MORE than three quarters of schoolchildren in Hampshire and Southampton go to schools ranked in the top two categories by Ofsted.

Figures released as part of the school watchdog's annual report reveal that more youngsters than ever are being given a good or outstanding education.

According to the latest figures 84 per cent of primary schools in Hampshire are ranked as good or outstanding, in Southampton that figure is 81 per cent an increase of almost 20 per cent on last year's figure of 64 per cent.

It puts the authority in the top five of local authorities in the south east region and equal 60th when compared with schools nationally.

However, work still needs to be done on raising the standard of all secondary schools in the city with 66 per cent of all schools in the category achieving a good or outstanding rating, that puts the local education authority at joint 109th nationally for the quality of secondary school education.

Across Hampshire 79 per cent of secondary schools are ranked in the top two categories putting it joint 60th nationally.

Councillor Peter Edgar, Hampshire County Council's Executive Member for Education, said: “Hampshire offers a high quality of education and this has been borne out by today's Ofsted report that shows more Hampshire schools than average across the country have been judged to be good or outstanding.

“While this is good news, we are not complacent and will continue to work closely with our schools to drive for high standards. Ofsted's annual report makes some points that are as relevant to Hampshire schools as any others and we have taken full note of these in order to ensure that they are addressed in all of our school improvement work.”

Whilst there was much to celebrate on the mainland the isle of Wight was ranked among the worst performing local Education Authorities in the country with just 14 per cent of secondary schools ranked as good or outstanding, whilst at primary school age 71 per cent were in the top two categories.

At GCSE level the authority was the second worst across the whole country.

Hampshire County Council has now taken over responsibility for education on the Isle of Wight.

A culture of ''casual acceptance''

In his organisation's annual report Ofsted Chief Inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw has said that England's schools are suffering from a culture of ''casual acceptance'' of misbehaviour in the classroom.

The Ofsted chief inspector warns that low-level disruption in lessons and poor attitudes to education are stopping pupils from learning, and preventing the nation from moving up international league tables.

Currently, around 700,000 children are being taught in schools where behaviour is not up to scratch, figures suggest.

Sir Michael says that there is a ''poverty of expectation'' in many schools that needs to be dealt with and ''a culture of casual acceptance of low-level disruption and poor attitudes to learning.''

This is ''a million miles away from the sort of cultures we see in some of the high-performing Asian countries''.

A major report published by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), published last week, found that the UK's performance in reading, writing and maths has stagnated, leaving the nation's teenagers lagging far behind their peers in East Asian countries such as Singapore and Japan.

Overall, eight in 10 state schools are now rated as good or outstanding by Ofsted - the highest proportion in the watchdog's 21-year history.