/ Providing Inspection Services for
Department of Education
Department for Employment and Learning
Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure
Education and Training Inspectorate
Report of a Focused Inspection
Hollybush Primary School and Nursery Unit
Culmore, Londonderry
Inspected: January 2004

CONTENTS

SectionPage

STATISTICAL INFORMATION

1.INTRODUCTION1

2.THE QUALITY OF THE CHILDREN’S WORK1

3.CONCLUSION4

4.THE NURSERY UNIT4

STATISTICAL INFORMATION (NURSERY UNIT)8

BASIC INFORMATION SHEET (BIS) - PRIMARY SCHOOLS

A. i. School: Hollybush Primary iii. Date of Inspection: W/B 26.01.04
Culmore, Londonderry

ii.School Reference Number: 203-6533 iv. Nature of Inspection: Focused

B.

School Year / 1999/00 / 2000/01 / 2001/02 / 2002/03 / 2003/04
Year 1 Intake / 39 / 52 / 40 / 49 / 47
Enrolments
Primary / 274 / 309 / 309 / 304 / 315
Reception / 0 / 0 / 0 / 0 / 0
Nursery Class/Classes / 0 / 26 / 26 / 26 / 26
Special Unit / 0 / 0 / 0 / 2 / 0

The enrolment for the current year is the figure on the day of notification of inspection.
For previous years it is the figure in the annual return to the Department of Education.

The calculations at C and D should be based on the total of the primary and reception enrolments only.

C.Average Attendance for the Previous School Year
(expressed as a percentage):95.89%

Primary &NurserySpecial Reception Unit Unit

D. i.Number of Teachers
(including the principal and part-time teachers):141-
(Full-time equivalent = 25 teaching hours)

ii.PTR (Pupil/Teacher Ratio):22.5 NI PTR: 19.9

iii.Average Class Size:25

iv.Class Size (Range):22 to 30

v.Ancillary Support:
Number of Hours Per Week: i.Clerical support:25

ii. Official Making A Good0

Start Support:
iii. Making A Good Start funding0

additional hours and other

classroom assistant support:

vi.Number of pupils with statements of special educational needs:4

vii.Number of children who are not of statutory school age: 0
viii.Percentage of children entitled to free school meals: 7%

1.INTRODUCTION

1.1Hollybush Primary School is situated on the edge of Londonderry, in the parish of the Assumption. The school’s enrolment has increased slightly over the past five years; the current enrolment of 315 includes 26 children in the nursery class. Almost 7% of the children are entitled to free school meals.

1.2The arrangements for the inspection of pastoral care included the completion of questionnaires by a sample of the parents, as well as meetings with the Board of Governors, and a group of children from year 6. In their responses the parents expressed high levels of satisfaction with the work of the school, particularly the caring ethos and the quality of education provided. Of those parents who made written responses, a few expressed concern regarding the amount of homework being set and some of them indicated that they would welcome an earlier opportunity, than currently exists, to meet with teachers. Reference will be made to these comments in the body of the report.

1.3The inspection focused on the work in mathematics, information and communication technology (ICT) and pastoral care, including the arrangements for child protection.

2.THE QUALITY OF THE CHILDREN’S WORK

2.1The principal, teaching and non-teaching staff have worked hard to create a caring and supportive environment in which the children are at ease with one another and their teachers. Relationships are excellent. In all classes the teachers effectively promote the children’s confidence, their self-esteem and provide appropriate opportunities to enable the children to begin to take responsibility for aspects of their own learning. The high quality of displays throughout the school also reflects the school’s positive ethos. The non-teaching staff make an excellent contribution to the life and work of the school.

2.2The behaviour of the children is excellent; they are polite, articulate and enjoy talking with visitors. The children settle well to their work and display a strong sense of enjoyment and fun in their learning. They are highly motivated and take a great pride in the presentation of their work. A reward system is in place and ‘pupil of the week’ is celebrated along with other children’s achievements on their ‘Wall of Fame’.

2.3The teachers have created good links with the parents, in particular through the weekly newsletter. The parents are also encouraged to become involved in the wide range of activities which take place after school. The children enjoy participating in the wide range of physical, musical and cultural events.

2.4The school’s policy for child protection is in line with the Department of Education Circular 1999/10. It outlines the procedures to be followed by staff when addressing any child protection issue. The school has provided for parents a useful booklet which outlines the main features of the school’s child protection policy. All teaching and non-teaching staff have participated in training in child protection matters.

2.5The quality of teaching observed during the inspection ranged from that which was excellent to that which was satisfactory; the majority of the teaching observed was good. In the best practice seen, the work matched the range of abilities in the classrooms, was exciting and challenging, and gave the children ample opportunities to engage, respond and become more independent in their learning. The teachers skilfully use questioning and consolidated the learning at the end of each session. It would now be beneficial for the staff to disseminate these characteristics of excellent practice across all classes in the school.

