Parents and Carers Annual Questionnaire Results - November 2024

Thank you for your feedback as part of our recent OFSTED inspection. We had a good response to the survey (76 family responses) and we are pleased to share the results with you via the link below. 

You views are very important to us as part of our self-review process and to inform  and support our planning of the children's learning journey at Oakham Primary.

As part of the feedback process, we previously asked parents and carers to offer any further comments or questions about our school and the provision we currently offer. 

We hope that the information shared below answers these and provides useful information about our school and our approach to your children's learning and personal development...

Off-site visits and residential trips can be expensive, especially in current financial climate.

This is an issue which we have discussed with staff and school governors as we obviously want the children to experience a wide range of visits and trips during their time at Oakham. 

We run three residentials to LA centres as we benefit from preferential prices as a Sandwell school and these are staggered across Years 2, 4 and 6. We have tried to give families as much time as possible with payments and children eligible for Pupil Premium funding benefit from a 50% reduction. Families who have concerns with payments are encouraged to contact the school office. 

Each class will participate in an off-site visit, linked to their learning, once a year. Staff are asked to plan these in advance to give families time to arrange payments for pupils not entitled to Pupil Premium. 

We will review the planning of these and ensure additional time is made available. We price every trip and residential to cover costs only and do not make any profit from these. 

To minimise costs and encourage as many families to participate in our residentials, we are subsidising the transport costs for this year's residential trips. 

Why don't Key Stage Two children have a Christmas Performance?

The  EYFS and KS1 performances do take up a lot of time to prepare and we only have one school hall. It would severely impact on curriculum teaching time and the PE timetable if we were to involve eight additional classes in rehearsals and practices. 

These encourage the children to develop confidence and the experience of  performing to an audience and so we have created additional opportunities throughout their journey through school.   

In KS2, each year group has an assembly or production linked to their learning and families are invited into school for these:

• Y3: Ukulele Performance - Summer Music Assembly
• Y4: Harvest Assembly
• Y5: Easter Assembly
• Y6: Leavers Production

How can I find out what subjects and topics my child will be learning about?

Curriculum Overviews for the Spring term have been uploaded to the              'Learning>Curriculum' section of our website to give families more information on what children will be learning about during this term. 

Each term, we also host informal 'drop-in' sessions focused on a particular element of learning. Recent events have highlighted 'Phonics', 'Comprehension' and 'Learning in Science'. 

Each drop-in includes a short presentation from the Subject Lead (Staff) and an opportunity to visit classes, across the school,  to see the learning focus on action. 

Feedback from these events has been overwhelmingly positive and we will be sharing our next event and learning focus in a few weeks...

How does Oakham Primary support my child's 'Wider Development'?

As well as following the statutory national curriculum subjects, we aspire to provide all of our children with the broadest curriculum and learning journey as possible. This is designed to provide frequent opportunities to cover areas such as:

• The Development of self-understanding and empathy.
• Making and maintaining healthy, productive relationships
•  Relationships Education
•  Understanding Healthy Lifestyles
•  Keeping safe on roads and around water
•  How to stay safe on the internet
• The promotion of good mental health
• Following the 'Clever Never Goes' and NSPCC 'PANTS' approaches
• Developing in to a great 'Oakham Learner'

Over their time at Oakham, children have opportunities to visit three Sandwell Residential Centres (Edgmond Hall -Y2, Frank Chapman -Y4 & Plas Gwynant -Y6) and participate in annual day trips to support learning. We regularly provide opportunities to engage with guest speakers, external organisations and author visits to our school. 

We run a School Council for KS2 children and Y6 children are trained as 'Young Leaders' to support children across school with fun activities during lunchtime as part of our 'Active Playgrounds' project. 

Our trained and supervised KS2 'Well-Being Champions' provide support to peers, promote emotional wellbeing and a positive mental health attitude around school and on our playgrounds.