Ofsted have
now published an updated version of its Education Inspection
Framework that will
come into play in November for schools that have volunteered for Inspection and
nationally in routine inspections for all state funded schools from 1st
December 2025. Francesca Pini, the founder and creator of Language Angels, outlines the key changes and shares her thoughts.
Why the
need for change?
Ofsted have
endeavoured to create an improved inspection model that is more detailed,
contextual and collaborative delivering fairer and more meaningful evaluations
triggered by the tragic death of Ruth Perry and intensified calls for a reform.
What are
the main Ofsted changes?
- Report cards
- Evaluation areas
- Toolkits
- Safeguarding and
inclusion now judged separately
- No more subject specific
‘deep dives’
- All inspections will be full inspections
- More school context
- Monitoring visits
- Five
-point scale not four-point scale
What will this mean for foreign languages at primary phase?
The good news is that there will be no more subject specific
Ofsted deep dives; instead, the whole curriculum coverage will be one
evaluation area. However, as the toolkit for curriculum and teaching details,
there must still be a range of subjects with a high-quality and ambitious
curriculum that is broad and balanced, with a focus on assessment. Teachers
delivering foreign languages must have a planned and sequenced foreign
languages curriculum and they must have expert knowledge in the content they are
teaching, whilst being informed by the best evidence available. All pupils
should have access to all areas of the curriculum and all pupils’ needs must be
considered taking into account reasonable adjustments.
What do foreign language subject leaders need to do?
If teachers at the primary phase delivering a foreign language already
have a strong foreign languages curriculum in place using a high-quality
language scheme of work and resource, such
as Language Angels, there should be no need to change anything in the short
term for inspection preparation. The need to have expert knowledge can be
easily achieved using the correct tools in class to support primary teachers
delivering languages that may not be linguists and non-specialist generalist
teachers. Regular high-quality and impactful CPD for primary foreign
language teachers is a must to build confidence in MFL. SLT and subject leaders
do however need to ensure that have made reasonable adjustments with regards to disadvantaged or SEND
pupils that may have barriers to learning in all subjects across the
curriculum. The toolkit is very clear on this and highlights the need for
schools to support SEND learners more. Our experience is that SEND pupils often
excel in foreign languages, but I would suggest teachers
consider the following:
- Do you know the starting points for your pupils with SEND?
- Does their work take different forms?
- Are you expecting all pupils to perform in all 4 language learning
skills?
- Is the curriculum you have planned adapted to their needs?
- Have you changed the end points to suit their needs?
- Do you know where gaps in their knowledge are?
- Do you have sufficient audio-visual content to support these
learners?
What are Language Angels doing?
The lack of
detail thus far on Ofsted languages inspection evidence and Ofsted primary
languages guidance makes it hard to be more subject specific but we will be
monitoring carefully so we can ensure our internal teaching and learning team
is well ahead of all changes. We will be updating our Ofsted documents in the
Curriculum Guidance area of the website constantly to help our schools navigate
the new changes to come. We also recommend that SLT invest in online training
portals specific to foreign language teaching and learning such as the Languages CPD Hub to ensure staff have the most up- to-date
evidence and training materials to ensure expert knowledge in the subject that
they are teaching.
