Nicola James (Headteacher at St Andrew's Primary School): Surviving the new OFSTED Framework

In this episode, Claire meets Nicola James, the headteacher of St Andrew’s Primary School in Bishop Auckland. Having recently had an OFSTED inspection under the new framework, Nicola shares her experience with Claire in order to help other schools who may be facing an imminent inspection themselves. After initially wanting to work in a bank (mainly so she could wear a smart suit every day!), Nicola was inspired to teach by her secondary school tutor, Mr Wilson, who told her she needed to be working with people. This inspired Nicola to want to make a difference to the lives of others, so she studied at Northumbria University before getting a teaching job as an NQT. Having worked in schools for over 22 years, Nicola has taken on many roles: these include art lead and SLT, and, after starting St Andrew’s 6 years ago, she became deputy head after 2 terms, acting head (while her headteacher did a secondment) a year and a half later and finally became substantive head at the school a year ago. The experiences she had as a deputy encountering OFSTED and a head encountering OFSTED varied quite significantly, with Nicola calling them, “a totally different experience.” In the podcast, Nicola speaks with Claire about her experience of her recent OFSTED inspection, the format of the days themselves, including the day before and the day after the inspection, as well as the newly-introduced ‘deep dives’. They discuss the new framework and what the inspection looked like for Nicola’s school under it. By discussing her experiences, Nicola explains what schools, headteachers and staff can do to best prepare themselves for what is a stressful time in the lives of any school staff. KEY TAKEAWAYS Find little ways to be as prepared as you can for the inspection.You can anticipate when OFSTED might visit, but (as was the case for Nicola who thought they might come in November but they actually came in October) they may visit earlier or later than expected. Some of the best ways to prepare include: creating an action plan so that everybody knows their role for the day of the phone call and the days of the inspections; compiling a list of questions that OFSTED might ask on their initial phone call (some authorities may already have this) and jotting down answers to them before the inspection; having mock interviews with subject leads, including some of the questions they might ask, and making sure everybody is giving the same key messages about the school and its practices. Use the 90 minute phone call to highlight to the inspector all the strengths and positives about your school, and arm yourself with information about the inspection.The admin team will usually ring some time in the morning (for Nicola, it was 10:30) and this is followed up by a phone call with the lead inspector. After the admin call, you may want to talk to staff and inform them of the upcoming inspection and discuss what messages you are wanting to send to the inspection team about your school. On the phone call with the lead inspector, there is chance to negotiate the subjects for the deep dives, and to inform your staff of this. There is also chance for you to tell your inspector the context of your school and what makes you unique. As in Nicola’s case, it may take more than 90 minutes due to the new framework being in place. It might be useful to take notes during this time so you can feedback to staff. A lot of the guesswork has gone from the new OFSTED framework.A key finding from the podcast is that a lot of the ‘unknown’ about the running of the inspection seems to have been eliminated from the new framework. You can negotiate the subject of deep dives (except reading and maths if you are in a primary) and a timetable is provided for the school of where the inspectors are going to be and at what time during the day. The inspectors also ensure that when a staff member is out of class to talk to one of the inspectors, the other one will not visit that class. This takes away some of the stress that comes from the ‘not knowing’ and expecting every visitor to your room to be the inspectors. The new framework is as new for the inspectors as it is for schools.Even if they have been inspectors for a long time, the new framework is new and will take some getting used to. This might mean that the inspectors are acutely aware of how little time they have to do everything they need to, especially if they are having to check things with HMI in order to ensure that the new procedures are being followed accurately. There are also transition arrangements in place for ‘Good’ schools for their curriculum intent and planning; the OFSTED inspector needs to be sure that the school has the capacity to have things in place in 2 years because the framework is so new. Gone are the days of excessive paper and clipboards.Everything under a new framework inspection is done digitally so there will be no more people coming in with clipboards! The inspectors cross reference their ‘cards’ (for things such as safeguarding) to ensure that they are not repeating questions. There is also less of a focus on data and paper-based evidence. Deep dives can take different forms, but conversations with staff and children remain at the heart.For the reading and maths deep dives, subject leaders were spoken to (as were children), classes were visited and books were looked at. The bottom 20% of Years 1, 2 and 6 read to the inspectors, although this may look different in your