Yetholm Primary School
Kelso
Scottish Borders Council
29 June 2010
HM Inspectorate of Education (HMIE) inspects schools in order to
let parents1, children and the local community know whether their
school2 provides a good education. Inspectors also discuss with
school staff how they can improve the quality of education.
At the beginning of the inspection, we ask the headteacher and
staff about the strengths of the school, what needs to improve,
and how they know. We use the information they give us to help
us plan what we are going to look at. During the inspection, we
go into classes and join other activities in which children are
involved. We also gather the views of children, parents, staff and
members of the local community. We find their views very helpful
and use them together with the other information we have
collected to arrive at our view of the quality of education.
This report tells you what we found during the inspection and the
quality of education in the school. We describe how well children
are doing, how good the school is at helping them to learn and
how well it cares for them. We comment on how well staff,
parents and children work together and how they go about
improving the school. We also comment on how well the school
works with other groups in the community, including services
which support children. Finally, we focus on how well the school
is led and how staff help the school achieve its aims.
If you would like to learn more about our inspection of the school,
please visit www.hmie.gov.uk. Here you can find analyses of
questionnaire returns from children, parents and staff. We will
not provide questionnaire analyses where the numbers of returns
are so small that they could identify individuals.
1
Throughout this report, the term ‘parents’ should be taken to include foster carers,
residential care staff and carers who are relatives or friends.
2
The term ‘school’ includes the nursery class or classes where appropriate.
Contents
1. The school
2. Particular strengths of the school
3. How well do children learn and achieve?
4. How well do staff work with others to support children’s learning?
5. Are staff and children actively involved in improving their school
community?
6. Does the school have high expectations of all children?
7. Does the school have a clear sense of direction?
8. What happens next?
1. The school
Yetholm Primary School is a non-denominational school. It serves the
villages of Town Yetholm and Kirk Yetholm and the surrounding area
of Scottish Borders. The roll was 35 when the inspection was carried
out in May 2010. Children’s attendance was in line with the national
average in 2008/2009. The school is one of two led by the same
headteacher.
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2. Particular strengths of the school
•
Close links between the school and its local community which
support children’s learning within and beyond the classroom.
•
Strong teamwork of all staff to meet children’s learning and
personal development needs.
•
The headteacher’s leadership approach, which has gained the trust
and respect of children, parents and staff.
3. How well do children learn and achieve?
Learning and achievement
All children are treated equally, fairly and with respect. They feel safe
and well cared for in school. Most children are developing confidence
in their ability to learn successfully through teachers’ high-quality
feedback on what they have done well and need to do better. When
given the opportunity to do so, most children can take responsibility for
aspects of their learning. The scope for this needs to be increased,
however. Increasingly, children at all stages evaluate accurately what
they have done well. They are developing their understanding of what
they need to do to improve. Children across the school need more
scope to work together more often in pairs and groups, and to learn
independently, building on existing effective practice. The school
should develop further the ways in which it seeks and takes account of
children’s views about their learning.
Children at all stages are developing well their understanding of
environmental issues through outdoor learning, including real life
contexts. The school has attained the Eco-Schools Scotland silver
award. Overall, the majority of children achieve appropriate national
levels in reading and writing, and most do so in mathematics. A
2
number of children achieve these levels earlier than might be
expected. There is scope to improve further the pace at which
children progress from prior levels of attainment. In the current
session, the school has placed high importance on improving
attainment in writing. At all stages from P1 to P7 children now write at
a more suitable length for a range of purposes. In mathematics,
children at the upper stages use their skills in measurement to record
distances accurately. At all stages children need more regular
opportunities to develop their skill in mental calculation. They draw
and interpret bar graphs accurately, and use information and
communications technology well to produce a range of other graphs.
Children achieve well in science and technology. Almost all children
are developing their capacity for imagination and creativity in music
and physical education. Most children are developing their
understanding of the environment through, for example, observational
drawing in art.
Curriculum and meeting learning needs
Staff provide a broad range of experiences and some opportunity for
children’s choice within these. They regularly use the local
environment effectively to extend children’s understanding in science.
The school works very closely with its local community to widen
children’s awareness of, for example, sustainable use of natural
resources. Staff and volunteers offer a wide range of clubs and
activities after school, and frequent trips and visits. All children in P6
and P7 take part in a residential experience. All children experience
two hours of high-quality physical education each week. Children are
well supported in moving into P1, and from P7 to S1 at Kelso High
School. Staff have planned well for Curriculum for Excellence. As a
result children are making increasingly effective links between different
areas of their learning. Staff should now ensure that all children
continue to develop their skills in literacy and numeracy. Teachers
should continue to support all children in developing their
understanding of other cultures and beliefs.
3
All staff know the children well. Teachers share with children the
purpose of lessons, and question effectively to check children’s
understanding. Their questioning is beginning to encourage children
to think for themselves. Teachers are skilled in identifying learning
needs. All staff supporting children use advice well to help children
who need additional help to make good progress. In lessons, most
tasks match children’s needs. However, some tasks, including
aspects set as homework, are too easy. At times the pace of lessons
is slow. Overall, teachers should more consistently set tasks that build
more effectively on what children already know and can do.
