In stark contrast to the grey drizzle and swirling mist that had been our first experience of the North (our visit to Parklands Primary, Leeds the day before), we arrived at Wilmslow Grange, just south of Manchester, on a bright November Friday. 

As with Parklands the previous day, it was their reputed excellence and ambitious curriculum which had brought our delegation of seven headteachers 200 miles north from Bristol, via Saddleworth Moor, to find out the secret of their success.

What we found was a ‘classically Outstanding’ school.

Over the years I have visited many Outstanding schools in order to learn from their practice and what has struck me is how similar their approaches are:

1. They all look amazing.
2. They don’t worry much about what OFSTED will think – only what their children need.
3. They don’t get blown this way and that by the latest fad or gimmick.
4. They do the basics really well and spend a lot of time and energy refining their strategies.
5. Their curriculum is carefully designed around the needs of the community.

In short, they are excellent by design.

Here’s what we learnt at the fabulous Wilmslow Grange:

1. You learn everything about the school’s values within 30 seconds of stepping through the front door.

Every truly Outstanding school that I have ever visited has understood the power of environment (more on this later) and the implicit messages which the school’s lobby transmits to every visitor entering the school.

I firmly believe that any visitor, be they 5 or 50, should be able to get a sense of what your school stands for within 30 seconds of entering the building.

Wilmslow Grange was no different.

The quality of work and the way in which it is displayed immediately signifies that this is a school which oozes high standards, but hasn’t sacrificed the wider curriculum to achieve these. Quite the opposite. The displays celebrate a curriculum rich in music and art and shows that Wilmslow Grange is an exciting place to learn.

2. The school’s learning environment is carefully designed and every class is identical.

Again, this is a feature of every Outstanding school which I have visited, but which often gets some teachers hot and bothered, complaining that their individuality is being sacrificed on the altar of consistency. 

I have been in some classrooms where every square inch of wall (and often every surface) is covered in ‘stuff’. Twinkl has been liberally vomited onto the walls.

Yet I have never found a high performing school which doesn’t have tidy, uncluttered and, often quite minimalist, classrooms.

The learning spaces at Wilmslow Grange were exceptionally organised. Everything on the walls or within the room was there for a purpose. As a result, there was a feeling of calm and space which permeated the building.

Likewise, every class was virtually identical (although adapted for the age and stage of the children). As with my own school, Blackhorse Primary, Wilmslow Grange has a Resource Base for children with Autism and therefore understands that children with AS can easily have their senses over-whelmed by clutter and ‘stuff’ all over the walls. Indeed, uniformity and consistency are something that most children (and adults) need in order to flourish – especially if neither are present in the home environment.

Put simply: calm, uncluttered classrooms create calm, uncluttered learning.

3. The curriculum is exciting, challenging and rigorously designed.

Sad as this is, the current OFSTED schedule has allowed some schools to be graded Outstanding because they are really good at English and Maths – but do very little else with the wider curriculum.

This is not the case at Wilmslow Grange where the broad, balanced curriculum is the driver of much of the school’s work.

The curriculum is divided into 3, equally important tiers: academic, sporting and artistic and whole-school projects.

Headteacher, Mark Unwin, has a deep understanding of how his school’s curriculum works and what it is trying to achieve. The level of intent within this curriculum design goes far beyond that of most schools; he and his staff know exactly how every subject and strand interacts with the other, and precisely what skills, knowledge and attitudes children should acquire at any point in their journey through the school.

Extra-curricular opportunities are championed with a vast array of clubs and even 2 afternoons per week where children are allowed to choose their own enrichment activities so that they feel that they have some control over their learning.

Every 3 week topic cycle begins with an experience, visit or visitor to spark the children’s imagination (actors are regularly bought in to become Vikings/ Queen Victoria/ pirates!). This is known as ‘ignition’.

Again, this 3 week cycle has been carefully designed, based on K Ericsson’s 10 000 hour theory, with 3 distinct phases: Ignition, Deep Practice, and a simple feedback loop.

4. Children read the curriculum

At Wilmslow Grange, children read the curriculum. The use of non-fiction texts to learn curriculum knowledge, alongside high-quality fiction to develop creativity is common-place.

