Grange Moor Prospectus 2025

School Prospectus

Choosing a Primary school for your child, we know is such an important decision for families. It can create the foundations of their future education and provide the building blocks they need for both school and wider life.

We aim, through our prospectus, to give you the confidence to entrust the staff and governors of Grange Moor Primary School with the privilege of offering this education so that, in partnership with yourselves, we can ensure success and a love of lifelong learning.

“Grange Moor Primary School is welcoming and friendly. This is a school where everyone is valued.

Grange Moor is a small, rural school in between Huddersfield and Wakefield. The school has countryside on its doorstep and has wonderful grounds belonging to the school itselfsomething that hugely attracted me to the school and post of Executive Headteacher here. A huge lover of the outdoors, the opportunity to be surrounded by nature every day is a real privilege.

At Grange Moor Primary School we pride ourselves on being The Small School with the Big Heart. Our caring, nurturing, child centred ethos is what makes us special. With only three classes and our own bespoke resource provision to support children with SEND, we really do know every child exceptionally well and can cater to each child's very individual needs. Grange Moor Primary has a real family feel and an atmosphere which gives children the confidence to flourish and shine. We stay loyal to our ethos of being the Grange Moor GREATEST. Bringing the Greatest of everything to every person who is a part of our school.

Miss D Barker Executive Headteacher

Proud to work with The Mast Academy Trust

Grange Moor Primary School has been a partner school with the Mast Academy Trust since 2023. The Trust has supported the school in its school development work since 2022 and is currently working towards official academisation.

“Leaders know all pupils well and ensure that vulnerable pupils get the support they need”

Ofsted 2024

As a Trust we want to support everyone to be the change they wish to see in the world. We understand that this is not about grand gestures, it's about helping individuals. Through a constant drive to enrich and develop our people, we can create a group of schools capable of achieving this goal. We will remember this in everything we do, everything we say, every action we take, everything we promote. By keeping this focus, we aim to be an influential contributor to the world of education and an example to others.

Putting children at the heart of everything we do is not just a tokenistic statement.

Our vision for Grange Moor is to achieve greatness in all we do.

We aim to provide a school experience that equips children with the skills they need to be fulfilled and responsible citizens.

We want our pupils to have success in all that they do both now and in the future and know that the experiences they have whilst at Grange Moor can shape and inform the decisions they make as individuals in their wider life. Therefore, it is our responsibility to ensure that we provide a provision that will enable our pupils to develop as young people who know they have an important place in a diverse community and wider world.

We aim to achieve this through an excellent education that is ambitious in its intent for all. Through consistent and high-quality teaching of discreet lessons we hope children will grow a love for learning and develop knowledge, concepts, skills and values that will be the fuel they need to become lifelong learners and be successful in their own path.

Wrapped around this is a culture of trust where relationships are valued and pupils and staff can thrive. We want a positive and inclusive school culture where every person can feel safe and happy and positive connections are at the heart of what we do.

“The school community is united in its ambition to make ‘Grange Moor Great’. There is a culture of high expectations for all. Pupils are proud of their school, enjoy learning and achieve well.’ Ofsted 2024

Class 1– Reception, Year 1 and Year 2

Class 2 – Year 3 and Year 4

Class 3 – Year 5 and Year 6

The Willow Room –Pastoral, nurture provision for children with communication needs or with Social, Emotional and Mental Health Needs

Children are arranged in three classes, each with a full-time teacher but school also has an additional resource provision for children requiring additional support, intervention or a more specialised curriculum.

We also value the opportunity for ‘family groups’ or mixed aged enrichment opportunities. Our ‘Forest Friday’ afternoons see children working together in year groups from across school. Enabling older children to lead and support younger children. Our whole school ‘House’ system also supports and enhances this with weekly House Challenges and ‘House Family’ enrichment time.

Twenty-two and a half hours are spent on teaching during the normal school week. This includes religious education, but excludes the assemblies, registration and breaks including lunch. We open our doors at 8:45am where children can settle in with consistent and supportive morning routines and registers are closed at 8:55am. The school day finishes at 3:15pm with extra curricular clubs running every day until 4:15pm.

OFSTED describe Grange Moor Primary School as a welcoming and friendly school where pupils arrive every morning happy and looking forward to the day ahead. They recognise that this is a small school, but this is certainly not a barrier to pupils accessing wider experiences. Inspectors noted how positive current parents and carers are about the care and education their children receive and describe our setting as ‘a great school. They put children at the centre of everything they do’.

