The Holy Brook School

110193 Unique Reference Number Reading LEA LEA 278377 Inspection number 14 March 2006 to 14 March 2006 Inspection dates Margaret Goodchild AI Reporting inspector

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This inspection was carried out under section 5 of the Education Act 2005.

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145 Ashampstead Road School address Special Type of school Southcote Community special School category Reading RG30 3LJ 7 to 11 Age range of pupils 01189015489 Telephone number Mixed Gender of pupils 01189015488 Fax number 22 Number on roll Ms Jenny Pickett Chair of governors The governing body Appropriate authority Mr Lee Smith Headteacher 14 June 2004 Date of previous inspection

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Inspection number Inspection dates Age group 278377 14 March 2006 - 7 to 11 14 March 2006 Website: www.ofsted.gov.uk

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This document may be reproduced in whole or in part for non-commercial educational purposes, provided that the information quoted is reproduced without adaptation and the source and date of publication are stated.

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Further copies of this report are obtainable from the school. Under the Education Act 2005, the school must provide a copy of this report free of charge to certain categories of people. A charge not exceeding the full cost of reproduction may be made for any other copies supplied.

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Introduction

The inspection was carried out by one Additional Inspector.

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Description of the school

This is a small special school for pupils in Years 3 to 6 who have a statement of special educational needs for their emotional, behavioural and social difficulties. Nearly all the pupils are boys. Most pupils are of white British heritage and no pupils are learning English as an additional language. Half the pupils are eligible for free school meals, and many pupils enter the school with attainment that is well below average. At the time of the last inspection, the school was found to have serious weaknesses in the curriculum and accommodation, in a number of subjects and in governance. The school experienced a number of changes of staff, together with a significant amount of staff absence and extensive building work during the last academic year.

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Key for inspection grades

Outstanding Grade 1 Good Grade 2 Satisfactory Grade 3 Inadequate Grade 4 1 Inspection Report: The Holy Brook School, 14 March 2006 to 14 March 2006

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Grade: 3

The headteacher and other staff believe that this is a satisfactory school and inspection findings agree with their judgement. The school has made satisfactory improvement since the last inspection and has the capacity to continue to improve. The headteacher has a clear awareness of how to move the school forward and is systematically working to raise pupils' achievement, which is currently satisfactory. Actions taken to raise achievement in English and mathematics have begun to have a positive effect. The school has recently improved the way that it records and checks the progress of individual pupils, but there is more work to be done on this. More regular monitoring of teaching is also needed, in order to ensure that all pupils are learning as well as they can. Governors provide satisfactory support to the school. A number of them have joined the governing body very recently and the school is working with them to

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Grade: 3

develop their role. The school cares well for its pupils and makes sure that they are supported effectively. As a result, pupils make good progress in their personal development, and the school has had outstanding success in improving the rate of attendance. Those parents who expressed an opinion about the school are pleased with the quality of education. The school provides satisfactory value for money.

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What the school should do to improve further

* Continue to raise achievement, especially in English and mathematics. * Ensure that the progress of individual pupils is recorded and tracked in all subjects. * Strengthen systems for monitoring teaching and learning. * Develop the role of the governing body and provide appropriate training for newly appointed governors.

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Grade: 3

The inspection supports the school's view that pupils' achievement is satisfactory. Standards are well below average overall, reflecting the low standards of many pupils when they join the school and gaps in pupils' previous learning as a result of their emotional and behavioural difficulties. Progress towards pupils' individual education plan targets is satisfactory. In the 2005 National Curriculum tests that pupils take in Year 6, pupils did significantly better in science than in English and mathematics. Pupils are now making satisfactory progress in English, mathematics and science as they move through the school. The recent improvement in resources for information and communication technology (ICT) means that computers are now being used to support pupils' learning in English and mathematics: the school has clear plans for extending the use of ICT further. The school's own monitoring has identified that girls make less progress than boys. Staff

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Grade: 3

2 Inspection Report: The Holy Brook School, 14 March 2006 to 14 March 2006 have already begun to provide additional personal support and rewards tailored to girls' interests in an attempt to remedy this.

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Grade: 2

Pupils make good progress in their personal development and well-being. They have good relationships with the staff, mostly co-operate with what is expected of them and clearly enjoy many of the activities provided. There has been exceptionally good improvement in the rate of attendance: it rose from well below average in 2004 to almost average in 2005. This outstanding outcome is the result of a really concerted effort to get all pupils attending as regularly as possible. The school has also been successful in reducing the number of exclusions. Behaviour is satisfactory overall, reflecting good improvement during pupils' time at the school. Pupils' spiritual and cultural development is satisfactory; their moral and social development is good. The school has made some improvement in spiritual development since the last inspection and is working to improve it further. It is also improving the promotion of pupils'

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Grade: 2

cultural development further: pupils have clearly enjoyed the activities in celebration of the Chinese New Year. The school gained the Healthy Schools bronze award in 2003 and is working towards the silver award. Pupils have good opportunities to learn about healthy living and about how to stay safe. They are increasingly involved in decisions that affect them and the school is exploring the best way of collecting their views. Pupils take responsibility by helping around the school and contribute to fundraising for local, national and international charities. Emphasis on rewards encourages pupils to behave responsibly and to make positive choices. They make satisfactory progress in acquiring basic skills, which should stand them in reasonably good stead for the future.

