My child is happy at school
96% of parents surveyed strongly agree or agree / 4% do not know

My child feels safe at school
94% of parents surveyed strongly agree or agree / 6% do not know

When I have raised concerns with the school they have been dealt with properly
96% of parents surveyed strongly agree or agree / 2% disagree / 2% do not know

The school has high expectations for my child
96% of parents surveyed strongly agree or agree / 4% disagree

• Supportive and understanding school. It is a very friendly school with a strong community feel. As it is a small school, children can make friends with children from other year groups. Office and staff are always helpful.
• Personable as everyone knows all the children. Best attention is given to each child. The size of the school feels more personal.
• Good faculty, religious values, helping kids to focus on core values and helping them grow into good individuals.
• It is a safe and lovely school and all children are given equal opportunity.
• Ethos of the school.
• Care provided for the pupils. They really pay attention to the littlest details about the general wellbeing of the children, not just their studies. The children are happy.
• There is an open-door policy where parents are kept informed and feel welcomed and encouraged to be involved. Communication with parents.
• Teaching and learning has improved a lot. The increased encouragement to learn more – reading, writing and other activities. The increased drive to see all children to achieve since Sep 2022. Teachers do everything they can for the children to learn more.
• The school listens to parents and have implemented suggestions.
• The teachers across the school and the learning they provide to the pupils. The staff are supportive and approachable. Great engagement from teachers. Teachers take time for all children.
• Expectations to read five times a week. The new reading and attendance scheme is brilliant.
• Good food choices for school lunch.
• The encouragement of the arts.
• Interventions and catch-up strategies to support children who are below age-related expectations. Feedback about child’s progress and interventions in place to support learning. Interventions that are being offered to Year 6 pupils.

Further development of the curriculum.
The Little Waltham Curriculum will be constantly improving and evolving over the next three years. We are pleased to have improved the curriculum this academic year to include:

• New local studies in History and Geography such as Marconi – The Titanic (Year 3).
• Curriculum Enrichment in place with the link with Chatham Green for a Climate Change Project in Year 5 and 6; National Gallery’s ‘Take One Picture Programme’ and the Little Waltham Speech Festival.
• There has been an increasingly focused approach to the teaching of Reading across the school with quality core novels used in Key Stage 2.
• A ‘Teaching for Mastery’ approach has been implemented in Mathematics. Mastering Number Programme is used to support early number fluency in EYFS and Key Stage 1.
• Curriculum subjects are monitored termly by governors and subject leaders in the school meet termly with local school subject leaders to develop their subject further.

To educate and inform pupils regarding bullying.
No form of bullying is tolerated at Little Waltham:

• New behaviour and relationships policy in place from September 2022, which can be read here.
• Reflection task used for pupils with a trained adult where behaviour does not meet expectations.
• All staff receive ongoing CPD on the T.P.P (Trauma Perceptive Practice) programme. This supports staff to understand behaviour and support emotional wellbeing.
• Regular focus weeks such as anti-bullying week, online safety week.
• Workshops to educate pupils eg. NSPCC – Speak out stay safe programme, Essex Fire and Police Service – Cyber safety.
• Regular behaviour and attitude expectations reinforced during worship linked to our core Christian values, PSHE lessons, in class behaviour expectations and lessons.

More opportunities for parents to be involved in children’s learning – open mornings and reading drop-ins.
As a school we are looking to develop this further over the next twelve months:

• At present, we have invited parents into school for special worship mornings such as Harvest and Remembrance Day.
• Each class will be planning a class assembly to showcase learning to parents.
• Parent workshops have taken place in Autumn term for Early Reading and Mathematics – Early Number. (Morning and evening workshops)
• Swimming pool workgroup have met to discuss future of swimming pool.
• ‘Meet the teacher’ year group curriculum parent meeting at the start of the year.
• Reception Stay and Play session
• Termly SEND Coffee Afternoon
• Parent reading volunteers read with pupils weekly.
• We have more workshops planned – please see our Parent Engagement Calendar.

Use of app to send messages rather than email.
Communication will continue to be made by email and app as different parents prefer different mediums of communication.

PTA and more PTA events. More social events for the children to interact with each other in a less formal setting.
PTA events to be published on the website. There are many new members of the PTA this year and we are thankful and appreciate their time and efforts. After a successful Christmas Bazaar, other events will be planned.

