20 August 2013
Dear Parent/Carer
Mearns Primary School and Nursery Class
East Renfrewshire Council
Recently, as you may know, my colleagues and I inspected your child's school. During
our visit, we talked to parents and children and worked closely with the headteacher
and staff. We wanted to find out how well children are learning and achieving and how
well the school supports children to do their best. The headteacher shared with us the
school's successes and priorities for improvement. We looked at some particular
aspects of the school's recent work, including improvements to the way children learn
in science, work on children’s rights and responsibilities and supporting children’s
health and wellbeing using nurturing approaches. As a result, we were able to find out
how good the school is at improving children's education.
How well do children learn and achieve?
The quality of children’s learning and achievement is outstanding. In the nursery,
children are highly motivated. They settle quickly at the beginning of each session and
participate enthusiastically in their chosen activities. Children take responsibility for
their learning through talking with staff and contributing to ‘mindmaps’. They show
high levels of independence when investigating and solving problems, for example, at
the mud kitchen and woodwork bench. Across the primary stages, children enjoy
school and have very positive attitudes to learning. They are enthusiastic and offer
thoughtful opinions and ideas during lessons. Children take responsibility for their
learning through setting appropriate success criteria with staff. They are skilled in
talking about their learning and can explain what they are good at and what they need
to do to improve. Children benefit from an extensive range of learning experiences
beyond the classroom. They have a strong understanding of global citizenship and
respect for other cultures as part of the school’s activities to maintain its Rights
Respecting Schools status and the Connecting Classrooms International Education
programme. Children show high levels of leadership skills through their involvement in
a wide variety of focus groups, committees and when acting as prefects and buddies.
Commendably, older children help younger ones with reading and organise and lead a
variety of additional clubs, including cheerleading, drama and information
communications technology.
Children are making very strong progress in their learning. In the nursery, children use
descriptive vocabulary in their conversations with staff and each other. Almost all are
interested in early writing and have created many of the signs and labels around the
playrooms. In early numeracy, children count confidently and with understanding.
Education Scotland
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0131 244 8424
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Transforming lives through learning
They use mathematical language very well when describing different types of
measurement. Children can organise information by sorting, matching and grouping,
and display their findings using tally marks and bar graphs. Across the primary stages,
children can express and justify their own opinions while respecting the views of others
during discussions. They use their listening and talking skills confidently in a variety of
activities, including debating and delivering oral presentations. Children research
information effectively and are learning to identify reliable sources of information. They
create high-quality pieces of text for a range of different purposes, including scientific
reports and poetry. In numeracy and mathematics, children are highly skilled in
analysing and presenting information using tables, bar charts and line graphs. They
are developing their awareness of applying their numeracy and mathematics skills in
real-life situations, including through financial education. Children are very confident in
explaining ways they have solved complex mathematical problems and challenges. In
other curricular areas such as French and art and design, children have an exceptional
knowledge and understanding of what they have learned.
How well does the school support children to develop and learn?
Staff are very effective in supporting children to develop and learn. Across the school,
staff know children very well and are sensitive to their individual needs. They plan
tasks and activities which are stimulating and at the right level of difficulty to help
children succeed in their learning. They use questioning skilfully to develop children’s
thinking and extend their learning. The school has a very inclusive culture and staff
place a high importance on supporting children’s social and emotional needs through
approaches such as the Learning Centre nurture room. They take many positive steps
to support children who require additional support for learning. The pupil support
assistants and support for learning staff provide high-quality support to help children
make appropriate progress in their learning. The school works very well with a range
of other partners, including the joint support team to support children who require help
with their learning.
Staff provide children with a curriculum which takes full account of the school’s vision
and values. They have developed high-quality programmes of learning using
Curriculum for Excellence guidance. Staff have worked closely together and with their
associated schools groups to help ensure continuity and progression in learning from
nursery to P1 and from P7 to S1. In particular, the collaborative approach to
developing the science programme led by the principal teacher and Science
Champions is an example of very good practice. There is a strong emphasis on
developing children’s skills for learning, life and work, including through enterprise in
education. Staff plan activities which make meaningful links across different areas of
children’s learning. They provide children with well-planned opportunities to use and
apply their skills in literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing across different areas
of the curriculum. Staff are building their confidence in assessing children’s progress
across the curriculum to demonstrate breadth, challenge and application of learning.
How well does the school improve the quality of its work?
The school’s approaches to improving the quality of its work are excellent. The
headteacher provides outstanding and inspirational leadership. She has put in place a
wide range of activities to gather information about the quality of learning, teaching
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and achievement across the school. Consequently, she has a clear understanding of
the school’s strengths and areas for improvement. The headteacher has led and
managed curriculum change exceptionally well. She encourages and supports others
to lead initiatives and school developments. As a result, leadership at all levels within
the school is very strong. The headteacher is very well supported by the depute
headteachers and principal teachers who undertake their roles highly effectively. Staff
have a shared understanding of their responsibility for improving children’s learning.
They have high expectations of what children can achieve and are fully committed to
continually reviewing and improving the work of the school to support children to
achieve success. The school has rigorous and robust arrangements in place for
tracking and monitoring children’s achievement. The senior management team
discuss children’s learning with staff and use this alongside statistical information to
determine how well children are progressing in their learning. Children play a
significant role in improving the work of the school. Notably, P7 ‘prefects’ work with
staff to observe learning within classrooms and speak with groups of children about
their work. Overall, these approaches are having a significant impact on improving the
work of the school and ensuring children’s experiences and achievement are of the
highest quality.
This inspection found the following key strengths.
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Confident and articulate children who play a significant role in the life of the school
and its community.
Extensive range of learning experiences which enable children to achieve high
levels of success across learning.
Inclusive ethos across the school with a clear focus on global citizenship and
children’s rights and responsibilities.
Staff who work effectively as a team to improve the work of the school and develop
a high-quality curriculum.
Impact of leadership at all levels across the school.
Inspiring and outstanding leadership of the headteacher.
We discussed with staff and the education authority how they might continue to
improve the school. This is what we agreed with them.
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Continue to take forward school improvement priorities as planned.
What happens at the end of the inspection?
We are satisfied with the overall quality of provision. We are confident that the
school's self-evaluation processes are leading to improvements. As a result, we will
make no further evaluative visits in connection with this inspection. During the
inspection, we identified aspects of innovative practice which we would like to explore
further in order to share the practice with others.
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We shall work with the school and local authority in order to record and share more
widely the innovative practice.
Janie McManus
HM Inspector
Additional inspection evidence, such as details of the quality indicator evaluations, for
your school can be found on the Education Scotland website at
http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/inspectionandreview/reports/school/primsec/Mea
rnsPrimarySchoolEastRenfrewshire.asp
If you would like to receive this letter in a different format, for example, in a translation
please contact the administration team on the above telephone number.
If you want to give us feedback or make a complaint about our work, please contact us
by telephone on 0141 282 5000, or e-mail: complaints@educationscotland.gsi.gov.uk
or write to us addressing your letter to the Complaints Manager, Denholm House,
Almondvale Business Park, Livingston EH54 6GA.
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