Broad Oak Community Primary School

What Ofsted said

From the inspection on 1 October 2024

Pupils are happy at this warm and welcoming school. The 'Broad Oak Family' values, such as friendship and having an 'I can do it' attitude, underpin the way that pupils approach learning. Pupils value the strong relationships that they have with adults at the school. The school has high expectations of what pupils can and should achieve. Pupils, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) and those who are disadvantaged, live up to these expectations. Pupils, including those with SEND, immerse themselves in lessons. This is reflected in the work that they produce and how confident they are to talk about what they have learned. Pupils respect each other. They are polite and well-mannered. From the Nursery onwards, their positive attitudes mean that there are rarely any disruptions to their learning. Pupils trust staff to deal with any incidents of misbehaviour quickly. Pupils benefit from a wide range of trips and clubs that the school carefully plan to enhance the curriculum and develop pupils' talents and interests. For example, pupils in the early years attend sewing club. Older pupils spoke excitedly about cooking, choir and art clubs as well as football tournaments and visits to the zoo.

What the school should improve

• The school's newly introduced writing curriculum has not had time to fully embed. This means that some pupils do not write competently and as a result are not as well prepared for the next stage of their education as they could be. The school should ensure that staff are fully trained to enable pupils to compose and structure their writing successfully.
• The school's expectations for pupils' presentation and handwriting across all subjects are not high enough. Some pupils have not mastered legible and accurate letter formation by the time they leave year 2, which hinders their writing fluency, communication and presentation as they move through the key stage 2 curriculum. The school should raise its expectations around children's handwriting skills from the early years upwards.

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