York's biggest junior school has received a glowing report from school inspectors.

Westfield Junior School, in Acomb, is described as a "very good school" by Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) inspectors.

According to the inspectors, the school, which has almost 400 pupils, "has very strong leadership with a clear educational direction and continual improvement of standards."

The school has an "excellent" relationship with parents and an "extremely" well planned curriculum.

It also "constantly" monitors pupils' progress, provides good quality teaching within a "very supportive" school community and has high standards of discipline and behaviour.

At age 11, pupils' attainment in all subjects meets or exceeds the national average, while standards in the core subjects of English, maths and science are higher than expected levels.

The high standards are achieved despite children's attainment on starting the junior school being broadly below average.

The report states the school is "very effective" in trying to maximise the potential of every child.

The teaching is said to be of "high quality" and the pupils' attitudes to learning are described as "very positive".

"They are well motivated, take a pride in their achievements and enjoy their school work," it states.

Head teacher, Mark Barnett, said he was delighted the hard work of the children, staff, parents and governors had been recognised by the Ofsted inspectors.

He said: "This is an excellent report and this is further reflected in that there is only one key issue to address which the school will be delighted to take on board."

The inspectors called on the school to further release subject co-ordinators to work alongside colleagues in the classroom.

"We already operate such a programme of release for staff and the additional funding that follows a first Ofsted inspection will allow us to further release staff to enhance our already recognised monitoring programme."

Geoffrey Talbot, chairman of the governors, said: "The children, staff, parents and my governor colleagues have always felt proud of their achievements in the school and now they have even more reason to do so."

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