A Suffolk free school which was placed in special measures by Ofsted after its very first inspection has received a slight reprieve in its latest monitoring report.

The education watchdog has found IES Breckland’s improvement plan and the statement of action from the school’s sponsor to be “fit for purpose”.

The monitoring report also said the school was making good use of external resources, including Suffolk Local Authority’s advisors, “to provide teachers with individually tailored support plans which is leading to improvements.

“These improvements in teaching have had a positive impact on behaviour; in most lessons students focus on their work and learn in a calm and orderly manner. On occasion, their concentration drifts and important learning time is lost.”

While the quality of marking was said to have improved the report also noted “marking continues to be inadequate in some subjects because students’ work goes unmarked for long periods of time.”

It added: “It is clear from the scrutiny of students’ work that some teachers are inaccurately assessing, often over-stating, the quality of students’ work.”

Since Ofsted’s initial inspection there have been a number of staff changes at the school with the appointment of an assistant Headteacher and new head of department in mathematics, science, English and design and technology.

A new special educational needs coordinator is due to join the school in the summer term.

Headteacher Alison Tilbrook said there was “much to be encouraged by” in the report, which recognised “that steps we have taken have led to improvements”.

The report “strongly recommended” that the school doesn’t seek to appoint newly qualified teachers.

An external review of the governing body is scheduled for late in the summer term.