Farley Hill Primary School

Inspection of a school judged good for overall effectiveness before September 2024: Farley Hill Primary School Baston Road, Arborfield Green RG2 9YW

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Outcome

Farley Hill Primary School has taken effective action to maintain the standards identified at the previous inspection.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils are happy and safe at Farley Hill. They love coming to school and appreciate that it is a great place to learn as a team. They know and live out the school’s motto of ‘Together Everyone Achieves More’. The school has high ambition for pupils. Pupils enjoy a broad and interesting curriculum, which helps them to develop successfully. They are proud of their work.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils of all ages enjoy lessons, behave well and try their best. They respond well to teachers’ instructions. Playtimes are joyful. Pupils of all ages play well together. They clamber on the pirate ship and relish playing games together. This helps to create a harmonious school community.

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What is it like to attend this school?

The school offers a wide range of enrichment opportunities. Pupils enjoy clubs such as choir, yoga and cooking. These experiences help to build their skills and confidence beyond the classroom very effectively. Pupils make a positive contribution to the life of the school. They learn how to make a difference in the wider community through raising money for charities that are important to them. Pupils are well prepared academically, socially and emotionally for secondary school.

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

The school has developed a well-considered curriculum across all subjects. The knowledge and skills that pupils need to know have been carefully sequenced from the early years to the end of Year 6. This helps pupils to develop an increasingly secure body of knowledge, skills and important vocabulary. 3 and 4 June 2025

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The school prioritises reading. Well-trained and skilled staff deliver the chosen phonics programme with clarity. Staff make careful checks on which sounds pupils know. The school ensures that books are closely matched to the phonics sounds pupils are learning. Pupils who need extra help them to gain essential knowledge and skills are given it quickly and effectively. Most pupils develop well into confident, fluent readers.

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Staff across the school typically have strong subject and teaching skills. They usually design lessons that are well structured and challenge pupils to learn and remember more. This supports pupils to achieve well. Teachers ensure that pupils frequently revisit and embed prior learning. Throughout lessons, teachers check that pupils understand the task. Teachers provide pupils with clear feedback to help embed learning. However, in some areas, teachers’ subject knowledge and choice of learning tasks do not allow pupils to be challenged as effectively as they could. This means that, occasionally, pupils’ learning of new knowledge and skills could be even stronger.

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Pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities are identified quickly and accurately. Appropriate support is given to these pupils. This means that they are involved fully in school life. Where some pupils have highly complex needs, school leaders have taken decisive action to ensure these pupils are well supported and achieve well.

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Pupils’ behaviour is calm and orderly. Pupils are polite to adults and each other. They are keen to contribute to lessons and concentrate well. The school has taken effective action to ensure pupils who struggle to behave well are given the support they need. After considerable training, staff are now more confident and adept at supporting pupils who struggle to manage their own behaviour.

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Attendance has been lower than the school has wanted. Recent enhancements to the way that attendance is tracked and how the school supports parents and carers have resulted in improved attendance. This is at an early stage. The school is developing its own internal systems and is working closely with external agencies to embed these practices.

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Pupils benefit well from the personal development provision of the school. They enjoy participating in the varied range of clubs and trips on offer. Pupils from the Nursery Year onwards celebrate different religious and national events. Pupils have an excellent understanding of difference in all its forms. They are taught about the protected characteristics and are well prepared for life in modern Britain.

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The school is supported by knowledgeable and passionate governors, who are determined, along with leaders, to continue to improve the school in the best interests of children. They have successfully ensured that the challenges faced since the last inspection have been managed very well indeed. These have included the pandemic, a change of school site with increasing pupil numbers and a newly appointed headteacher. The vast majority of parents appreciate the efforts all leaders have made. They recognise it has ensured continued strong provision for their children in a time of change. 3 and 4 June 2025

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Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

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(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

 Occasionally, the teaching and activities set do not challenge pupils effectively. This means that, in some subjects, pupils could achieve more. The school should ensure that teachers have the expertise to explain new learning precisely and set appropriately challenging tasks so that all pupils learn as well as they should.

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Background

Until September 2024, on a graded (section 5) inspection we gave schools an overall effectiveness grade, in addition to the key and provision judgements. Overall effectiveness grades given before September 2024 will continue to be visible on school inspection reports and on Ofsted's website. From September 2024 graded inspections will not include an overall effectiveness grade. This school was, before September 2024, judged to be good for its overall effectiveness.

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Background

We have now inspected the school to determine whether it has taken effective action to maintain the standards identified at that previous inspection. This is called an ungraded inspection, and it is carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. We do not give graded judgements on an ungraded inspection. However, if we find evidence that a school's work has improved significantly or that it may not be as strong as it was at the last inspection, then the next inspection will be a graded inspection. A graded inspection is carried out under section 5 of the Act. Usually this is within one to two years of the date of the ungraded inspection. If we have serious concerns about safeguarding, behaviour or the quality of education, we will deem the ungraded inspection a graded inspection immediately.

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Background

This is the second ungraded inspection since we judged the school to be good for overall effectiveness in May 2016.

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How can I feed back my views?

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. 3 and 4 June 2025

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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' is used to mean pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND); pupils who meet the definition of children in need of help and protection ; pupils receiving statutory local authority support from a social worker; and pupils who otherwise meet the criteria used for deciding the school's pupil premium funding (this includes pupils claiming free school meals at any point in the last six years, looked after children (children in local authority care) and/or children who left care through adoption or another formal route). 3 and 4 June 2025

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School details

Appropriate authority The governing body

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School details

Dates of previous inspection 12 and 13 November 2019, under section 8 of the Education Act 2005

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Information about this school

 The headteacher was appointed in April 2022.  The school moved to its current site in September 2021. It has two classes in each year group up to Year 2 and one class in each year group from Years 3 to 6. It is expected that the number of pupils in key stage 2 will increase by one class each year until September 2028.  The school runs its own wraparound care both before and after school.  The school currently does not use any alternative provision.

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Information about this inspection

 Inspections are a point-in-time evaluation about the quality of a school's education provision.  This was the first routine inspection the school has received since the COVID-19 pandemic began. The inspector discussed the impact of the pandemic with the school and have taken that into account in their evaluation of the school. 3 and 4 June 2025

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 The inspector visited a sample of lessons, spoke with some pupils about their learning and looked at samples of pupils’ work.  The inspector met with the headteacher and other leaders within the school. The inspector also met with members of the governing body, including the chair, and an educational representative from the local authority.  To evaluate the effectiveness of safeguarding, the inspector: reviewed the single central record; took account of the views of leaders, staff and pupils; and considered the extent to which the school has created an open and positive culture around safeguarding that puts pupils’ interests first.  The inspector reviewed a range of the school’s documentation including the school’s self-evaluation document, minutes of governing body meetings, and behaviour incident logs.  The inspector considered the views of parents shared through Ofsted’s online survey, Ofsted Parent View, including any free-text comments. The inspector also spoke with

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some parents at the start of the school day.  The inspector considered the views of staff through interviews and discussions conducted throughout the inspection The inspector also considered the responses to Ofsted’s survey for staff.  The inspector gathered pupils’ views throughout the inspection, including through classroom visits, group discussions and informal conversations at social times.

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Inspection team

Chris Parker, lead inspector His Majesty's Inspector 3 and 4 June 2025

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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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