School Profile

Firwood Manor Preparatory School opened in September 2002 as an independent, co-educational, one form entry, day school for children aged from 2¾ to 11 years. It is situated on Broadway in Chadderton, Oldham, close to the beginning of the A627M and to Junction 21 of the M60. This location makes it very accessible from a number of places in Greater Manchester and Lancashire, including Bury, Rochdale, North Manchester and Ashton. It is also an easy dropping-off point for parents who commute to work. The surrounding area provides a wide variety of housing and businesses, and yet, is near to open countryside in the foothills of the Pennines.

Our building began life as a public house, but has been architecturally designed to become our purpose-built school with state-of-the-art facilities, set in extensive, attractive grounds.

Firwood Manor was chosen as the school’s name after a whole school vote. The children researched the local area. As a result, each class put a name forward for a whole school vote involving parents, pupils and staff. Firwood Manor was the winning name. Firwood is the name of a local area and modern housing estate. Manor is the name of a nearby former cotton mill from which the public house took its name. Firwood Manor, therefore, blends the old with the new from our local area. Following in this vein, the names of our Houses were taken from local former cotton mills – Elk, Raven and Fox.

The school has a talented, innovative and well-qualified staff, committed to high expectations for achievement, a happy environment based on mutual respect and trust, a whole child approach to learning and the development of skills for a lifetime of confident citizenship. In addition to the Head, there are seven class teachers, four part-time teachers for Modern Foreign Languages, the Performing Arts and Swimming, seven classroom assistants, one school administrator, one financial administrator, one caretaker, mid-day supervisors and catering and domestic staff. Two of our classroom assistants are also responsible for our Out-of-School-Hours Care.

The Senior Management and Leadership Team comprises the Headteacher and two Assistant Headteachers and one Senior Teacher, who are responsible for the following year groups – Foundation Stage, Development Stage (Years 1,2&3), Emergent Stage (Years 4,5&6).

Our Nursery is part of our whole school family and caters for children from 2¾ to 4 years of age. We offer a flexible part-time or full-time introduction to our school, dependent on the needs of each child. The Nursery belongs to our Early Years Department, which also includes the Reception class. The education the children receive in these two classes constitutes the Foundation Stage and is planned by the all the Early Years staff to ensure continuity and progression.

In Years 1 and 2, the children are taught in their own class bases by their class teachers, but have specialist teaching in Music and Modern Foreign Languages (Spanish is taught from the Nursery and French from Reception).

In Years 3,4,5 and 6 the four teachers have responsibility for their own classes, but are also involved in specialist teaching throughout the Key Stage. This means that the teachers know all the children very well whilst the children themselves become accustomed to a secondary school approach to teaching within the security of their primary setting.

Pupils in Years 5 and 6 are prepared for the entrance examinations at all the local Grammar Schools. Most of our Year 6 pupils move on to attend some of the best Grammar Schools in the area. (Please see our Role of Honour.)

Maximum class size is 22. The Foundation Stage classes may exceed this number depending on the ages of the children.