As you know, we had our SIAMS (Statutory Inspection of Anglican and Methodist Schools) on 09 March!

Our report is now in, and you can read it in full on our website here!

Thank you ever so much to everyone who contributed to our inspection, either by meeting the inspector personally, or via email, and also, to those of you who shared your good luck wishes, they meant a lot to us!

We are delighted with the report, and we feel it has captured us at Shap CE School well!

With regards to behaviour and wellbeing, the inspector found:

• We are an inclusive community where ‘all can soar’. Through the school’s individualised approach to learning, ‘all can soar’ from their own starting point
• The school develops the strengths and addresses any weaknesses of each individual pupil, so that every pupil is given specific opportunities to excel
• We enable all to be the ‘best self’ they can be, created in the image of God
• Pupils’ behaviour is good and they show care and concern for each other

With regards to our curriculum, the inspector praised:

• A strength of the school is its curriculum provision, which is well designed to ensure the flourishing of the whole child
• The school’s curriculum is bold, varied, and individualised
• The busy and active curriculum includes bespoke elements tailored to the school’s rural Cumbrian environment. Opportunities are timetabled for outdoor education, field trips to cities, and occasions when more able pupils work with students from the nearby grammar school.
• Children confidently engage with key issues in the world around them. Pupils sent their hopes for the future of the world to pilgrims journeying to the Climate Change Conference in Glasgow. Pupils help develop positive attitudes of citizenship and responsibility by working with police in their local community to address parking problems and litter 

Writing about our Collective Worship, the inspector noted:

• Collective worship provision is rich, strong, and integral to school life
• Collective worship is biblically based and linked to the school’s values. It is inclusive, invitational, and integral to the school’s life. Through the strong partnerships forged between school leaders, churches and worship leaders in the local area, worship provision has been greatly enhanced. As a result, pupils experience a rich variety of styles and elements of Christian worship

The inspector observed RE and scrutinised our books, and concluded:

• Pupils benefit from skillful religious education (RE) teaching and a progressive curriculum
• RE curriculum is well constructed, coherent and ambitious. Due to sound, confident teaching, particularly in years 5 and 6, learning in RE is effective. RE enables all pupils make good progress, including those with additional needs and the most able. Evidence in books shows that rigorous and effective systems are being developed to enable teachers to know what and how well pupils are learning in RE. 

Finally, the inspector recognised the effective relationships we have:

• A harmonious and mutually supportive staff team
• Each family is known and valued
• Longstanding and strong partnership with the local church is integral to the daily life of the school
• The school is at the heart of its village community, and its active working relationships with a wide range of people and organisations locally exemplify what ‘living in harmony within our community’ means

The report also recommends some areas to focus on for improvement! These areas will be included in our School Development Plan for 2022-2023. They include:

• Developing systematic governor monitoring with curriculum leaders  
• Extending opportunities for pupils to reflect on collective worship  
• Ensuring that opportunities for spiritual development, already evident in the RE curriculum, are extended to the whole school curriculum  
• Improving pupil confidence in making links between worship and their behaviour and thinking, and the ability of pupils to talk about the value of prayer and reflection