2.6The teachers prepare conscientiously for lessons. They plan collectively in year groups for their six-week planners. The whole-school guidance material provided is good and helps guide the teaching and learning. The teachers have begun to monitor and evaluate the learning at the end of their six-week planning cycle; they use their evaluations to influence and direct the future teaching and learning.

2.7The children experience a wide range of appropriate activities during their structured play sessions. They are settled and co-operate with one another, share resources and are developing their social skills. In the main the classroom activities enable the children to acquire a good foundation to support their learning across the curriculum. The teachers need to identify learning outcomes, and to link their planning more effectively with other subjects across the curriculum. In addition, the teachers of the younger children have identified the need to develop a more cohesive policy relating to structured play which will help them to plan more effectively for progression.

2.8The special educational needs co-ordinator (SENCO) has been involved in the Reading Recovery Programme for three out of the last four years. There is evidence to show that the strategies involved in this reading programme are being disseminated to other members of staff. The school has identified a number of children who are in need of additional support in English. Those children who have been identified in need of numeracy support are catered for within the classroom. Procedures are in place for the identification and screening of the children’s specific difficulties. The school needs to begin to analyse the data collected from the wide range of testing and use it to inform future teaching and learning. Procedures need to be put in place to monitor and evaluate, not only the children’s achievements, but also the provision afforded to those in need of additional help.

2.9Information and communication technology is used effectively in all classes throughout the school to support and enhance the children’s learning. The school has a well-equipped computer suite. The staff completed their New Opportunities Fund (NOF) training in March2003 and report an increased confidence and competence in the use of ICT to plan lessons and prepare teaching aids, to enhance displays, and, through the use of daily PowerPoint presentations, to inform the children, parents and visitors about aspects of the work of the school. In the main, the teachers have made a good start in integrating ICT into the planned curriculum across years 1 to 7. The children have regular opportunities to learn through exploration of suitable programmes and gradually progress by year 7 to composing, editing, saving and filing text and accessing information from the Internet. During the inspection, the year 7 class skilfully used a PowerPoint presentation on the Holocaust. The children are developing effectively their ability to manage databases and the graphical representation of information. In some classes, good use is made of the Clicker 4 program to support children with learning difficulties in reading and writing. Opportunities are developing for the use of Roamer, the data projector and the digital camera. In 2002, the two year 7 classes participated in the Northern Ireland Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (CCEA) ICT accreditation in Communication and Information Handling and achieved levels of accreditation between three to five. The ICT co-ordinator has made a good start in developing the provision; he has also, with the support of the Curriculum Advisory and Support Service (CASS), and in consultation, with the staff, recently updated the ICT policy and skills progression grid, to identify the children’s learning opportunities. It is important that the school now plans systematically to support the next stage of proposed developments and implement a consistent approach to monitoring and evaluating the children’s progress and the best use of the school resources.

2.10The school has identified mathematics as a major area for development and has participated in the Northern Ireland Numeracy Strategy (NINS) training programme. A comprehensive whole-school scheme of work for mathematics is in place and detailed action plans address important aspects of teaching and learning such as the promotion of mental mathematics, the use of ICT within mathematics and the development of effective procedures to monitor and evaluate the children’s experiences. In all classes, appropriate emphasis is placed on promoting the children’s mental and oral skills. Through a variety of imaginative teaching activities, the children are becoming increasingly flexible and confident in their mental reasoning and in their ability to talk about their learning.

2.11In the early years, the children’s mathematical understanding is developed through rhymes and songs, oral and practical activities, structured play and simple recording exercises. In addition, the teachers have created a stimulating mathematical learning environment through the display of number lines and grids, key words, definitions, mathematical challenges and relevant samples of the children’s work. As the children progress through the school their learning is developed systematically and, by year 7, the overall standards achieved are good; the children have a good understanding of place value, can estimate, measure and calculate accurately for a range of purposes, are able to present and interpret data in a variety of forms and are aware of the properties of a range of two-dimensional (2D) and 3D shapes. Much of the children’s learning is linked effectively to everyday experiences and to other areas of the curriculum. In year 4, for example, as part of a science activity on materials, the children presented their findings in a variety of ways, including the good use of ICT to produce relevant graphs and pie charts. In the most effective lessons observed, the children applied their learning to problem-solving and investigative activities and were able to discuss and explain their work. It is appropriate that this important aspect of the children’s learning is to be incorporated more fully into the teachers’ lesson planning.