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Grade: 3

Teaching is satisfactory with some good features. Where teaching is good, pupils are made aware of what is expected of them and tasks are tightly structured to ensure that they remain focused for most of the time. In these lessons, some pupils show evident pride in their achievement and most pupils apply themselves well. When teaching is satisfactory, staff provide effective support to pupils in the completion of their work, prompting and guiding them, but expectations for work and behaviour are not always as high as they should be. The topics that are to be covered in the long and medium-term are carefully planned and this provides a good framework for teachers when preparing lessons. However, tasks are not always matched as well as they should be to different needs. Teachers sometimes expect pupils, for instance, to write a different number of sentences if they are less or more able than one another, rather

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Grade: 3

than providing some activities that are more challenging than others. Support assistants 3 Inspection Report: The Holy Brook School, 14 March 2006 to 14 March 2006 are used well and make a good contribution to pupils' learning. Teachers' marking encourages pupils and also informs them about what they could do to improve. Assessment is satisfactory and continuing to develop in English and mathematics. Limited assessment takes place in other subjects, with no coherent records of the progress of individual pupils in these subjects. The inclusion of specific and detailed targets for English and mathematics within pupils' individual education plans, alongside targets for improving their behaviour, is a positive development. The school has begun to analyse how well pupils are doing in meeting their targets to improve its understanding of their overall progress. It has more work to do to arrive at a clear

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Grade: 3

picture of how much progress individual pupils are making overall. Parents are kept well informed about how their children are doing. Some parents have requested that regular homework should be set but providing this on a regular basis remains a development priority. It is important that homework is provided without further delay as a way of raising pupils' achievement and promoting independent learning.

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Grade: 3

The school provides a satisfactory curriculum that is generally matched to pupils' needs. An increase in the length of the school day means that subjects are now covered in sufficient depth, including those subjects that did not receive enough attention at the time of the last inspection. The school provides pupils with satisfactory opportunities to develop skills in English and mathematics, and increasingly so ICT. Good attention is given to promoting an awareness of health and safety. Pupils are given opportunities to contribute to the community and the school makes good use of the locality, for instance, involving pupils in a survey of public opinion within a local history project. The school provides satisfactory enrichment opportunities through visiting professionals - such as an artist-in-residence and providers of specialist football training, drama coaching as part of multi-cultural week, drug awareness sessions - and

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Grade: 3

some educational visits. It provides a number of lunchtime clubs, rather than after-school clubs because of the distance that pupils travel and their difficulty in staying on after school.

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Grade: 2

The school cares well for its pupils and makes sure that they feel safe and supported. Staff make themselves readily available to support pupils who are anxious or distressed. Pupils have detailed behaviour support plans and individual education plans. Effective systems are in place for dealing with difficult behaviour so that its impact on learning is kept to a minimum and pupils are made aware of their behaviour targets. The school recognises that pupils and parents need to be made more aware of pupils' academic targets as a way of raising achievement. Pupils receive good feedback on how to improve their work in English and mathematics, but they are not so well informed by assessment in other subjects. The school has introduced a system for identifying pupils' 4 Inspection Report: The Holy Brook School, 14 March 2006 to 14 March 2006 attainment when they join the school and uses the findings of this to place pupils in

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Grade: 2

the class where their needs can best be met. Pupils are supported well in class and a high level of supervision is provided at break times to ensure that pupils are kept safe and have an adult to whom they can turn. The school works closely with other agencies to ensure that pupils are protected and their needs identified. A speech and language therapist works on the school site, providing support for those pupils who have communication difficulties.

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Grade: 3

The school is led and managed satisfactorily. Improvement since the last inspection has been satisfactory, slowed to some extent by changes of staff, and during the last academic year by an unusual level of staff absence and extensive building work. All staff are now involved in school self-evaluation and the school is exploring ways to include the views of pupils and parents increasingly in evaluating overall effectiveness. A comprehensive development plan details what actions are to be taken to bring about further improvement: this shows that the headteacher is clear about the way forward and is focusing appropriately on raising achievement. Teachers' planning is checked regularly but lessons are not observed often enough. As part of its staff restructuring, a deputy headteacher is to be appointed, in order to help future development move at a faster pace. Teachers responsible for co-ordinating English and mathematics have

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Grade: 3

worked very closely with local authority advisers in identifying how to bring about improvements in their subjects and as a result standards have begun to rise. Since the last inspection, the school has made good use of external support from the local authority and other schools to increase staff expertise in a number of areas and this has begun to have a positive impact on pupils' achievement. The school is well staffed and satisfactorily resourced to meet pupils' needs. Improvements in accommodation mean that it is now satisfactory. Satisfactory links with mainstream schools contribute to pupils' learning, with good links in physical education. A number of governors left towards the end of 2005 and the school was without a chair for a time. A new chair, experienced in governance, has been appointed recently and a number of new but inexperienced governors are now in place. The governing body receives regular information from the headteacher about the workings of the

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Grade: 3

school and has contributed to school self-evaluation. Governors have not yet begun to collect independent information from which to make judgements about the school's effectiveness and some governors are awaiting training. 5 Inspection Report: The Holy Brook School, 14 March 2006 to 14 March 2006 .

