OFSTED school inspectors have praised Burnham-On-Sea Infant School as ‘outstanding’ in a brand new report released this week.
The school, which is based in Winchester Road and has almost 200 pupils, was visited by inspectors at the end of May who were clearly impressed by what they found.
In a glowing report, OFSTED’s Reporting Inspector, Margaret Dickinson, says: “This is a good school with some outstanding features. The school has a supportive and purposeful atmosphere and a strong sense of teamwork.”
“The youngest children get off to a very good start in the reception classes. They make very good progress and benefit from outstanding provision. Most reach the expected standards by the end of the year.”
“There have been times over the last two years when pupils in Year 1 have made satisfactory, rather than good, progress. However, this is no longer the case. Pupils now make good progress in Years 1 and 2 because of consistently good, and sometimes outstanding, teaching and a well-planned curriculum.”
The report goes on to focus on the staff themselves – and here again the school has come out very positively.
“Teachers are very skilful at matching work to pupils’ differing needs,” says Ms Dickinson. “Teaching assistants and volunteers are highly effective and play a key role in helping pupils to learn. This year, the school has been providing extra opportunities for more able pupils.”
“Good strategies are helping these pupils to move ahead more quickly in their writing and mathematics. Leadership and management are good. The headteacher provides exceptionally clear and energetic direction.”
The only weaker areas highlighted by the inspection team were evaluation of new initiatives and collating of some records.
“A relative weakness is that new initiatives are not evaluated soon enough to check that they are having an effect on pupils’ achievement.”
“Teachers assess pupils’ standards regularly and methodically record the information obtained. However, this is not collated in an easily accessible format to help the headteacher identify whether some pupils could be making even better progress over time.”
But the report concludes: “The school’s many strengths mean that it gives good value for money. Progress since the last inspection has been good and the school is in a good position to improve even further.”