• Move and Munch event later this half term.

Communication with parents.

• The partnership with parents is extremely important and we always want communication to be as good as possible. At the start of the year, we returned to an open-door approach where parents could have face to face communication with teachers at the end of the school day. At the start of the school day, teachers are in class however we always have staff on the gate to pass any messages on.
• We have worked on improving communication further with parents through our new text service.
• The website and newsletter continue as forms of regular communication to parents.
• We are open to new opportunities that arise that would improve parent-school communication.

More time in the school day.
Linking to the Government’s White Paper document all schools will be required to offer at least a 32.5 hours school week by September 2023. Our school times will be changing for the second half term of the Summer term to the following to meet these requirements:

• School gates will open from 8:40am
• Registration will close at 9:00am
• School day will finish at 3:15pm

Spelling Club.
Spelling Club is difficult to implement due to the different stages and expectations of spellings within each year group. We however are looking at development within the teaching of spelling within each year group and providing support with spelling at home.

The opportunity for children to take part in swimming / swimming lessons provision.
A parent consultation took place on the 18th November regarding swimming provision. Everyone agreed the current swimming building was in a very poor state and could see the repairs that would need to be made at very high costs to the school. Swimming provision is now in place for Year 6 pupils and is planned for the second half of the Summer term.

To further develop teaching and learning and expectations for the children in the school. To ensure all children achieve their best not just meeting average requirements.
The core purpose of a school is to put children and learning at the heart of everything we do. The curriculum we deliver must be challenging, ambitious and enjoyable for the children.

To ensure children achieve their best and reach their potential we have:

• Used smaller class sizes in Year 6 and Year 2 to enable pupils to receive increased teacher time and in the moment feedback to enable them to make accelerated progress.
• School led tuition in place focusing on reading or mathematics development.
• Monitoring and tracking in place for all pupils and reviewed on a half termly basis. All pupils with SEND now have One Plan meetings each term.
• Parents are informed on progress by either a parent consultation in the first half of a term or a written progress report in the second half of a term.
• Focused CPD on the teaching of reading across the school. The teaching of reading skills is a current school priority objective.
• Ongoing development within the Early Years Foundation Stage to immerse our children in stories, rhymes and poetry and development of speech and language.
• Classrooms are vocabulary rich and development of language and vocabulary is being prioritised in lessons.
• The school is working in partnership with local schools to develop best practice. The school are also working with Lyons Hall Primary on the Reading Comprehension Programme, a Science specialist to improve Science teaching and learning and Essex Venn Maths Hub on the development of mathematics across the school.

Open days for parents.
We will be holding an open day in our final parents evening in the Summer term. The pupils loved showcasing their artwork in the ‘Take One Picture’ art exhibition open afternoon for parents and the school are keen to explore further opportunities for open afternoons/mornings for parents.

This question will help form a Parents’ School Improvement Plan and understand the key aspects of the school that you would like developed over the coming years.

Swimming in the Curriculum. Remove the swimming pool and utilise the space.
The Swimming Pool Parents Workgroup is scheduled to meet on Wednesday 22nd March at 2pm to discuss future of the development of the swimming pool area. Pupils from the school council, local community will also play a part in discussing next steps of development.

School to continue to stay dynamic.
We will continue developing curriculum, standards, teaching and learning and pupil opportunities across the school. Parent feedback supports the school to continue to move forward.

Foreign language provision at Key Stage 2.
The school will be introducing a new Modern Foreign Languages scheme of work in the Summer term 2023. All pupils in Key Stage 2 will have weekly dedicated time for the teaching of Modern Foreign Languages.

Continue direction school is going to promote high expectations and standards. A strong focus on the development of reading.
Reading is key to the development plans for the school as this opens up the whole curriculum to our pupils. The development of reading and instilling high expectations in everything we do as a school will remain a central thread to the development plan over the next three years.

Continue to invite parents into school for events. Increase parent workshops in the evening or notes to be provided for morning parent workshops.
Parents play an extremely important part in the education of their child. We will be building on our Parent Engagement Calendar within the next two academic years.

