Rawtenstall Newchurch Church of England Primary School

What Ofsted said

From the inspection on 8 January 2025

Relationships between staff and pupils at this school are warm and nurturing. Pupils celebrate and respect each other's uniqueness. They appreciate the care and support that staff provide. Pupils understand the school's expectations of their behaviour. They enjoy school and behave positively in lessons and at social times. Overall, the school is ambitious for pupils to achieve well and to leave well prepared for the next stage of their education. It is taking swift and effective action to improve key weaknesses in pupils' learning. One of these steps includes redesigning the curriculum. However, most of the changes are new and are not fully embedded, including in the early years. As a result, pupils have gaps in their knowledge across a range of subjects. Published results in 2024 were lower than average in phonics, reading, writing and mathematics. Pupils enjoy taking on responsibilities, such as play leaders, reading buddies and school councillors. They are also eager to make a difference to the local community. For example, pupils talk passionately about the letters they wrote to their local member of parliament to discuss facilities that they felt were needed in the area. Pupils develop their interests and talents through attending a wide range of clubs, including gardening, jujitsu, sign language, computing and fencing.

What the school should improve

• In some areas of learning in the early years, the key information that children should know and the order that they should learn this is not clear. This makes it difficult for the school to ensure that the delivery of the curriculum helps children to build on their learning consistently and securely. The school should continue its work to develop the design and delivery of the early years curriculum so that children are well prepared for their learning in Year 1.
• The curriculums across many subjects are new and not fully embedded. Consequently, pupils have key gaps in their knowledge and are not fully prepared for their next stage of education. The school should continue to embed the curriculum securely to ensure that pupils develop a deep and rich body of knowledge in all subjects.
• Across many subjects, the school's systems for checking the impact of the new curriculum are in their infancy. This hinders how well the school is able to identify and address gaps in pupils' knowledge. The school should continue its work to develop strategies to check that previous gaps in pupils' knowledge are closing effectively and that pupils' learning builds securely over time.

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