St Margaret Mary Catholic Primary School, Carlisle

What Ofsted said

From the inspection on 8 October 2024

Pupils are happy and enjoy attending school. They told inspectors that it is like being part of one big family where everyone is welcome. Pupils typically behave well. This helps to create a calm and orderly learning environment. Most pupils follow the school's 'golden rules'. Relationships between staff and pupils are positive. Pupils are confident that staff are there to listen. Pupils believe that their school is a safe place. Pupils' personal development is fostered well. Many pupils take on board pupil leadership responsibilities such as reading buddies or being part of the group known as 'the planeteers'. Pupils make a difference in the school and local community through litter- picking events and donating to the local food bank appeal. One of the school council's most recent achievements is the design of a new school uniform, which pupils wear with pride. In contrast, the school's expectations for pupils' achievement are low. Its efforts to improve the curriculum have lacked sufficient urgency. Pupils' strong attainment in reading, writing and mathematics in the 2023 data is in stark contrast to the current picture of pupils' learning in the school. In different year groups and across different subjects, pupils are underachieving. This includes children in the early years, who are not well prepared for their next steps.

What the school should improve

• The curriculum in many subjects, as well as in the early years, is not well designed. It does not provide teachers with sufficient guidance for them to know what pupils should learn and when subject content should be taught. This hinders pupils, including those with SEND, from building a secure body of knowledge over time. The school must ensure that the curriculum sets out the important information that pupils will learn, ordered from the beginning of the early years to the end of Year 6, so that pupils can build their learning securely.
• In the absence of curriculum guidance, and without suitable support and training, teachers lack the expertise to deliver the curriculum. This means that the activities they select, alongside unclear explanations, do not help pupils to develop their knowledge or to understand key concepts. As a result, pupils do not learn the important knowledge that they should. The school must ensure that teachers are suitably equipped to build pupils' knowledge over time.
• Teachers do not use assessment strategies well. Consequently, they do not know what pupils know and understand. Misconceptions and gaps in pupils' learning remain unidentified and not corrected. The school should make sure that teachers have the support they need to utilise assessment strategies successfully so that they understand where pupils have gaps in their knowledge and adapt their teaching to remedy misconceptions.
• The school's early reading curriculum is not effective in making sure that children in the early years, and pupils in key stage 1, learn to read as soon as they should. Consequently, many pupils do not learn to read well enough. This makes it difficult for these pupils to access the rest of the curriculum. The school must ensure that staff are sufficiently trained to implement the phonics programme consistently well. Additionally, it must ensure that pupils who do not keep up with the pace of the programme receive swift and effective support to be able to access the curriculum.
• The school has not ensured that teachers have the expertise to meet the needs of pupils with SEND. Consequently, adaptations to teaching and resources are not matched to pupils' needs. The school must ensure that teachers have the knowledge and expertise to provide the right support for pupils with SEND so that they learn all that they should.
• Capacity to improve the school is weak. The efforts to bring about much-needed improvements have been slow and lack urgency. Consequently, pupils underachieve and do not receive the standard of education to which they are entitled. The trust and those responsible for governance must ensure that they secure the necessary leadership capacity in the school to bring about rapid and sustained improvement. HMCI strongly recommends that the school does not seek to appoint early career teachers. The position regarding the appointment of early career teachers will be considered again during any monitoring inspection we carry out.

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