Peterborough primary school where children ‘experience high levels of success’ receives ‘Good’ Ofsted report

A Peterborough primary school with a “close-knit school community”, where children “experience high levels of success”, has received a ‘Good’ Ofsted report.

In Ofsted’s report, published on February 21 this year, St Botolph’s Church of England Primary School, in Oundle Road, was rated ‘Good’ across the board.

It included the quality of education it delivers, the behaviour, attitudes and development of its pupils, and the leadership and management displayed by staff.

An Ofsted inspection team of Al Mistrano, Fiona Webb and Sally Garrett concluded in their report that the "strength of the school community is plain to see” when pupils come together to celebrate each other’s achievements in assemblies.

The report detailed how “pupils, parents and staff” have said behaviour at the school has “markedly improved”, and how school and trust leaders “work well together to ensure that the school continues to improve”.

It comes as leaders have “made clear their expectations for pupils’ behaviour and how staff should manage it” – with children going “out of their way to show kindness”.

The education watchdog said that during its inspection lessons at the school were “typically calm, focused on learning, and free from any disruption”.

St Botolph’s Church of England Primary School has constructed a new curriculum and “trained staff to teach it effectively in most subjects” – with them “quickly identifying when pupils misunderstand or have forgotten what has been taught.”

However, for the school to improve Ofsted said it must address the fact that in a “small number of subjects delivery of the intended knowledge is not as strong as it is in others”.

In some cases, this is because “leaders have not finished training staff” – resulting in some members of staff “not having the subject knowledge they need”.

This means some staff are unable to “plan learning activities that provide the right amount of time and emphasis to embed key knowledge” – and children “do not learn the intended content as well as they could”.

Despite this, St Botolph’s is a ‘Good’ school overall, where “pupils feel safe” in the knowledge that “staff are willing and able to help should they need to”.

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