school. In reading, the inspectors wanted to check that reading books matched abilities and that the phonics scheme was secure; in maths, the inspectors wanted to know what the school were currently doing and what the plans for the future were. If a deep dive is happening in a subject that isn’t being taught, the inspectors will probably choose to scrutinise the books in more detail, as well as talking to the subject lead and the children. Consistency is key.The inspectors in Nicola’s school were adamant that they should not alter from their usual working week. This meant that even though the deep dive was in history, no history lessons were being taught, but this was okay. When the fire alarm went off, the inspectors reassured the staff to just ‘do what you normally do’. The consistency will enable the staff, and children, to feel more secure in what they are doing. Feedback from the inspectors doesn’t look exactly the same as in the previous framework.If you are having a 2-day inspection, the deputy and head will probably be asked to sit in on a meeting at the end of the first day, where the inspectors feed back to each other. You are not allowed to interject during this but can make notes to feedback to staff and can challenge anything that they have said at the end. The inspectors will feed back to the SLT and governors at the end of the inspection as usual and then this can be disseminated to staff once the inspector has left. Give as much time as possible to your middle leaders.Under the new framework, the scrutiny lies more with the middle leaders than with the headteacher so it’s important that middle leaders are given the time to fully understand their subject and how it looks across school. They need to be able to understand what is happening across school and where the subject is going, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of the subject. Giving staff time to understand this, allowing them to get into classes and liaise with other class teachers, as well as allocating staff meeting time to it and holding mock interviews, will increase confidence levels when it comes to answering whatever question might be asked of them during an inspection. Expect the unexpected!No matter how prepared you think you are for an inspection, there will always be something that crops up. Whether this be a 2-day inspection when you were expecting a 1-day inspection, the cooks setting off the fire alarm or a hamster in a lunchbox; the more you can pull together as a team, the easier it will be to deal with the unforeseen challenges! BEST MOMENTS “Obviously you talk to other headteachers of their experiences but none of my headteacher colleagues had had the experience of this framework so I felt really vulnerable and I felt a bit like a guinea pig so it was kind of going into the unknown.” “Tuesday morning, 10:30, my secretary comes in, knocks on the door: “I’ve got OFSTED on the phone,” and you can feel your face drain. If I’d been standing up, I think my knees would have gone. You process that information…really, it’s as if you’ve been smacked in the face.” “We said to staff, ‘Let’s get together at lunchtime,’ and we just got it all out of our system, anything that we were worried about and what we needed to do. Fortunately, we already had a plan in the staffroom, for if we get the call…down to who’s ordering the pizza, who’s going round the displays putting the things that are hanging off on, so we had it military style…Everybody had a purpose.” “During that time [the phone call with the lead inspector], the deputy head’s writing down everything I’m saying so that we then had another meeting with staff…[we said] ‘This is the messages we’ve been sending to the OFSTED inspector; this is what he’s expecting to see and hear,’ just so they had the same message, because that was important. That’s what he was coming back to find out: if what I was saying is true.” “We had a Section 8…We were expecting a Section 5 but because our 2018 data wasn’t so good, they risk assessed us on that, which meant we got a 2-day. We had 2 inspectors on the first day and 1 inspector on the second…That threw us a bit, because we thought we were already Good so are they coming to make us Requires Improvement, based on that data? Our 2019 data was strong and we were worried that they weren’t going to take that into consideration…we thought we were going to have to fight for Good, but there was no fight. Everything they saw they were happy with.” “During that day [the first day], as headteacher, I was twiddling my thumbs; I didn’t know what to do with myself…I felt really useless to be honest…It was a strange feeling.” “We did flowers, chocolate biscuits, tea, coffee, juice… it was like a hotel room for them… I don’t know if the flowers helped, but it made us feel better.” “He came and gave the deputy and I our feedback and told us what our rating was going to be… he gave feedback to governors, which was very similar to what he’d given us, and then he went, and he was gone by half 4. The staff all filtered in and we repeated it again to them and had a big sigh of relief and it was all over!” “It’s important to say that the timetable isn’t set in stone because every school is different, every school has a different amount of staff. He absolutely didn’t want us to change anything from the norm. We agreed that he would look at history, but because we block our subjects, there wasn’t going to be any history taught that week, but we said we would put some history lessons on…he said, ‘Absolutely not. Do not change