Oldbury Primary School Logo
Oldbury on Severn
Church of England VC
Primary School
‘Love one another as I have loved you’ (John 15:12)
Oldbury Primary School Logo
Oldbury on Severn
C of E VC Primary School
‘Love one another as I have loved you’ (John 15:12)
Oldbury Primary School Logo
Oldbury on Severn
C of E VC Primary School
‘Love one another as I have loved you’ (John 15:12)

Christian Values

The school’s Christian values are having a good impact on children’s academic achievement - SIAMS

Delivering on Potential

Focus on the individual

Perhaps the greatest benefit of being a small school, is our ability to focus on the individual. It’s something that many schools claim, so you may well ask, how do we achieve this?

Class size – we have small classes with a high teacher to pupil ratio. We also have an even higher adult to pupil ratio thanks to our excellent TAs, who work in each class.

Differentiation – we have mixed age, and so very mixed ability, classes. Whilst some may see this as a challenge, we find that it creates an opportunity. Because nearly every child has a different need, differentiated lesson planning ensures every child is working at their own level is a given at Oldbury School. And as our teachers differentiate every day, they are very good at it – a virtuous circle for success.

Keep up not catch up – we utilise our small team to pre-teach concepts and pick up misconceptions. We also run ‘maths mop-ups’ in ks2 daily to ensure children do not fall behind on a day to day basis. Our head of school also teaches so that we can break down our groups to tailor learning even more closely.

Strong relationships – the size of the school, the family atmosphere and a very low turnover of staff, all mean that our staff know and understand the pupils very well indeed.

These unique attributes means that every child at Oldbury School gets something close to an individually styled education as a default, which is a huge help towards achieving their potential.

Exceptional staff

We are proud of our staff and they are proud of their school.

We are an outward looking team and our staff are keen to learn and gain from best practice. As a staff we work with our partner school – Olveston CEVC – to develop best practice. We also work with our wider network of schools – The Bridge Hub – to share best practice and the latest approaches to teaching and learning.

Our staff have a unique skill-set, as a small school we can take a different approach to most mainstream settings. For example, our KS1 teacher leads manages teaching and learning through small adult led groups, rather than pitching teaching to the whole class. This means that the children receive a more tailored approach to teaching and learning. Adults led groups are flexible and so can have an even greater level of individualisation.

Adult led groups mean a greater focus on quality rather than an approach that is generic and focuses on the quantity of adult directed learning time. This then means that all our KS1 children also have significant opportunity to engage in high quality play. Play that is adapted and targeted to their needs. We believe that play, or discovery time as we call it, is a vital part of the learning process. We value play so highly that all of the children in our KS1 class, not just the EYFS children, have plenty of discovery time each day. Our balance between play and high quality adult led groups is what sets us apart. Our staff are the glue that holds this all together.

We are small but dedicated team who complement one another; and most importantly like each other. In a small school a vibrant, supportive and nurturing staff team makes a huge difference!

Satisfied parents

In a recent survey, parents were overwhelmingly positive about their school:

But perhaps the best measure of satisfaction is the pupils retention rate at Oldbury School. The Thornbury area is blessed with a high proportion of very good schools – we regularly receive pupils from these schools, but almost never lose pupils to them.