Barnes Junior School

What Ofsted said

From the inspection on 14 June 2023

Pupils enjoy coming to this welcoming school. Many pupils say that staff help them to focus and to learn a lot. Staff provide a caring learning environment where pupils flourish. This includes pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). Staff are present at the school gates at the beginning and end of the school day. This is just one way by which staff get to know pupils and their families well. Pupils say that there is always a trusted member of staff to talk to. This helps pupils to feel safe. Staff have high expectations of pupils. This includes their behaviour. Most pupils' attitudes to learning are positive. They appreciate that staff help them to achieve well. Pupils enjoy the range of activities on offer at playtime. Activities include cricket, football and netball. Pupils behave well. They move around school showing respect for one another. Reports of bullying are rare because pupils appreciate the community values of 'ready, respectful, safe and kind'. Leaders deal effectively with all incidents of bullying. Pupils enjoy the clubs available such as karate, art, football and dance. The wide range of clubs and experiences help to nurture pupils' talents and interests. For instance, pupils' musical talents are developed through acoustic guitar tuition.

What the school should improve

• In a few foundation subjects, the precise knowledge and skills that pupils need to learn as they move through the school are not clear enough. This means that pupils do not build on their prior knowledge as well as they do in other subjects. Leaders should continue to develop the curriculum and support teachers to understand what they need to teach to help all pupils to develop subject knowledge well.
• Some of the methods for listening to pupils read do not help pupils to practise decoding independently. This means that some pupils are not achieving reading fluency as quickly as they could. Leaders need to continue to develop staff as early reading experts.
• Younger pupils do not have enough opportunities to develop their problem-solving and reasoning skills in a range of contexts. This means that their understanding of mathematics is not as well developed as it could be. Leaders need to ensure that they implement this aspect of the mathematics curriculum in all year groups so that all pupils deepen their knowledge and skills.

Read the full Ofsted report (opens in a new tab)