St Andrew's Church of England Primary School

What Ofsted said

From the inspection on 13 May 2025

This school is a happy and nurturing place to learn. Pupils have warm and positive relationships with staff. 'The Cove' gives pupils a supportive space for them to have their emotional needs met. This helps pupils to have a positive view of school life. Following the previous inspection, the school experienced a period of turbulence which caused the quality of education to decline. As a result, pupils did not learn as well as they should. New leadership has not only steadied the ship but has made many positive changes. It has started to raise expectations of what pupils can achieve. However, some of these changes have not had long enough to take root and pupils' learning across some subjects is uneven as a result. The school has a calm and purposeful atmosphere. Pupils follow the day-to-day routines well. They appreciate the school's efforts to reward positive behaviour. This motivates pupils to behave well. In lessons, they work hard and co-operate with one another. Any incidents of bullying are dealt with swiftly. The school has recently increased its participation in sports tournaments. This instils pupils with a sense of pride in their school. It also helps them to understand the importance of teamwork. Pupils also experience a range of trips to help them deepen their knowledge of the curriculum.

What the school should improve

• The quality of how staff implement the curriculum is variable. On some occasions, staff do not use the most appropriate teaching strategies or resources to explain new ideas clearly. When this happens, pupils find it hard to learn new concepts. The trust should ensure that staff have the pedagogical understanding to introduce and explain new concepts clearly using appropriate resources to help pupils learn new ideas well.
• On some occasions, the school does not provide learning tasks that consider well enough what pupils can already do. As a result, some pupils do not progress through the curriculum well. The trust should ensure that staff provide learning tasks that are well matched to what pupils can already do so that they build knowledge securely.
• In the wider subjects, pupils have gaps in their knowledge due to historical weaknesses in the curriculum. As a result, pupils have not developed a deep, long-term knowledge and struggle to make links between areas of learning in these subjects. The trust should ensure that it continues to embed the wider subjects, check how well pupils are learning them and address gaps in knowledge accordingly.

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