OFSTED also note that pupils are well prepared for life beyond school. They know how to stay safe and healthy and have a keen sense of equality, demonstrating respect for those from different backgrounds and beliefs.

Overall Effectiveness: Good

The Quality of Education: Good

Behaviour and Attitudes: Good

Personal Development: Good

Leadership and Management: Good

Early Years Provision: Good

Grange Moor Primary School is committed to ensuring the welfare and safety of all children in school and follow the Kirklees Safeguarding Children Board procedures. Should you wish to discuss Safeguarding and Child Protection our Designated Safeguarding Lead is Miss Barker (Executive Headteacher). In her absence, the deputy safeguarding leads are Mrs Degan (Assistant Headteacher) and Mrs Stirling (Business Support Officer)

Mrs Degnan Miss Barker Mrs Stirling

Staff’s knowledge and insight into the needs of pupils with SEND ensures that they give the right support and at the right time, both in and out of lessons. This allows pupils with SEND to be fully included and involved in the life of the school.

Ofsted 2024

The school SENDCo is Mrs Whittaker.

As a school we strive to meet the needs of individual pupils and take a multi-agency, working together approach to ensure that the best provision possible is in place for all children. We believe that every child has the right to a fulfilled education and strive to make this happen for all. We work with families and other agencies to ensure any additional needs are supported and regularly review provisions to ensure this is personalised and appropriate to individual needs.

The school updates its accessibility plan regularly and the Governing Body ensures that this is implemented. The school has wheelchair access and a disabled toilet. We ensure equal opportunities by updating the curriculum, support and the physical environment.

At Grange Moor Primary School special educational needs can be met in a number of ways:

• Classrooms organised to encourage independence;

• Work is planned to meet the needs of the child;

• Additional support may be given;

• Staff may use a different teaching method;

• The child may use special equipment;

• More time may be allocated for the child to complete an activity.

• Access to our more specialised provision spaces

Overall though, we strongly believe that every teacher is a teacher of SEND and invest in continuous professional development for staff in how we can meet a range of neurodiverse, communication and social and emotional needs in our everyday Quality First Teaching.

We follow the National Curriculum for children in Years 1 - 6 and the Early Years Foundation Stage Framework for Reception.

“The school’s curriculum Is ambitious for pupils, including those with

special educational needs and/or disabilities.

Reading is at the heart of our curriculum with both explicit teaching of decoding, fluency and comprehension as well as creating a Reading Rich culture, so that a real love of reading is enabled, balanced with children who have the skills to be lifelong readers and access their wider curriculum fully.

Our Writing curriculum is also strongly linked to Reading with a bank of linked texts and stimuli for teachers to choose from.

For the Humanities subjects of Geography and History we ensure children take a journey around the world and back through time as they move through school. This is planned with progression at the heart, making sure children learn more and remember more year by year, always revisiting and building on studies from the year before.

All other key subjects in the curriculum: Religious Education, Personal, Social and Health Education, Physical Education, Computing, Music, Art and Design and Modern Foreign Languages are taught discreetly with links where appropriate to the themes described above, so that learning is outcome focused. We aim to enhance as many of the topics across school with trips, enrichments and experiences.

“The curriculum is well sequenced to help pupils build their knowledge over time”

PSHE and SMSC

As a school we follow the Kirklees Religious Education curriculum, covering the 6 main religions. We also try to celebrate and acknowledge key religious festivals throughout the school year as these happen. The school does have strong links with local church as part of its community work. We have half termly visits from our local Reverand to lead collective worship in school and sometimes visit the Church for celebrations such as Christingle or Easter.

At Grange Moor Primary School, we really do believe that our GREATEST classroom is the one outside. We are incredibly enthusiastic towards outdoor learning and stay committed to daily outdoor learning for our youngest children in our Outdoor Continuous Provision and at least weekly for our older children.

We are very lucky to have rich outdoor spaces in school with a field, pond, small woodland area and private garden. Our weekly ‘Forest Friday’ sees children working together in mixed aged groups through our six Outdoor Learning themes.

Working Together. Being Adventurous. Problem Solving. Our Place in the World. Our Environment. Our Wonderful World.

