St Mary's Catholic First School, Hexham

Overview

St Mary’s Catholic First School is described as a “happy and welcoming” environment where pupils feel safe and behave well. Leaders have driven “considerable improvement” following previous staff turbulence, establishing a clear vision and a new, broad curriculum. The school is rated Good across all inspection categories, with strong relationships between staff and pupils.

Strengths

• Pupils are “considerate of the feelings of others” and bullying is rare, with staff responding quickly to any incidents.
• The new curriculum is “broad and sequenced,” helping pupils demonstrate “strong understanding of key content” in subjects like history and mathematics.
• Pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) “keep up with their peers” thanks to effective support plans and specialist equipment.
• Leaders prioritise reading with a well-implemented phonics programme, ensuring most pupils are “fluent readers” by the end of key stage 1.
• Children in Reception make a “strong start to their learning,” benefiting from a sequenced curriculum and skilled adults who extend vocabulary.

Areas to improve

• Writing lessons for younger pupils do not match the phonics programme, leading to struggles with “basic spelling and punctuation.”
• In some subjects, teachers do not focus sufficiently on key content, causing pupils to struggle with independent work without additional support.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective, with robust processes for reporting concerns and strong oversight by governors.