Greater focus on technology.
We have recently implemented our new Computing Curriculum (from September 2022). We have also invested in laptops and the Clicker software to support some of our pupils in class.

Structure for ongoing staff CPD development.
Staff CPD and development has been a key objective on the school improvement plan. We know the quality of teaching is the greatest influence on pupil progress. Improving practice leads to improved outcomes for pupils. Over the next three years, development in teaching and learning is key to ensuring high expectations and standards are met at Little Waltham.

Greater variety of clubs, after-school options and sports activities eg. Cricket. A homework club or a times tables / spelling and punctuation club. Clubs for reception.
We introduced a range of new clubs for this academic year and will be refreshing the clubs available each term. We have some fantastic before and after school clubs available at present such as Dance, Kickboxing, Choir, Football, Science Stem Club.

After listening to requests from our pupils, we are looking to introduce Basketball and Cricket clubs in the Summer term.

We are in the process of trying to source clubs for Reception pupils. We are hoping to introduce a ‘Gym Trail’ club soon to support pupils with fine and gross motor skills.

To develop a reputation for good academic achievement. School should be more competitive and more challenging tasks for the students. Have high expectations of children and focus on key reading, writing and mathematics skills.
Raising standards and establishing high expectations for all is a key objective in the 5 year long term plan for Little Waltham School. We want to ensure we equip and support our pupils to be in the best position to continue their education in secondary school. Reading development has taken place over the Autumn and Spring term. The school are currently working with Venn Essex Mathematics Hub to develop teaching and learning in Mathematics using a teaching for mastery approach. New programmes that have been implemented in September such as the Mastering Number programme in Reception and Key Stage 1 have had a positive impact on pupils’ early number skills.

Development and enrichment of the school curriculum. Take opportunities to develop an exciting and creative curriculum. Further experiences and learning for the children to widen their learning.
It is crucial that we constantly ensure that we have an evolving and improving curriculum to make sure that our pupils get the best educational opportunities and experiences. In the Autumn term there has been a focus on the development of the Art and Design and Technology curriculum and added enrichment that took place in Spring term with the ‘Take One Picture’ art programme. Our Reading curriculum has been developed during the Autumn term and a new computing scheme of work was introduced in September.

Homework – more regular spellings and times tables weekly and matched to the child’s ability.
A new homework policy and approach will be launched in the Summer term. Our approach to learning times tables and spellings will also be analysed and these will be actions within the second year of school improvement.

Strengthen friendships in school. More activities as per personal development of the children.
As a school we are committed to support friendships form and develop. We are looking to not only teach and develop personal development through teaching and curriculum but look for opportunities to support through breaktime and lunchtime provision. In the next year we will be looking to develop pastoral care and support within the school.

Bigger school dinners.
Thank you for the feedback regarding school dinners. This will be passed onto the catering team.

More school trips.
School trips are opportunities to enrich the learning experiences for pupils. This academic year children have had school trips to the theatre, experience days in school, Colchester Castle, Mountfitchet Castle and Toy Museum, Duxford Air Museum, Space Wonderdome, Essex Fire Museum. Year 5 are attending ‘Wicked the Musical’ in London’s West End in March.

We have also taken part in whole class sporting events such as Superstars in Year 4 at the Melbourne Stadium. Year 1 will be taking part in the Teddylympics and Year 2 will be taking part in the Mini Games. Year 5 will also be taking part in the Junior Music Festival this year.

We are hoping to put plans in place for all school trips and learning opportunities at the start of the new academic year. This will be shared with parents and carers during the ‘Meet the Teacher’ meeting at the start of the Autumn term.

Greater focus on end of Key Stage 1 SATS.
It is important that we support our pupils to be in the best position as possible before starting Key Stage 2. To ensure the best progress is made, we currently have employed two small classes with two experienced teachers in Year 2 to support our pupils to make rapid gains in the Spring 2 and Summer 1 half terms in preparation for the Key Stage 1 SATs. We analyse and look at pupil progress as a leadership team each half term.

The after-school clubs are great and the school trips are now happening.

Great opportunities for the children with the clubs and the trips.

I recommend this school to everyone who asks in the catchment area.

My child’s reading and writing has improved dramatically.

Very happy with the school.  

The school has changed in a very positive light.

Brilliant communication with parents.