St Cuthbert's Church of England Academy Infants and Pre-School

Overview

St Cuthbert’s Church of England Academy Infants and Pre-School continues to be a good school, where pupils are happy, feel safe, and benefit from strong relationships with adults. The school fosters a calm, harmonious atmosphere where children work hard, behave well, and are proud of their achievements. Leaders have high expectations for all pupils, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities, ensuring they access the same curriculum with appropriate adaptations.

Strengths

• Pupils are happy, feel safe, and enjoy a welcoming environment where bullying is rare and staff resolve issues quickly.
• Leaders have designed a broad, ambitious curriculum with a strong phonics programme that helps most pupils read fluently by the end of key stage 1.
• Mathematics teaching is effective, with knowledge broken into manageable steps and regular revisiting to help learning ‘stick in pupils’ memories’.
• Children in the early years settle well, love learning, and get off to a strong start with high-quality stories and songs.
• Trustees and governors carry out their duties effectively, challenging leaders well about the quality of education.

Areas to improve

• In a few subjects, such as art, the important knowledge pupils need to learn is not identified in full, meaning they lack the ‘building blocks’ to learn the curriculum well.
• Teachers do not always design learning that enables pupils to build securely on previous knowledge, so leaders must strengthen teachers’ pedagogical knowledge.
• Leaders have not fully considered how the early years curriculum links with learning in Years 1 and 2 in a small number of subjects.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective, with a strong culture where staff are well trained to identify risks and report concerns.