Abernyte Primary School
Inchture
Perth and Kinross Council
27 October 2009
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. Where
applicable, you will also be able to find descriptions of good
practice in the school.
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
Abernyte Primary School is a non-denominational school. It serves
the village of Abernyte and the surrounding rural area. The roll was 16
when the inspection was carried out in September 2009. Children’s
attendance was above the national average in 2007/2008.
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2. Particular strengths of the school
•
Confident, well-behaved children who are keen to learn.
•
The success of staff and children in developing the school grounds
for learning and their participation in Eco-Schools Scotland
activities.
•
Children’s achievements in sports and arts initiatives.
•
Partnership with parents to support links with a school in France.
3. How well do children learn and achieve?
Learning and achievement
Almost all children are motivated and keen to learn. They readily
identify areas for investigation during topic work. They work well with
others on partner and group tasks. In P4-P7, all children make
effective use of the Internet when carrying out independent research
tasks. At all stages, they receive regular oral feedback on their work,
but are not always clear about what they need to do to improve.
Relationships between children and all members of staff are positive.
Children new to the school are made welcome and are included
quickly.
Across the school, all children develop effective citizenship skills by
undertaking additional responsibilities. Examples include duties as
eco and pupil council members, librarians and junior road safety
officers. Children have a very good understanding of the need to care
for their surroundings. Supported by staff, they have won a Woodland
Trust gold award and an Eco-Schools Scotland silver award for their
outstanding work to develop an outdoor learning environment. All
children achieve well in a broad range of activities. This includes
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participation in an extensive range of sports activities, instrumental and
choral performances and mathematical challenge events. Twinning
arrangements with a school in France has produced many benefits.
Children have made very good use of a webcam link to talk about
aspects of Scottish culture. They have also written letters and
e-mailed. All enjoyed hosting French children for a week of shared
educational and social activities.
Across the stages, the school has maintained high standards of
attainment over a number of years. Almost all children attain
appropriate national levels in reading and mathematics. Most achieve
these levels in writing. In English language, almost all children listen
closely to instructions. They readily share their knowledge and ask
relevant questions to extend their understanding. They respect the
views of others. In P4-P7, almost all children are confident when
talking to an audience. Examples include, leading assembly and
guiding a tour of the school grounds. From the early stages onwards,
children make good use of their phonic skills to sound out words when
tackling unfamiliar text. Across the school, children read for enjoyment
and almost all attend the Chatterbooks Club to discuss their current
reading and share book reviews. From P4 onwards, all children make
effective use of their information and communications technology skills
when preparing interesting reports for the school newsletter. Children
need to write at length more often. In mathematics, almost all children
are quick and accurate when undertaking oral and written numerical
calculations. In P4-P7, children can tell the time using analogue and
digital clocks. At all stages, children have a good understanding of
symmetry. They can apply a range of strategies when solving
problems.
Curriculum and meeting learning needs
Staff provide children with a broad and varied curriculum. Teachers
have taken positive steps to improve children’s experiences in line with
Curriculum for Excellence. Staff are developing children’s literacy
skills well during topic work and should develop a similar approach to
their numeracy skills. Children experience a broad programme in the
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expressive arts which is enhanced by regular visitors to school. All
children learn to swim and experience two hours of well-planned
physical education each week. The health education programme
provides appropriate coverage of substance misuse issues and
encourages children to adopt a healthy lifestyle. At the early stages,
children need more opportunities to learn through well-structured play
activities.
In most lessons, tasks and activities are set at an appropriate level of
difficulty for almost all children. A wide range of practical resources
are used appropriately to support learning. Occasionally, the time
allocated to tasks is too long and the pace of learning slows. At all
stages, staff provide effective support for individuals and groups as
required. Teamwork between teaching and support staff is strong,
particularly in P4-P7. Staff are skilled in using questioning which
encourages children to think for themselves. The school has
appropriate procedures in place to support children with additional
learning needs. Steps should be taken to involve children and parents
in developing and reviewing individualised educational programmes.
Homework is regular but not varied enough.
4. How well do staff work with others to support children’s
learning?
All staff have helped to develop the positive relationships with parents
and the welcoming atmosphere in the school. They deal effectively
with any concerns raised by parents. Annual reports to parents on
their children’s progress provide good coverage of all curricular areas.
The Parent Council helps raise funds and organises very well-attended
social events. Staff and parents worked closely together to ensure the
success of a visiting group from France. Staff have plans to increase
parents’ involvement in their children’s learning. Children benefit from
links with a number of local groups. These include a plant nursery, an
antique centre, a cricket club and the twinning committee. Staff work
well with other professionals such as the speech therapist and
educational psychologist. The school collaborates effectively with
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neighbouring primary schools to develop the curriculum and provide
children with regular opportunities to socialise with other youngsters
during shared educational and sporting events. The school has
effective arrangements to support children entering P1 from nursery
and transferring from P7 to secondary schools.
5. Are staff and children actively involved in improving their
school community?
Every member of the teaching and support staff contributes to
improving the school by leading a specific aspect of its work. The
headteacher discusses forward plans and visits classes. Teachers
regularly meet to discuss how to improve aspects of their work and
take effective action to address any priority areas. In particular, they
have planned and implemented changes to the curriculum well.
Almost all children contribute to school improvement through being
involved in eco activities. Children’s views influence the purchase of
resources for play and fundraising activities. They are not yet fully
involved in discussing their learning experiences. The school seeks
the views of parents informally at the Parent Council. Overall, the
school could do more to involve children and parents in evaluating and
improving the quality of education.
6. Does the school have high expectations of all children?
Almost all children respond very well to staff expectations of high
standards of behaviour and effort. All staff have an appropriate
awareness of child protection procedures. Any unexplained absences
are followed up thoroughly. Children feel safe and well looked after at
school. Any incidents of inappropriate behaviour are dealt with
effectively by staff. Teachers make good use of praise and celebrate
children’s achievements and encourage them. Staff provide
appropriate arrangements for religious observance and also prepare
children for life in a multi-ethnic society.
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7. Does the school have a clear sense of direction?
The headteacher has the confidence of the school community. She
has recently involved staff, children and the Parent Council in updating
the school’s aims and values to reflect the ambitions of the school
more clearly. The headteacher has been successful in capitalising on
the skills and interests of staff. All lead aspects of the work of the
school well. They are a strong team who have been successful in
improving children’s learning experiences. The school is well placed
to improve further.
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 school.
We have agreed the following areas for improvement with the school
and education authority.
•
Further develop approaches to give children greater responsibility
for their learning.
•
Continue with the planned implementation of the curriculum in line
with the principles of Curriculum for Excellence.
•
Involve children and parents more fully in improving the school.
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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 Abernyte 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: Anne Park
27 October 2009
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 2009
HM Inspectorate of Education