Standards and Quality Report 2017-18 Underbank Primary
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Standards and Quality Report 2017-18 Underbank Primary School 154 Lanark Road Crossford Carluke South Lanarkshire 1 Standards and Quality Report 2017-18 School Name: Underbank Primary School Context of the school: Underbank Primary School is a small, rural, non-denominational school which serves the villages of Crossford, Rosebank, Tillietudlem, Hazelbank and the surrounding area. Underbank is situated within Clydesdale in South Lanarkshire. The current roll is 108, with five classes (P1/2 – 18 children, P2/3 – 19 children, P4/5 – 21 children, P5/6 – 25 children and P6/7 – 25 children). 44.85% of our pupils are placing requests. The catchment area is varied and draws from a mix of housing within the local villages. The school is split-level and is set within attractive grounds which are used to deliver outdoor education and play. Some staff are trained in Forest Schools which impacts greatly on our creative outdoor curriculum. The school is featured in SLC’s Modernisation Programme and our new build is in its early stages. Our core values and principles are centred around CfE. We aim to raise standards, prepare our children for a future they do not yet know and equip them for jobs of tomorrow in a fast changing world. Our vision at Underbank is to work in partnership with all stakeholders, to provide a safe, nurturing and stimulating environment in which every child can achieve their full potential in preparing for their role in society. Strong partnership working is a key feature of our school. We believe strongly in working together in order for every child to reach their fullest potential, and benefit from an educational experience that will equip them with the relevant knowledge and skills to be successful as they progress to secondary education and beyond. We promote positive relationships within school and foster an ethos which encourages all pupils to respect themselves and others. Our teachers deliver subjects creatively, work together across the school and with other schools, share best practice and explore learning together. We believe that there should be good teaching indoors and outdoors, and aim to deliver a curriculum which embraces outdoor learning in a deep and relevant capacity, while recognising the community in which we sit. At Underbank, we wish to nurture parental involvement; we have an active Parent Council and a Parent and Friends Association, both support us in valuable ways. We welcome the support of parent helpers to assist us in providing an active and engaging curriculum, as well as a variety of after school opportunities. Our school offers a varied choice of extra-curricular activities including football, netball, tennis, running, athletics, Spanish and chess. We participate in local and SLC wide events, such as swimming, netball, football, athletics, tennis and cross country. Our children have the opportunity to participate in a variety of events during the year e.g. Orchard Day in the valley, creating and delivering harvest hampers within the village, school showcase events, Religious Festival celebrations and dance competitions. P6 & 7 are offered a residential outdoor experience annually and are currently booked to go to Lockerbie Manor which offers many new activities and experiences to the children. This year has been a fairly stable year and our NQT has been highly effective in P2/3. One class teacher moved onto an acting PT post early in 2017 and was replaced by area cover. Our CCC teacher (one day per week) has changed throughout the year and this does have some impact on consistency for classes. 2 The National Context for Education The National Improvement Framework (NIF) for Scottish Education sets out the Scottish Government’s vision to continually improve Scottish Education and to close the attainment gap, delivering both excellence and equity. Our school, working in partnership with South Lanarkshire Council is fully committed to delivering these ambitious aims. The key priorities of the National Improvement Framework are: Improvement in attainment, particularly in literacy and numeracy Closing the attainment gap between the most and least disadvantaged children Improvement in children and young people’s health and wellbeing Improvement in employability skills and sustained, positive school leaver destinations for all young people Key drivers of improvement have also been identified, these are: School leadership. Teacher professionalism. Parental engagement. Assessment of children’s progress. School improvement. Performance information. Our school is committed to taking these priorities forward and developing each driver through our annual School Improvement Plan (SIP.) Assessment of children’s progress throughout the Broad General Education (to end of S3) As one of the drivers, our school, alongside all schools in Scotland, has been required to report on Curriculum for Excellence levels for literacy and numeracy achieved by all children at the end of stages P1, P4, P7 and S3. This data is submitted to South Lanarkshire Council in June each year and collected subsequently by the Scottish Government. This data is based on teacher judgement, informed by a wide range of assessment evidence including standardised testing where appropriate. As from session 2016/17 all schools in Scotland will be required to participate in the new Scotland National Standardised Assessment (SNSA) project. This will further help inform teacher judgement of levels. The following table shows benchmarks for children achieving Curriculum for Excellence Levels. 