The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. You and your senior leaders were all appointed after the inspection and you brought a sense of purpose and direction. You introduced accountability at every opportunity, which has led to an increase in staff’s motivation and morale to always seek the best for pupils. Priorities are clear for all to see and effective procedures support conscientious and regular self-evaluation. You and senior leaders have a good understanding of how to drive improvement. The Christian ethos of the school is strikingly evident in that you seek to serve the local community, be they of the Christian faith, other faiths or none. All are welcome in this school. Discrimination and discord are taboo. A number of parents were very keen to tell me of the extent that you and your staff go to so as to support the most vulnerable and give them the best start in their education. From starting points well below those typical for their age, pupils leave the school well prepared for the next stage of their learning. Since the last inspection, you set to work on addressing the areas needing improvement. Pupils’ writing skills have developed considerably. The standard of their writing is much better than other pupils nationally. This is because you went right back to basics and analysed exactly what is was that prevented pupils from being competent in their writing. You then put into place very specific strategies that were embedded across the whole school. While you have secured rapid improvements in writing, the achievement of pupils in reading and mathematics has not been as impressive. In mathematics, you ensured that problem-solving was introduced into teaching and that pupils would be given opportunities to use their reasoning skills. I could see evidence of this in pupils’ book and through your own records. However, it is noticeable that pupils’ basic mathematical skills are not always secure, and this is impeding the progress that pupils are making in this subject. Likewise in reading. Because opportunities for pupils to read at home and more widely are limited, pupils’ vocabulary is not as developed. You have spent a considerable amount of money resourcing the school library and purchasing a range of reading books and pupils are using these well. However, too few pupils read outside of school. We spoke about ways in which parental engagement could be further enhanced to support and promote their children’s reading for pleasure. Teaching has improved since the last inspection and information about pupils’ learning is used in a more intelligent way. Teachers build on pupils’ prior knowledge to plan lessons that meet their needs and engage their interests. The pupils spoke to me about how well their teachers make learning fun and simple to understand. At the same time, they recognised that they are made to think at school and that they often go home with ‘heads that hurt a little. Not in a bad way just that we’ve learned so much.’ You have very high aspirations for the pupils, but you know that in order to realise these aspirations the teachers need to be suitably equipped with the skills to deliver. An extensive programme of training has been put in place and where staff need support it is provided for. In developing staff, you are astute in identifying future leaders and have worked hard to develop leadership skills so as to ensure effective succession planning for the future. Governors share the ambition and diligence of senior leaders to improve continually. They are very self-aware and readily acknowledge how much they have grown in confidence and expertise since you became headteacher. Comprehensive training has given governors the skills necessary to understand assessment information, which helps them understand how well the school is doing. This enables governors to support leaders while holding them firmly to account. Effective performance management arrangements, regular visits, links to different subject areas and purposeful questioning all contribute to making governors efficient in carrying out their duties. Safeguarding is effective. All of the pupils and parents I spoke to, and those who responded to the online questionnaire, say that this is a safe school. All the safeguarding arrangements are effective and reflect requirements. The procedures to check the suitability of adults working with children are thorough and you leave nothing to chance. There are clear systems in place to record incidents effectively; records are detailed and of high quality. You work closely with external agencies and parental involvement is appropriate. Staff training is up to date and adults know what to do if there are any concerns about a pupil. Pupils know whom to speak to if they have any concerns or worries and show a good understanding of how to keep themselves safe.