Buryfields Infant School

Overview

Buryfields Infant School has “taken effective action to maintain the standards identified at the previous inspection.” The report describes a school that is “at the heart of its community,” where pupils are “polite, kind and courteous” and “achieve highly across the curriculum.” Leaders have ensured that high expectations are met through the use of ‘learning powers’, resulting in a positive environment where children feel safe and enjoy learning.

Strengths

• The curriculum is “well-designed” with a “strong focus on the local area and community,” engaging pupils through “well-chosen activities.”
• Reading is a clear priority; staff have the necessary skills to help pupils learn sounds for fluency, and there is a “love of reading” well developed among pupils.
• Pupils make “good progress in their writing,” producing sentences of increasing complexity and checking their work for accuracy.
• Support for pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) is effective, with skilled adults adapting tasks to ensure these pupils “also achieve well.”
• Behaviour is excellent, with pupils following instructions to allow “quick starts to lessons” and attendance being closely monitored to ensure it remains “excellent for all.”

Areas to improve

• Assessment is “not fully developed across all subjects,” meaning teachers lack a “complete understanding of what pupils have learned and can remember.”
• Assessment in foundation subjects requires further development so teachers can “check pupils’ understanding effectively and use this to inform future teaching.”

Safeguarding

The report states that “the arrangements for safeguarding are effective.”