Belfield Community School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils are proud ambassadors of their school. They embrace and celebrate the diversity within its community.

Some pupils join the school at different times in the year. Many of these pupils speak English as an additional language. There is always a warm welcome for everyone, no matter when they arrive.

Pupils are happy in school. They know that staff care for them deeply and expect them to succeed. Pupils who need extra support get it quickly.

This includes pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND), as well as those learning to speak English as an additional language. Pupils typically achieve well. They are suitably prepared for the dem...ands of secondary school.

Pupils are highly respectful of each other and of adults. They understand how staff expect them to behave and follow the school's rules well. For example, pupils walk safely and quietly in corridors.

This makes the school a calm and orderly place.

Pupils readily assume roles of responsibility. They wear their different-coloured sweatshirts to represent their roles as school councillors, eco ninjas and well-being ambassadors with pride.

Pupils who act as young interpreters relish their role in supporting pupils who are new to school to settle in quickly.

What does the school do well and what does it need to do better?

The governing body makes a strong contribution to the leadership of the school. It supports the school's unwavering determination that every pupil can succeed.

Irrespective of when they join, the school quickly builds positive relationships with pupils and their families. It identifies the additional needs of pupils with SEND swiftly. The school provides staff with rich information about pupils' needs.

It ensures that most pupils with SEND access the curriculum successfully alongside their peers. Pupils with more complex SEND have their individual needs met exceptionally well. This is a strength of the school.

Pupils with SEND thrive.

The school has strengthened the curriculum to ensure that the most important knowledge and vocabulary that pupils need to learn are set out clearly. Pupils build their academic knowledge as well as their understanding of the locality.

For example, they learn about local history and the legacy left by influential movements, including the Co-operative Group.

Teachers appreciate that leaders consider their workload and well-being when making any changes. They recognise how improvements to the curriculum have helped them to deepen their own subject knowledge.

Curriculum improvements are more recent in some subjects than in others. At times, teachers are unsure what should be checked to ensure that pupils know and remember key information at the end of a unit of work. Added to this, the school continues to refine its approaches to supporting pupils to embed their knowledge securely in the long term in these subjects.

While pupils have broad knowledge of topics learned, some do not demonstrate the same depth of understanding over time that they do of more recent learning.

Teachers receive appropriate guidance to support them to deliver the curriculum well. However, the school has not ensured that it checks this guidance is being followed closely enough in a small number of subjects.

On occasion, the curriculum is not delivered as effectively in these subjects as in others. Pupils' knowledge is sometimes uneven in these subjects as a result.

The school makes reading a priority.

Pupils study a wide range of books and poetry, including from other cultures. This encourages them to develop positive attitudes to reading. Children in the early years enjoy learning rhymes and songs.

They listen closely for different sounds. Teachers typically deliver the phonics programme well. Pupils' reading knowledge is stronger than the most recent Year 1 phonics screening check results suggest.

The school steps in quickly and provides effective support for pupils who find reading more challenging.

Kindness is at the heart of this school. Children in the early years develop warm, trusting relationships with staff.

Older pupils build on this positive start. They are caring and considerate to others.

The school keeps a close watch on attendance patterns.

It works in partnership with parents and carers to reduce absence levels. The proportion of pupils who miss large chunks of their education has declined in recent years.

The school has carefully considered its personal development offer.

Pupils benefit from an increasingly diverse range of experiences to enhance and deepen their learning. For example, through the 'Belfield Promise', pupils have opportunities to learn to cook, tie a tie and build sandcastles. Pupils are respectful of other faiths and cultures.

They know what is right and wrong, as well as what makes a healthy relationship. Pupils are well prepared for life beyond school.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

• In a small number of subjects, the school's current approaches to assessment do not enable teachers to check whether pupils have secured and, at times, deepened the intended knowledge. This sometimes hinders some pupils from demonstrating a rich body of subject knowledge. The school should ensure that teachers are fully equipped to check that pupils have embedded their knowledge securely.

At times, in some subjects, teachers do not focus on helping pupils to recall the most important knowledge that they have learned. As a result, some pupils are less confident in recalling learning over time in these subjects. The school should ensure that teachers design sufficient opportunities for pupils to recap, rehearse and recall previous learning so that they build a secure understanding across the curriculum.

• The school's systems to quality assure recently refined curriculums in a small number of subjects are not as effective as they could be. At times, these curriculums are inconsistently implemented, and pupils' learning is uneven as a result. The school should check that teachers deliver subject curriculums consistently well and provide appropriate support where this is not the case.