2.12The teachers collect and analyse data such as standardised test scores, informal test results and end of key stage outcomes to assess and track the individual progress of the children. The teachers are increasingly using this information, along with an evaluation of the effectiveness of their own teaching, to monitor and evaluate the quality of the teaching and learning in mathematics across the whole school. This good practice should be extended to other curricular areas.

2.13The school has in place arrangements to record and report the attainment of each child, including an annual meeting with the parents. The school plans to review the timing of the meetings with parents. An annual report is prepared for parents which indicates the progress which their child has made. The teachers use a range of standardised tests in English and mathematics. The school has compiled a useful pupil profile which accompanies the child throughout the school and records all relevant data on their attainment and progress. The data collected from these tests now needs to be used more effectively to plan for subsequent teaching and learning. The effective monitoring and evaluating which takes place in mathematics needs to be more widely spread across all areas of the school.

2.14The teachers mark the children’s work regularly and consistently. In the best practice the teachers indicate how the work might be improved. It is timely that the school reviews the current policy and in particular reasons for setting homework to ensure that the homework is not taking up an inordinate time to complete.

2.15The school has devised a three-year School Development Plan which identifies appropriate areas for improvement. There is a need to focus on the development of detailed action plans to help implement and monitor the priorities agreed by the staff.

2.16The principal has been in post for 24 years. During this time he has overseen the introduction of significant changes and initiatives. He sets the positive tone for the school and is committed to the children and the staff.

3.CONCLUSION

3.1The school has significant strengths which include:

  • the positive ethos;
  • the excellent behaviour of children;
  • the stimulating learning environment;
  • the excellent relationships at all levels;
  • the conscientious and hard-working teachers;
  • the high quality of teaching observed;
  • the effective leadership of the principal and the mathematics and ICT co-ordinators.

3.2Areas for improvement include:

  • the need to put in place a systematic approach to monitoring and evaluation at all levels, including the provision and achievements of those children who receive additional help with their learning.

3.3There are strengths in many aspects of the educational and pastoral provision in this school. There are also areas that require improvement if the needs of the children are to be met fully.

4.THE NURSERY UNIT

4.1INTRODUCTION

4.1.1Hollybush Nursery Unit is situated in the grounds of Hollybush Primary School. The children come mainly from the surrounding area.

4.1.2The arrangements for the inspection of pastoral care included the completion of questionnaires by the parents. The comments indicated that the majority of parents were satisfied or very satisfied with all aspects of the nursery’s provision.

4.2SUMMARY OF MAIN FINDINGS

4.2.1The staff have worked hard to create an attractive environment for the children, which is enhanced by examples of their work, relevant posters and other displays. There are friendly relationships at all levels. The majority of the children are well-behaved and co-operate with the staff; however, a significant minority at times engage in activity which is not acceptable. The staff need to implement effective and consistent strategies for behaviour management in order to promote more settled and purposeful play for the children who are less settled.

4.2.2The staff have established useful links with the parents and use a range of methods to inform them about aspects of the work in the nursery unit. In addition to the informal meetings which occur at the beginning and end of the day, the parents are invited into the nursery unit twice a year to discuss their children’s progress with the staff.

4.2.3The nursery has in place appropriate procedures for pastoral care and child protection which are in line with guidance given by the Department of Education. The staff need to ensure that the information relating to child protection matters in the nursery unit is more readily available to the parents.

4.2.4The planning outlines a range of interesting and varied learning experiences for the children throughout the year. The learning potential of the activities is identified and used to guide the staff in their day-to-day work with the children.

4.2.5The thoughtful organisation of the daily timetable allows the nursery day to flow smoothly and provides a balance between free play and activities organised by the staff. Daily routines are organised informally and operate efficiently.

4.2.6Throughout the session, the staff support the children’s efforts; they engage the children in valuable discussion about their play and experiences and at times participate sensitively in the activities to provide role models. On occasions, the staff need to do more to foster the social development of some of the children and to provide additional stimulus when the children lose interest in the materials provided.

4.2.7The nursery programme includes a range of activities which provides opportunities for learning in most areas of the pre-school curriculum. The majority of the children display a good measure of independence and responsibility.

4.2.8There are daily opportunities for the children to develop physical skills and confidence with a variety of tools and equipment. Outdoor play is available when the weather permits.

4.2.9The wide range of creative activities provided encourages the children to explore and experiment with different materials and tools; some children have begun to make representations of people and objects in their surroundings.

4.2.10The children’s language is developed effectively through skilful story-telling sessions, the use of rhymes and group discussions. The nursery has a good range of books and many of these are incorporated into areas of play. The children are introduced to text incidentally through captions displayed around the room; the provision of a range of paper and writing tools helps to generate an interest in experimental writing.

4.2.11Although there is some incidental learning in mathematics, the staff need to develop greater skill in recognising the potential of activities, and in developing strategies to promote mathematical ideas and language.