Ofsted has recommended that primaries work with other schools on curriculum design to overcome the challenge of lacking expertise across multiple subjects.
The schools watchdog has produced a blog today addressing what primary school subject leaders should expect during inspections.
It follows concerns from some heads that the inspectorate’s subject focus is creating expectations on primary schools to have a level of expertise they cannot achieve.
Ofsted’s curriculum-focused Education Inspection Framework gathers evidence by carrying out “deep dives” into particular subjects during school inspection.
In a new blog today, Heather Fearn and Jonathan Keay, Her Majesty’s Inspectors (HMI) from Ofsted’s curriculum team, have acknowledged that in primary schools - and particularly smaller ones - “it is often not possible or realistic to develop detailed expertise in multiple subject areas - neither do we expect you to”.
They add: “What is important is that, as a collective, staff give careful thought to the content they want pupils to be taught and to remember.
“To overcome the challenges of expertise in multiple curriculum areas, lots of schools work with other local schools to design their curriculum.
“Schools also make use of schemes of work that are developed by subject specialists.”
The blog also says Ofsted does not consider it necessary for schools to design curriculum themselves.
It adds: “Whatever it is you do, it hasn’t got to be all singing and dancing. Your curriculum just needs to be ambitious and coherent.”
The HMI stress that Ofsted inspectors are aware of the impact inspection visits have on teachers in a small school.
They say: “We also know that small schools won’t necessarily have the capacity to provide the same resources and experiences as larger schools.
“That is why the deep dive will focus on what matters most for the quality of each pupil’s education: whether pupils are learning the knowledge they need to achieve the goals of their education.”
What does Ofsted ask primary school subject leads about during a deep dive?
The new blog says: “We’re likely to want to talk to the subject leader as close to the start of a deep dive as possible. This helps us have a sense of the ‘big picture’. We’ll understand if the subject isn’t an area of specialism for you.
“What matters most is what you want pupils to learn and why. We don’t have any expectations about what paperwork schools provide and you can bring any notes you might wish to refer to during the discussion. It is up to you how you record and set out your curriculum expectations.”
Ofsted says it will ask questions such as:
- Does the subject curriculum match the scope and ambition of the national curriculum?
- Are there clear end points? Can we see how content is broken down into manageable chunks to build towards those end points?
- Are the identified chunks logically sequenced? Do they prepare pupils for the learning that is to come?
Subject leads are also likely to be asked specifically about lessons inspectors see as part of a deep dive.
The blog adds: “We’ll hopefully be able to see the chunks we talked about being taught and practised. We’ll start to understand how well pupils are remembering the content and using it to understand more complex ideas or answer more complex questions.”
It also says that when it does visit lessons, “it isn’t to judge teaching”.
The blog follows concerns from some primary school heads that Ofsted’s current subject focus is setting expectations for schools that go beyond the national curriculum.
Ofsted has been publishing a series of subject reviews and reports focused on both its own inspection findings and outside research into specific subject teaching.
At a Schools North East conference in autumn last year, Darlington headteacher Pete King warned that heads were concerned that primary schools could not meet the level of subject expertise being promoted by Ofsted.
