A TOCKHOLES primary school has been told that it requires improvement by the education watchdog Ofsted for the second time in nine months.

St Stephen’s CE Primary School was inspected in December and received the same rating after the inspector’s previous visit in March 2014.

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The report, which was published on Friday, said that teaching at the school does not take into account the needs of all pupils closely enough so pupils are not moved on rapidly in their learning.

Lead Inspector Fiona McNally said that pupils, including those who are disadvantaged, are not making good progress in reading, writing and mathematics.

She said: “Governors have not robustly challenged the data they have been given, which means that, in some cases, inaccurate information about pupils’ progress has been accepted.

“In the nine months since the previous inspection, improvements to teaching have not yet lifted standards to where they should be.

“Marking and feedback are done regularly but the points identified by the teachers are not used by the pupils to move their learning on.

“Leaders in the school do not ensure that the assessment of pupils’ progress and attainment is checked with sufficient care.”

The report did say that pupils’ behaviour has improved since the last inspection and that attendance is well above the average and has continued to rise.

Head teacher Dominic James, said: “Ofsted visited our school on December 4 and December 5 and found many positive aspects which included good behaviour, excellent attendance and quality of teaching in literacy skills, particularly writing.

“As a small church school the area we are most pleased with is the good spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of our children.

“We know there are areas we can improve on and we are already putting in place plans to make those improvements which will help us to develop children’s progress.

“One of the main areas we are looking at is the development of assessment for learning principles.

“This with other strategies will be implemented to help move our school forward.

“We are committed to make these improvements as quickly as possible.

“The governors and I are very proud of our small school.

“The way that our children and staff welcomed Ofsted was a credit to the ethos of our school.”