As I have increasingly seen in the highest performing schools, whole class guided reading has replaced the small group-work (often vague) sessions of old, with children exposed to challenging texts and a rigorous and structured approach to vocabulary acquisition, comprehension and understanding.

Children spend a lot of time reading and discussing what they have just read; and every class ends the day with the teacher reading the children a story – again, a feature which is increasingly present in the best schools.

In every class we visited, it was clear that children were expected to read widely and often (with home reading again carefully monitored).

Again, it sounds like a ‘no-brainer’, but I ask you this: how long do children at your school spend on highly focused reading each day?  I suspect the time may be less than we imagine.

5. Deep Practice is key

Whilst the children at Wilmslow Grange have access to regular inspirational events, what makes new learning stick is the ‘Deep Practice’ which Mark and his team are committed to. 

Children spend a lot of time reading and then writing about the subjects and topics which they’re learning about – every day in fact.

Whilst in some schools the ‘Big Write’ or ‘Extended Write’ might be something which children engage in once or twice a fortnight, extended writing is a daily occurrence at Wilmslow.

The staff firmly believe that to excel you must practice, so the children spend every morning honing these skills. Done badly, this could result in a dry, lifeless curriculum, but at Wilmslow, the use of high quality texts (augmented by specially written ‘models of excellence’ produced by the staff) allow the children to access a rich stimulus for writing.

But please don’t mistake this writing for the unstructured ‘free writes’ which can sometimes be mistakenly called ‘Big Writing’. No, these are all the result of precise modeling of all the necessary grammatical features, vocabulary and structure. Children know exactly what ‘good writing’ looks like because this is made explicit to them (through teaching, learning wall prompts and feedback.

Children take great pride in their writing, and every class contains a display of carefully crafted, edited and published writing; the product of the simple feedback loop which their marking approach promotes.

6. Fluency matters.

Like Parklands Primary the day before, Wilmslow Grange understands the importance of fluency in the basics.

As I have already mentioned, the children at Wilmslow Grange spend a good amount of time every day practicing reading and writing. So too, the children spend the first part of the day practicing basic mathematical fluency.

Again, this sounds blindingly obvious: ensure the children know their times tables and number bonds at an early age, freeing up cognitive assets for problem solving and reasoning later on. However, in the headlong dash to introduce ‘mastery’, schools often relegate fluency to a warm-up activity given little thought or planning, resulting in children ending their primary education without these skills secured.

Increasingly I am seeing a divide (especially in terms of the attainment Pupil Premium and vulnerable children)  between those schools which are taking fluency seriously and those which are not.

Likewise, just like Parklands, Wilmslow Grange teaches maths in two halves (with assembly in between) allowing the class teacher to assess the children mid-lesson (during the assembly) and adapt the learning accordingly.

7. Leaders lead learning.

There are no formal lesson observations at Wilmslow Grange; no lesson grading, only simple (PIRA/PUMA) assessment, minimal marking.

Yet Mark and his team spend all their time thinking about teaching and learning. Leaders are visible in classrooms regularly.

When asked about how long it took to develop the school’s approach to maths planning ‘about 15 staff meetings’ was the unapologetic’ reply.  Like other Outstanding schools I’ve visited, the staff at Wilmslow Grange rarely attend external ‘courses’ – yet CPD is regular and of the highest quality.

The school is discerning in which ‘expert’ they listen to. They read, research and carefully select an approach. And once selected, they spend months honing that approach for Wilmslow Grange, constantly sharpening and adapting their practice.

When they commit, they commit fully.

And this is perhaps the most important lesson of all. I have spent a good deal of time in outstanding schools, and a good deal of time supporting schools in difficulty. Both behave in predicable ways…

Struggling schools flit from strategy to strategy, leaping from new idea to new idea in the vain hope that something will stick. But because nothing is embedded and because training is poor, nothing seems to work – even when the strategies are the same as the high-performing school down the road.

In contrast, outstanding schools do less. They are highly skeptical of the latest magic bullet, promising quick-fixes. They spend time thinking, learning and developing strategies, returning to them constantly for year after year to check that they are effective.

It is no accident that Wilmslow Grange is outstanding. It is not luck, it is not chance.

Wilmslow Grange have designed their success – and are Outstanding as a consequence.