, leaders’ actions are having a positive impact. Children in the early years learn to count and understand numbers. They also explore other areas of mathematics. Through the mathematics curriculum, pupils’ knowledge steadily builds. They gain a secure understanding of the important concepts. Staff have good subject knowledge and identify where pupils could have misconceptions. Staff use assessment to identify gaps in pupils’ knowledge.

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In some of the other subjects, leaders have not identified the important knowledge that pupils need to learn. They have not thought carefully about how to organise the curriculum. This means that pupils do not always build on what they have learned before.

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Leaders work with a range of agencies to accurately identify the needs of pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities. This starts from the early years. They use a range of specific programmes to target areas such as language and communication and reading. These have had significant impact for individual pupils.

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The environment in the school is calm and orderly. Pupils’ learning in lessons is rarely interrupted. Staff give pupils appropriate reminders when required. Most pupils attend school regularly. However, there are some pupils who do not attend as often as they could.

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Through the curriculum, pupils learn about fundamental British values, and other religions and cultures. They make positive contributions to school life through the jobs they do, such as being a milk monitor. The eco-committee organised their very own COP26 and discussed climate change with their local Member of Parliament.

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Staff work well together as a team. They feel well supported by leaders and appreciate the changes made to try and reduce workload.

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Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

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Safeguarding

Leaders make sure that all staff receive appropriate training to recognise the signs that a pupil might be at risk of harm. There are clear systems for reporting concerns that all staff know, understand and use when necessary. Leaders act swiftly when issues arise. They work closely with families and other agencies to make sure that pupils are safe.

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Safeguarding

Pupils learn how to stay safe online through the curriculum. They also learn about safe relationships, and how to stay safe around roads and water. 21 and 22 September 2022

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(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

 In some subjects, the curriculum is not coherently sequenced to build on pupils’ knowledge from year to year. Leaders have not thought carefully about the most important knowledge they want pupils to know and remember. As a result, pupils do not achieve as well as they could in these subjects. Leaders must ensure that they identify what they want pupils to know and sequence learning in all subjects so that pupils’ knowledge builds progressively year on year.  Not all staff have the subject-specific knowledge they need to deliver all areas of the curriculum. As a result, some subjects are not taught as well as they could be. Leaders should ensure that staff develop the expertise they need to teach all subjects equally well.  Some pupils miss too much time from school. As a result, they do not achieve as well as they could. Leaders should ensure that they do everything possible to increase the attendance of these pupils so they can reach their full potential.

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How can I feed back my views?

or to find out what other parents and carers think. We use information from Ofsted Parent View 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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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 and 22 September 2022

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School details

Inspection number 10241045 Type of school First

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School details

Appropriate authority The governing body

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School details

Date of previous inspection 27 November 2019, under section 8 of the Education Act 2005

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Information about this school

 The school has recently joined the South Staffordshire Partnership.  Leaders do not use alternative provision.

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Information about this inspection

The inspectors carried out this graded inspection under section 5 of the Education Act 2005.

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Information about this inspection

 This was the first routine inspection the school had received since the COVID-19 pandemic began. The lead inspector discussed the impact of the pandemic with school leaders and has taken that into account in her evaluation of the school.  The inspectors reviewed documents on the school’s website, as well as published information about the school’s performance.  The inspectors held meetings with the headteacher, the assistant headteachers, the special educational needs coordinator, subject leaders, governors, including the chair of the governing body, representatives from the partnership, including 21 and 22 September 2022

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the executive headteacher, and also spoke to a representative of the local authority.  The inspectors carried out deep dives in these subjects: early reading, mathematics, computing and history. For each deep dive, inspectors met with subject leaders, spoke to teachers, visited lessons, spoke to some pupils about their learning and looked at samples of pupils’ work.  The lead inspector met with the headteacher, who is the designated safeguarding leader. Pupils’ case files were reviewed. The single central record of the checks on staff’s suitability to work with children was scrutinised.  The inspectors met with staff to discuss their workload and the support they receive to carry out their roles.  The inspectors spoke to pupils about how safe they feel in school and how they learn to keep themselves safe.  The lead inspector considered the responses to Ofsted Parent View, Ofsted’s online questionnaire, and the staff questionnaire.

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 There were no responses to the pupil survey.

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Inspection team

Helen Forrest, lead inspector His Majesty’s Inspector

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Inspection team

Melanie Callaghan-Lewis Ofsted Inspector 21 and 22 September 2022

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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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