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set out in the guidance 'Complaints about school inspection', which is available from Ofsted’s

website: www.ofsted.gov.uk. 6 Inspection Report: The Holy Brook School, 14 March 2006 to 14 March 2006

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Overall

Key to judgements: grade 1 is outstanding, grade 2 good, grade 3 satisfactory, and grade 4 inadequate

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learners?

NA 3 How well does the school work in partnership with others to promote learners' well-being? NA NA The quality and standards in foundation stage NA 3 The effectiveness of the school's self-evaluation NA Yes The capacity to make any necessary improvements NA Yes Effective steps have been taken to promote improvement since the last inspection

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Achievement and standards

NA 3 How well do learners achieve? NA 4 The standards 1 reached by learners

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Achievement and standards

NA 3 How well learners make progress, taking account of any significant variations between groups of learners NA 3 How well learners with learning difficulties and disabilities make progress

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learners?

NA 3 The extent of learners' spiritual, moral, social and cultural development NA 3 The behaviour of learners NA 2 The attendance of learners NA 2 How well learners enjoy their education NA 2 The extent to which learners adopt safe practices NA 2 The extent to which learners adopt healthy lifestyles NA 2 The extent to which learners make a positive contribution to the community NA 3 How well learners develop workplace and other skills that will contribute to their future economic well-being

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needs and interests of learners?

NA 2 How well are learners cared for, guided and supported?

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needs and interests of learners?

Grade 1 - Exceptionally and consistently high; Grade 2 - Generally above average with none significantly below average; Grade 3 - Broadly average; Grade 4 - Exceptionally low.

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and supporting all learners?

NA 3 How effectively leaders and managers at all levels set clear direction leading to improvement and promote high quality of care and education NA 3 How effectively performance is monitored, evaluated and improved to meet challenging targets, through quality assurance and self-review NA 3 How well equality of opportunity is promoted and discrimination tackled so that all learners achieve as well as they can NA 3 How effectively and efficiently resources are deployed to achieve value for money NA 3 The extent to which governors and other supervisory boards discharge their responsibilities NA Yes The adequacy and suitability of staff to ensure that learners are protected

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The extent to which schools enable learners to be healthy

Yes Learners are encouraged and enabled to eat and drink healthily Yes Learners are encouraged and enabled to take regular exercise Yes Learners are discouraged from smoking and substance abuse Yes Learners are educated about sexual health

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The extent to which providers ensure that learners stay safe

Yes Procedures for safeguarding learners meet current government requirements Yes Risk assessment procedures and related staff training are in place Yes Action is taken to reduce anti-social behaviour, such as bullying and racism Yes Learners are taught about key risks and how to deal with them

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The extent to which learners make a positive contribution

Yes Learners are helped to develop stable, positive relationships Yes Learners, individually and collectively, participate in making decisions that affect them Yes Learners are encouraged to initiate, participate in and manage activities in school and the wider community

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The extent to which schools enable learners to achieve economic well-being

Yes There is provision to promote learners’ basic skills Yes Learners have opportunities to develop enterprise skills and work in teams NA Careers education and guidance is provided to all learners in key stage 3 and 4 and the sixth form NA Education for all learners aged 14–19 provides an understanding of employment and the economy

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Text from letter to pupils explaining the findings of the inspection

Pupils I enjoyed my visit to your school and would like to thank you for making me feel welcome. This letter is to tell you about some of the important things that I saw in your school. I was pleased to see that you are making good progress in your personal development and learning how to control your behaviour. I could see that the staff care about you and you get a lot of support in class and at break times. The school has done really well to make sure you all attend as regularly as you can. The teaching is satisfactory and sometimes good. In the lessons I looked at, it was good to see how some of you take a pride in what you've achieved - this is important. You are achieving satisfactorily: if you worked really hard, you could sometimes do better. The teaching also needs to be checked more often to make sure you are learning as much as you could. The headteacher knows what to do to improve the school and

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Text from letter to pupils explaining the findings of the inspection

has done a lot recently to make it better for you. Teachers are now checking your progress carefully, especially in English and mathematics, and need to do this in all your subjects. There are several new governors and some are waiting to be trained in the things that governors have to do so that they can work more closely with the school. Try to make the most of the rest of your time at The Holy Brook School. Yours faithfully M J Goodchild Lead Inspector

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