3 Level Stage covering 3 years approx. Early The pre-school years and P1, or later for some. First To the end of P4, but earlier or later for some. Second To the end of P7, but earlier or later for some. S1 to S3, but earlier for some. The fourth level broadly equates to Scottish Credit and Qualifications Third and Framework level 4. Fourth The fourth level experiences and outcomes are intended to provide possibilities for choice and young people’s programmes will not include all of the fourth level outcomes. Senior S4 to S6, and college or other means of study. phase Some children and young people will start learning at these levels earlier and others later, depending upon individual needs and abilities. Many children not attaining National Levels will have an Additional Support Plan (ASP) and may be making good progress but against different milestones e.g. individual targets. Learning progress is not about how fast children move through the levels but about ‘how much’ and ‘how well’ children learn, having depth and breadth of experiences at each level. Assessment of these levels is based on a wide variety of evidence and ways of measuring progress such as assessment of projects, general class work, observations and peer assessment. Where possible, children and young people are encouraged to be directly involved in the assessment process. Schools and teachers work with others to set shared standards for assessing progress. These standards are based on National “benchmarks” for each area of the curriculum. This process is called moderation and it ensures that schools have similar expectations. What follows is our school’s data about achievement of these levels for sessions 15/16 (when data was first collected) and 16/17. 4 Attainment data - Attainment of Curriculum for Excellence levels 2015/16 (teacher judgement) Reading Writing Listening & Talking P1 P4 P7 P1 P4 P7 P1 P4 P7 Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved School Early or First or Second Early or First or Second Early or First or Second better better or better better better or better better better or better Underbank 95.5% 73.7% 76.5% 95.5% 73.7% 70.6% 95.5% 89.5% 100.0% Primary SLC 80.0% 75.2% 72.3% 78.2% 67.9% 62.7% 83.8% 82.6% 79.7% National 80.8% 75.2% 72.3% 78.2% 69.3% 65.1% 85.0% 80.9% 77.4% Numeracy P1 P4 P7 Achieved Achieved Achieved School Early or First or Second better better or better Underbank 95.5% 68.4% 64.7% Primary SLC 83.0% 71.2% 67.9% National 83.9% 73.1% 67.8% 1.2 Predicted Attainment 2016/17 National Improvement Framework - Attainment of Curriculum for Excellence levels 2016/17 Reading Writing Listening & Talking P1 P4 P7 P1 P4 P7 P1 P4 P7 School Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Achieved Early or Early or Early or Early or Early or Early or Early or Early or Early or better better better better better better better better better Underbank 100% 87% 64% 100% 93% 54.5% 100% 93% 100.0% PS Numeracy P1 P4 P7 Achieved Achieved Achieved School Early or First or Second better better or better Underbank 100% 80% 81.8% PS 5 Achieving Excellence: Overall Progress towards National Improvement Framework Priorities Session 2016-17 Use all available evidence (including data) Literacy: Progress satisfactory good very good excellent Strengths Our spelling data for 2016 – 2017 shows the positive impact of the North Lanarkshire spelling approach from P1-4 and teachers also recognise the positive impact of our work to develop higher order reading skills throughout all stages. Our predicted data for listening and talking shows that this is a real strength from P1-7 at Underbank. Areas for Development A large number of our P7 group this session have been supported in literacy throughout their years with us. This has impacted greatly on P7 writing, reading and numeracy data. As we progress NLC spelling approaches into P5 next session, we believe this will impact positively on data in the years ahead. Our aim is to work on moderation and holistic assessments for listening and talking to build staff confidence within achievement of a level using the new Benchmarks. We will continue to develop writing as a learning community, aiming for a consistent standard across our school and our learning community.