4. How well do staff work with others to support children’s
learning?
The school works very closely and effectively with a wide range of
community partners and agencies. These include an educational
psychologist, speech and language therapist, home link worker and
school nurse. Together they provide many successful opportunities to
support children’s learning and personal development. The Parent
Council supports the work of the school through its fundraising
activities. Parents help in many ways that contribute to an enhanced
learning environment for children. Almost all parents are satisfied with
the work of the school and find school reports informative. Overall, the
school deals well with any concerns raised. The school recognises the
need to involve all parents more fully as active partners in their child’s
learning.
5. Are staff and children actively involved in improving their
school community?
All staff are highly committed to improving outcomes for children.
Teachers and support staff together form a close-knit team which
allows everyone to contribute well to children’s learning experiences.
Teachers use information from a range of sources to form accurate
views about what the school does well and to plan what it needs to
4
improve on. Almost all children contribute to the life of the school
through roles such as their Eco group, as Junior Road Safety Officers,
or as school council members. Staff now need to enable children to
take greater responsibility for leading planning and organising within
such activities. There is scope in particular to develop the role of the
school council as a forum for seeking children’s views on how to
improve learning further.
6. Does the school have high expectations of all children?
The school is open and welcoming to all. Relationships between
adults and children are based on respect and fairness. All staff are
highly committed to children’s welfare. Children are developing a good
understanding of how to keep themselves safe and healthy. Teachers
have high expectations of children’s behaviour and all are eager to
ensure children’s learning is successful. Children’s achievements are
celebrated through displays of their work in school, in newsletter
articles, and on the school website. Teachers should now consider
ways to help all children meet still more demanding targets in all areas
of their learning. The school has suitable arrangements for religious
observance.
7. Does the school have a clear sense of direction?
The headteacher provides clear direction to the work of the school.
Since her return from a temporary post in another school she has
established clear priorities to improve outcomes for all children’s
learning. These priorities include a suitable emphasis on raising
attainment. Staff feel valued and well supported. They recognise the
headteacher’s care for the wellbeing of all children and adults within
the school community. Her open and approachable leadership style
has gained the trust and respect of children, parents and staff. The
school is well placed to continue to improve.
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8. What happens next?
As a result of the good quality of education provided by the school, we
will make no further visits in connection with this inspection. The
education authority will inform parents about the school's progress as
part of the authority’s arrangements for reporting to parents on the
quality of its schools.
We have agreed the following areas for improvement with the school
and education authority.
•
Continue to raise attainment, particularly in writing.
•
Provide more opportunities for children to take responsibility for
leading planning and organising suitable learning experiences.
•
Improve teachers’ understanding of all children’s progress to help
inform more ambitious learning targets.
6
Quality indicators help schools and nursery classes, education
authorities and inspectors to judge what is good and what needs to be
improved in the work of a school and a nursery class. You can find
these quality indicators in the HMIE publications How good is our
school? and The Child at the Centre. Following the inspection of each
school, the Scottish Government gathers evaluations of three
important quality indicators to keep track of how well all Scottish
schools and nursery classes are doing.
Here are the evaluations for Yetholm Primary School.
Improvements in performance
Learners’ experiences
Meeting learning needs
good
good
good
We also evaluated the following aspects of the work of the school.
The curriculum
Improvement through self-evaluation
HM Inspector: Alistair Kirkwood
29 June 2010
7
good
good
When we write reports, we use the following word scale so that our
readers can see clearly what our judgments mean.
excellent
very good
good
means
means
means
satisfactory
weak
unsatisfactory
means
means
means
outstanding, sector leading
major strengths
important strengths with some areas
for improvement
strengths just outweigh weaknesses
important weaknesses
major weaknesses
If you would like to find out more about our inspections or get an
electronic copy of this report, please go to www.hmie.gov.uk.
Please contact us if you want to know how to get the report in a
different format, for example, in a translation, or if you wish to
comment about any aspect of our inspections. You can contact us
at HMIEenquiries@hmie.gsi.gov.uk or write to us at BMCT,
HM Inspectorate of Education, Denholm House, Almondvale Business
Park, Almondvale Way, Livingston EH54 6GA.
Text phone users can contact us on 01506 600 236. This is a service
for deaf users. Please do not use this number for voice calls as the
line will not connect you to a member of staff.
You can find our complaints procedure on our website
www.hmie.gov.uk or alternatively you can contact our Complaints
Manager, at the address above or by telephoning 01506 600259.
Where the school has a nursery class, you can contact the Complaints
Coordinator, Headquarters, Care Commission, Compass House,
Riverside Drive, Dundee DD1 4NY, telephone 0845 603 0890.
Crown Copyright 2010
HM Inspectorate of Education