At Grange Moor Primary School we stay loyal to ensuring that our Personal, Social, Health and Economic (PSHE) curriculum is not just a series of ‘one-off’ stand-alone lessons. Instead, we ensure that the core values and concepts wrap around everything we do. Overarching our whole curriculum are key themes that support children’s personal, social and emotional development - these are drivers for whole school assemblies, house point challenges and generally wrap around everything we do in school that half term.

The six themes are:

We are Respectful. We Belong. We are Safe.

We are Happy. We are Responsible. We are Inclusive.

Other whole school enhancements to our PSHE curriculum include:

• Having an active School Council with weekly meetings and class council sessions;

• Whole school behaviour system based on a coaching tool;

• Weekly PSHE assemblies with linked challenges and activities;

• Themed weeks and days linked to wider initiatives and awareness raising;

• A school culture focused on developing children’s personal, social and emotional skills in every conversation and interaction.

As a school we follow the PSHE Association Programme of Study and follow the DfE Relationship Education and Health Education statutory guidance to ensure curriculum coverage through our six half termly key themes. The NHS backed ‘My Happy Mind’ programme and West Yorkshire Polics ‘Pol-Ed’ platform are used to deliver a lot of this content in age appropriate and meaningful ways. Parents have the right to withdraw their children from Sex Education.

We believe that offering an enriched curriculum develops the whole child and makes education truly fulfilling. Each month of the school year sees a ‘Subject Spotlight’ where there will be a focus on this area of the curriculum and enrichments planned in different ways such as trips, in school experiences or family events.

More widely than the school day, at Grange Moor we try to offer a very exciting programme of Extra Curricular Activities including lunch times. Our After School Clubs vary with a planned schedule over the year to try and reach all ages, interests and skills. Above is a sample of what a half term offer looks like and other areas we include are Dance, Choir, Science, Music, Drama and Gardening. We communicate with parents each term and keep our website up to date with current clubs that children may book on to if they wish. For those children in receipt of Pupil Premium we work with families to support with the cost of clubs too.

There are also opportunities for competitive games to be played against other small schools in the pyramid throughout the year through our engagement in the Pyramid Sports.

Peripatetic music lessons are another extra-curricular offer, through the school music service.

At Grange Moor Primary School we aspire to provide the GREATEST of everything for every person. Encouraging GREAT behaviour is an important part of this. As a school we encourage self-discipline, a pride in being part of our school team and a sense of responsibility and respect for ourselves and each other. We reward good behaviour in a variety of ways, including house points, weekly special mentions and personalised class reward systems. We keep our school rules clear and simple so they are accessible to all and link them to safety, welfare and consideration for others.

Together, with our children, we have three agreed ‘Grange Moor Behaviours’ that we ask everybody in our school to have. These are reinforced through individual class rules, reminded as part of weekly assemblies and encouraged and rewarded by all staff.

When starting Grange Moor Primary School children are put into a family ‘House’. A team of children across all school ages who work together to earn points for weekly challenges linked to behaviours and attitudes. Weekly the winning house is shared and celebrated with a half termly reward time to work towards.

We focus on positive behaviours at Grange Moor and use the systems outlined above to encourage, motivate and reward children. With this though, we have an agreed stepped consequences approach to correcting behaviour should a child behave inappropriately. This is designed around a coaching model, with each step being there to help children make the right choice. If necessary, parents will be contacted to agree a joint approach to addressing behavioural needs that are not being met through this stepped approach. Through this we would aim to create a personalised plan to support behaviour and review regularly to ensure success and the correct intervention.

“Pupils are proud of their school. They are polite and well mannered. Pupils play cooperatively together and older pupils willingly take care of younger ones. Ofsted

We have a passion for Early Years at Grange Moor Primary and aim to make links with younger children and their families as soon as we can. Every Thursday morning, we run a free ‘Tree Tots’ Session. A fun outdoor Forest School play experience for 2–4-year-olds and their parents or carers.

Thursdays 9:15am – 10:15am

Entrance Via the Class 1 Mobile Classroom gate.

Open and free to all 2 – 4-year-olds and a parent or carer. No booking needed.

Our ‘active’ School uniform is designed to be practical and allows children to participate in all activities without changing on PE days. The uniform with logo is available to buy at www.topclassschoolwear.co.uk However, you do not have to purchase the school uniform, school understands and respects the rights of parents to buy similar items from their own suppliers. However, all items should be without the manufacturer's logos and follow the school's colour code of red tops and black bottoms.

