Thameside Primary School in South Abingdon had been judged to be a Good School during an inspection by Ofsted on 6th March 2014. This is the best judgement they have received for over a decade, and means both South Abingdon schools, Thameside and Caldecott, are judged to be giving a good education to pupils.
Traditionally some parents living in the south have sent their children to schools in the north of Abingdon. I would guess this adds to the peak time traffic problems out of South Abingdon. But now both South Abingdon schools are judged to be good, it could improve the traffic situation in a more sustainable way than pedestrian traffic light tinkering.
Thameside at one time abandoned the traditional phonetic method of teaching children to read and took up the disastrous word recognition method. Consequently children could not read or make sense of words that they were not familiar with.
I wonder how Chinese children learn to read – or, indeed, any language group where the “alphabet” is ideographic rather than literal? Presumably, they don’t see it as quite so disastrous!
Congratulations to both schools on their achievements and new ratings.
..just to clarify, Caldecott *maintained* its GOOD status; it wasn’t new.
you never know…now, the traffic issues may continue…but from North to South instead!
Congratulations to Thameside, but it may be over-optimistic to suggest this will have any positive impact on school run traffic. The pressure on school places in North Abingdon is such that they cannot accommodate local children, let alone those from the other side of town. As a result, N Abingdon children are being placed in S Abingdon schools because this is where the vacancies are. We are paid travelling expenses by Oxford City Council to transport our child across town to school, even though there are 3 schools within walking distance from our house.
This is great news and particularly reflects a huge amount of hard work and commitment from the Thameside Head, staff and Governors.