Oaklands Primary Academy

What Ofsted said

From the inspection on 20 February 2024

Pupils enjoy their time at this school where staff are approachable and kind. Pupils' social and emotional development is supported from the early years onwards. Pupils are confident in this safe and nurturing school. Children settle well when they join the school. The school promotes its values of the 'five Rs' with pupils, using these to foster positive working relationships. Pupils are polite and friendly. They are keen to learn, and they typically respond well to teachers' requests. However, when pupils have not been taught all they need to know to complete work set by their teachers, they can become distracted and disturb the learning of others. The school has not set out clearly how all staff should respond in such instances. Trust leaders, governors and the school are keen to strengthen the school's work to benefit all of its pupils. In recent time, the school has taken steps to redesign its curriculum. However, the school has not identified specifically all that pupils need to know and remember in each subject and the order in which it should be taught. As a consequence, the curriculum does not support pupils to achieve as well as they should, including in the early years and those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). This is reflected in national test results, the work pupils produce and in what pupils know and can do across the curriculum.

What the school should improve

• In a number of subjects, the school's curriculum sequencing does not set out clearly the key knowledge pupils need to know and understand at each stage, in order to achieve its ambitious end points, including in the early years. Without this guidance, teaching focuses on activities, rather than the important concepts pupils need to remember. Teaching does not check routinely that pupils have understood key concepts. As a result, pupils have gaps in their knowledge and struggle to recall key ideas when they move on to new learning. Leaders must ensure that the curriculum sets out a clear, logical sequence, in order to build knowledge cumulatively and securely over time and to ensure that teaching focuses on these key aims.
• Teaching in phonics does not offer pupils regular practice in hearing and saying the target sounds they are learning. Pupils do not have routine opportunities to read books with the key sounds that they are learning in them. As a result, pupils do not recall some sounds readily, and this prevents them from reading with fluency. Leaders must ensure that pupils practice phonic sounds regularly and read books that are matched to the sounds they are learning.
• The school's personal development curriculum does not detail what leaders intend all pupils to be taught. Leaders do not check carefully that pupils have been taught the things that they intend. As a result, pupils do not routinely receive a curriculum that matches leaders' intentions. Leaders must provide clear guidance about what all pupils should be taught and check that teaching routinely delivers the content they intend.
• The school does not make clear what common approaches it expects all staff to use to manage pupils' behaviour and attitudes consistently and how leaders will support staff in doing so. As a result, the behaviour of pupils does not routinely reflect the school's high expectations, and sometimes learning is interrupted in lessons and occasionally poor behaviour persists. Leaders must ensure that all staff follow clear behaviour systems so that behaviour is dealt with effectively and consistently and is good across the school.

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