Active Uniform School Uniform

or

Black track pants, joggers or leggings Black skirt, pinafore dress or trousers

Black shorts or skort Red and White gingham dress or tailored shorts.

We run a constant Uniform Swap Shop in the school office – we appreciate outgrown uniform in good condition donated to school at any time in the school year. These are then available to view in the office and taken should you need anything.

Black trainers or pumps Plain black school shoes

On Fridays we ask that children have wellies and a change of outdoor clothes – for all weathers – in school for our Forest Friday session.

We encourage long hair to be tied back for the school day and jewellery should not be worn. Single studs are permitted but these need to be removed for PE and swimming

Our School Meals are cooked onsite in our kitchen led by Kirklees Catering.

In September 2014 the Government introduced Free school meals for all foundation and Key children. After this School Meals are charged Kirklees rates.

Children may instead bring a packed lunch, a drink are always provided if needed

Research suggests that when children become dehydrated it directly affects their concentration and thinking skills, so children are encouraged to have water bottle in their classroom, which they can fill up at any time, with all classrooms having their own sink.

Children are allowed to bring a for morning playtime. As part of our healthy school standard we aim to make morning snacks as healthy as possible. Having taken advice from the British Nutrition Foundation, they suggest the following foods would give children a choice, yet do not increase their sugar & salt levels to too high a level:

Up to the age of 5 children currently receive free milk under the Government Nursery Milk scheme. Pupils who partake in the ‘Milk in Schools Scheme’ (available up to the end of the school term before they are seven) benefit from a subsidy from the Intervention Board. This represents a significant reduction in the actual cost of milk. If you want your child to have milk it can be ordered and paid for each term. Milk is also available for children in Key Stage 2, but without a subsidy.

Fruit and vegetables – fresh or dried fruit, carrot/ celery sticks etc.

No chocolate bars, cereal bars, crisps, nuts or sweets allowed.

Key Stage 1 pupils are given free fruit every day as part of a Government initiative.

All parents and those associated with school are welcomed into the 'Friends of Grange Moor' organisation and encouraged to take part in its activities. The group endeavours to plan a full and varied programme of activities throughout the year to raise funds for the school. The money we raise is used to benefit all the children in school, for example developing our outdoor area or subsidising trips.

The Friends of Grange Moor Association is very active. Each term they organise and support a wide range of activities, both during school time and around the school day. Some are social, creating a real sense of community, and others raise money for school funds.

Parents are every child’s first educators and at Grange Moor Primary we know how important your support is in ensuring that your child feels secure and achieves success in school.

We believe that by working together we will understand and develop children in the GREATEST way we can and value a strong partnership of working together. We hold two parents meetings through the school year and provide an annual report, with an invitation to be followed up with a meeting should this be needed. In addition to this, however, any concerns parents have are always welcome and encouraged to be shared with teachers. We too will contact you if ever we feel that any difficulties in progress, behaviour or emotional wellbeing exist.

We are proud of the family feel and ethos we create at Grange Moor Primary and open our doors to wider families as much as possible. Parents join us for our weekly Friday celebration assembly and half termly classes provide a Class Assembly to share their learning from that half term. Other events such as fairs and concerts are also valued and attended well by families.

The Governing Body is delighted to welcome you to

Grange Moor Primary School.

School governors are volunteers who help to run the school. Most schools work with a group of school governors - together they’re called the Governing Body. They’re involved in decisions about all aspects of managing the school – such as running buildings and budgets, supporting staff and monitoring standards and the curriculum. Governors also help to make decisions about the school’s long-term goals. They support headteachers but are also expected to hold the school to account and provide challenge to ensure the headteacher is taking the school in the right direction.

Since September 2024 we have been working closely with Birdsedge First School in an Executive Leadership model. Birdsedge strives for the BEST and is a similar small school to Grange Moor with small but mighty at the heart of everything it does.

Working together we have been able to grow capacity across the two schools bringing added resource to children in both settings, a wider support network for staff and strengthen leadership by growing shared curriculums schools.

Telephone: 01924 840748

Miss Barker email dbarker@themast.co.uk

Office email: office@grangemoorps.co.uk

To find out more

Website: grangemoorps.co.uk

Facebook: facebook.com/grangemoorprimary

Instagram: @grangemoorps

Grange Moor Primary School

Liley Lane, Grange Moor. Wakefield. WF4 4EW