your timetable; it’s not fair on the children; it wouldn’t be part of their progression of skills, so don’t change anything.’” “The staff were amazing - they were amazing. I fill up about it still because they were just… they just smashed it. I couldn’t be happier. They just all took on their roles, they didn’t flap, they just got on with it… They got on with their jobs; they knew what they had to do; they knew what the message was that we had to get across; they were so passionate and some of the feedback that was given was how infectious their enthusiasm was and that sums up who we are.” “Last year, I was beginning to feel the anxiety towards it [the inspection]. I know, if I’m being honest, hand on heart, that it affected my health, because I felt that pressure, coming down, and I can’t tell you the difference, now they’ve been… It’s unbelievable, the pressure. When you’re going through it, you don’t notice it – or you try to deny it, really – but when it’s gone, you realise how heavy it was.” “Just the week before they came…I’d had a conversation with staff, kind of thanking them, because I know they were working ridiculously hard because we were thinking they’re coming November, let’s put everything in this term, but I’d said to them, ‘We can’t maintain this. We can’t go on this hard, and working these hours: what if they don’t come November? What if it’s another term? We’re going to kill ourselves. We have to stop. We can’t do this.’” “[Our OFSTED inspectors] were human. They were lovely, approachable people. I don’t know if we were lucky, because I have heard some stories, and there’s certain ones where you think, ‘I hope we don’t get them!’ but we got two really approachable, human inspectors.” “For me, and for our school, I can’t say with anything different but positive. I was blown away by how positive it was. I wasn’t expecting to feel like that… It was a partnership, we worked together, and we hadn’t been ‘done to’; it wasn’t a negative experience.” “I fed them [the staff] and made sure they were ok. I made sure they weren’t here until a ridiculous time; sent them home to their families. Asked them if they needed some time… but I didn’t feel like I needed to hold their hand. They were ready.” “It’s about feeling prepared, and feeling confident, that if you get asked that question, you’re going to have an answer for it.” “Have those notes for that phone call… Calm yourself down, and it’s all on the screen. I would say take some time, you and your deputy, to sit down… having that aide memoire will save you… I just kept going back to it. I was so pleased I did it. It was a lifesaver.” “That plan that I had for OFSTED…have that ready… have that up…it becomes wallpaper but my God everybody knows where it is on the day, and they go to it, and it just ran like clockwork.” “I did a really long assembly in the morning so staff could go and have biscuits and tea and just relax, and I asked the deputy head to speak to staff and let them know that I was going to give them a day off during the year, which they gratefully received so they can choose a day, during this year to take, when it suits them.” “I would like to give my staff more time to do the things that they need to do, so I would need some more money, to employ another member of staff to take their children… That would be the answer to all of our problems.” “I just would like schools to be that place that I remember as a child: a fun, happy place to be but for everyone. Not just the children, but for the staff as well. I just think if you’re enjoying teaching, the children will enjoy learning.” “It really is a time to celebrate your school, and there’s so many opportunities to do that.” VALUABLE RESOURCES Nicola James:http://www.st-andrews-pri.durham.sch.uk/ (School Website)https://www.facebook.com/groups/866792993453061/ (Facebook leaders website) OFSTED Transition Arrangements: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/830378/School_Inspection_Report_Sept2019.pdfThe Teachers’ Podcast: https://www.facebook.com/groups/TheTeachersPodcast/Classroom Secrets Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ClassroomSecretsLimited/Classroom Secrets website: https://classroomsecrets.co.uk/ LIFE/work balance campaign: https://classroomsecrets.co.uk/lifeworkbalance-and-wellbeing-in-education-campaign-2019/ ABOUT THE HOSTClaire Riley Claire, alongside her husband Ed, is one of the directors of Classroom Secrets, a company she founded in 2013 and which provides outstanding differentiated resources for teachers, schools, parents and tutors worldwide. Having worked for a number of years as a teacher in both Primary and Secondary education, and experiencing first-hand the difficulties teachers were facing finding appropriate high-quality resources for their lessons, Claire created Classroom Secrets with the aim of helping reduce the workload for all school staff. Claire is a passionate believer in a LIFE/work balance for those who work in education citing the high percentage of teachers who leave or plan to leave their jobs each year. Since February 2019, Classroom Secrets has been running their LIFE/work balance campaign to highlight this concerning trend. The Teachers’ Podcast is a series of interviews where Claire meets with a wide range of guests involved in the field of education. These podcasts provide exciting discussions and different perspectives and thoughts on a variety of themes which are both engaging and informative for anyone involved in education.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.