Beech Green Primary School

What Ofsted said

From the inspection on 16 July 2024

The school's values, 'believe, achieve and respect', encourage pupils to work hard and acknowledge the opinions of others. Pupils have opportunities to develop an understanding of living healthy lives, their community and differences between people. For example, the Beech Green Values Award was recently presented to Year 6 for their promotion of increased diversity in reading books. Pupils are polite and respectful. They feel safe and know they can talk to an adult if they have concerns. For example, they can visit the 'regulation station' at breaktime. Pupils move through the school calmly and orderly. Routines and expectations are high. Typically, lessons flow without disruption. Right from the early years, children know the school's expectations for behaviour. A wide range of clubs and activities are open to all. Pupils enjoy a range of educational trips and visits. They can often recall topics studied that are linked to trips. Since the last inspection, the school has revised its curriculum. The essential curriculum knowledge pupils should know and remember is now identified in most subjects. However, the quality of learning activities varies between subjects and year groups. Pupils are not able to secure curriculum knowledge sufficiently well in all subjects.

What the school should improve

• The school does not implement its new curriculum as intended. The important concepts in some subject curriculums are not sufficiently detailed or carefully sequenced. This means pupils do not learn the curriculum's essential concepts successfully. The school needs to ensure important curriculum concepts are well- sequenced and sufficiently detailed and that the curriculum is implemented effectively.
• Learning activities do not always provide pupils with the opportunities to secure and deepen their subject knowledge. When this occurs, pupils do not build on prior learning or make connections between concepts taught. The school needs to ensure learning activities enable pupils to apply their knowledge and skills to know more, do more and remember more over time.
• The school's expectations of what pupils can achieve are sometimes too low in Years 1 to 6. When this happens, pupils do not reach their potential and outcomes are poor. The school needs to raise its expectations of pupils, providing appropriate support and opportunities to study an ambitious curriculum that prepares pupils well for the next stage of their education.
• The school does not have an accurate view of the quality of education. It does not accurately analyse the information it gathers. Consequently, leaders, including governors, do not have an accurate overview of the school's strengths and weaknesses. The school needs to ensure information about the quality of education is used to drive school improvement consistently and sustainably.

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