Yaxley Infant School

Inspection of Yaxley Infant School Main Street, Yaxley, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire PE7 3LU

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Overall effectiveness Good

The quality of education Good Behaviour and attitudes Good Personal development Good Leadership and management Good Early years provision Good Previous inspection grade Good 2 and 3 November 2022

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils at Yaxley Infant School are happy. They enjoy learning about the world around them. Staff encourage pupils to be independent, curious learners. This prepares pupils well for the next stage of their education.

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What is it like to attend this school?

From the moment pupils start at the school, they are taught to be respectful and listen to others. As a result, pupils’ kind and caring behaviours follow them through the school, creating, in the words of several parents, ‘a family feel’.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Through staff’s calm and positive relationships, pupils’ behaviour is consistently good. Pupils experience a range of innovative support to keep them focused, such as daily massage sessions.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils feel safe and bullying rarely ever happens. Pupils have strong, trusting relationships with staff. Support is available if pupils find school life tricky, for example attending the ‘happy sad club’. Consequently, pupils are confident to talk to adults in school if they have any worries.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Most pupils attend at least one of the clubs on offer. These include gymnastics, dance and football. The clubs enhance the curriculum to support the wider development of pupils. Other opportunities, such as being on the school council and raising money for charity, enable pupils to understand how their actions affect others.

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better?

Leaders have worked with staff to design a curriculum that is ambitious. The curriculum is planned to ensure pupils make links with what they already know. Leaders provide staff with effective support and training. Therefore, staff are confident in their delivery of the curriculum. Most of the curriculum is taught by using first-hand experiences. Pupils have opportunities during each lesson to recap and then share their new learning with a partner or teacher. Pupils are able to remember key words and concepts due to staff’s skilful use of questioning and clear explanations.

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better?

Most pupils learn to read well. Pupils are enthusiastic about their reading. Staff have strong subject knowledge and follow the chosen phonics programme well. Pupils read books that are well matched to the sounds and words they know. Pupils who are at an early stage of reading are correctly identified and assessed. Most are receiving appropriate catch-up sessions that are having an impact. There are, however, a small number of pupils who are not having enough opportunities to practise and remember the sounds they need to learn. This is affecting the fluency and confidence of these pupils.

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better?

Children in the early years get off to a strong start. Skilled adults model behaviours and language to set the children up to be confident learners. All areas of the 2 and 3 November 2022

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classroom encourage children to rehearse throughout the day what they have been learning. Children are taught how to regulate and express their feelings. Common, shared language of ‘making good choices’ supports children to understand right from wrong.

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The general needs of pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) are identified. These pupils are supported to access the same ambitious curriculum alongside their peers. Most pupils are achieving well. The majority of staff are experienced and well trained. However, some pupils with SEND are not having their more specific needs correctly identified and do not have precise enough targets. This leads to these pupils making less progress in their reading and writing. The monitoring of pupils with SEND has not picked up these few inconsistencies. Consequently, these pupils are not making the progress they could.

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Pupils behave well. The school characters of ‘Tommy Tortoise’ and ‘Ritzy Rat’ are central to pupils’ understanding of what good behaviour looks like. Staff are consistent in their use of rewards and ‘warnings’. Older pupils in the school take care of the children in the Reception Year. Pupils take their responsibilities seriously and show a maturity beyond their age.

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Leaders ensure all pupils are offered the same opportunities in the wider curriculum. These range from sports clubs to trips to the theatre and visits to the seaside and ancient castles. Pupils remember these experiences and talk excitedly about them.

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The governing body carries out its statutory responsibilities well. Governors use information from their own checking to support them to ensure leaders’ work is making a difference. Governors take a key role in keeping an eye on well-being and the workload of staff. Staff are overwhelmingly positive about the support they receive, and all enjoy working at the school.

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Parents spoken to, and those who responded to the Ofsted questionnaire, were, without exception, complimentary about the school. Many commented that the school is a ‘special place’.

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Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

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Safeguarding

Leaders and staff know their families well. The safety and well-being of pupils is at the centre of their work. Staff are skilled at noticing any signs that may indicate a pupil is at risk of harm. All concerns, however small, are recorded and followed up promptly. Where further support is needed, leaders are persistent at achieving this support for their families.

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Safeguarding

Pupils know how to keep themselves safe online and are aware of the dangers. The personal, social and health education (PSHE) curriculum teaches pupils to understand information about their own personal safety and relationships. 2 and 3 November 2022

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All necessary checks are carried out on adults working with pupils in school. Ongoing training keeps staff informed of any changes in safeguarding policies.

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(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

 A small number of pupils are not having enough regular opportunities to practise the sounds and words they need to learn to improve the fluency of their reading. This means that these pupils are not catching up quickly enough. Leaders must ensure this becomes a focus of their monitoring. They need to make sure that staff have a clearer understanding of the expectations and actions required to ensure those readers who struggle to read are supported effectively to become fluent and confident readers.  The needs of some pupils with SEND are not always correctly identified. Therefore, targets set are not specific enough to enable these pupils to achieve as well as they should. Leaders must ensure the current targets are more precise and closely linked to pupils’ needs. Leaders also need to ensure staff have the right training to be able to review and monitor this support to ensure pupils achieve well from their starting points.

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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. 2 and 3 November 2022

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School details

Appropriate authority The governing body

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School details

Date of previous inspection 15 March 2017, under section 8 of the Education Act 2005

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Information about this school

 There have been significant changes to the leadership structure at Yaxley Infant School since September 2022.  The school has a falling roll due to pupil numbers in the local area.  Leaders do not use any alternative providers.

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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 received since the COVID-19 pandemic began. Inspectors discussed the impact of the pandemic with leaders and have taken that into account in their evaluation of the school.  Inspectors held meetings with the headteacher, other leaders, staff, pupils, a representative from the local authority, the chair of governors and three other members of the governing board. 2 and 3 November 2022

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 Inspectors carried out deep dives in these subjects: early reading, mathematics, science and computing. For each deep dive, inspectors met with subject leaders, looked at curriculum plans, visited a sample of lessons, spoke to teachers, spoke to some pupils about their learning and looked at samples of pupils’ work. In early reading, this took the form of listening to pupils read to a familiar adult.  Inspectors also looked at curriculum plans and spoke to the PSHE leader.  As part of the evaluation of the school’s safeguarding processes, inspectors reviewed the single central record, met with the designated safeguarding lead, reviewed safeguarding files, looked at behaviour and attendance records and spoke to pupils and staff.  Inspectors reviewed a range of school documentation, including the school self- evaluation form and improvement plan, school policies and minutes from governing body meetings.

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 Inspectors reviewed the 21 responses that were submitted by parents to Ofsted’s online parent questionnaire, Ofsted Parent View, and considered 19 free-text responses from parents. Inspectors also considered 20 responses to the Ofsted staff questionnaire. There were no responses to the pupil survey.

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Inspection team

Isabel Davis, lead inspector His Majesty’s Inspector

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Inspection team

Linda Allison Ofsted Inspector 2 and 3 November 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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