The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. In this small school, you and your team create a warm, family environment where pupils feel safe and are valued as unique individuals. Pupils and their families are known and cared for exceptionally well. This is underpinned by an ethos which permeates all aspects of school life. Parents enthuse about the school and appreciate the family feel. One parent reflected the view of many when she commented, ‘My child goes to school happy and comes home happy.’ Your ‘open door’ policy enables parents to feel that they can approach the school about any concerns and are confident that they will be listened to. They speak highly of the headteacher and the staff. Almost all parents who spoke to me during the inspection or responded to Parent View, Ofsted’s online questionnaire, said that they would recommend the school. Pupils are also proud of their school. They say that the school is a safe and happy place. They trust the adults and are confident that they are there to help them if they have a problem. Pupils demonstrate maturity in their understanding that not all pupils find school easy and express a desire to support these pupils. This is evident around the school as pupils play and learn well together. Pupils welcome the opportunity to talk about their work and say that they find their topics interesting. Since the last inspection you have provided stability in leadership and formed a successful formal collaboration with two other church schools. As a team, you have worked hard to build the ethos and culture of the school in order to raise aspirations and ensure purposeful learning while developing an improving curriculum. Nevertheless, there is still work to be done to raise standards further. Sometimes teacher’s expectations are not high enough, particularly for the most-able pupils. In writing, opportunities are missed to extend pupils’ use of vocabulary and develop more complex writing techniques. Consequently, teaching is no better than good. You recognise that securing these higher standards in all classes and all subjects is key to fulfilling your ambition to become an outstanding school. The school provides pupils with many opportunities through the ‘100 activities’ that are identified for each pupil to access during their time at the school. There is a wide range of carefully considered experiences, both during and beyond the school day as part of your extended curriculum. These include a school residential visits to Norfolk and The Peak District, as well as visits to a mosque and the Holocaust Centre. You and your team have high aspirations for pupils and have a desire to improve the school. You have correctly identified the areas where more work is needed and leaders, governors and staff have the capacity to make improvements successfully. Safeguarding is effective. You place a high priority on keeping pupils safe. Leaders and governors have ensured that current safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose and records are of high quality. Staff see safeguarding as everyone’s responsibility. You provide all staff with relevant and regular training so that they know what to do if they have any concerns. Pupils understand the difference between disagreements and bullying. They are adamant that there is no bullying in school. Parents also report that bullying is rare and that staff act swiftly to resolve differences between pupils. Pupils understand how to keep themselves safe online and report that this is regularly discussed in lessons. All parents and pupils who I spoke to or responded to the online questionnaires reported that pupils are safe, happy and well looked after at school. This is a strength of the school. Inspection findings During this inspection, I looked closely at your work to improve pupils’ progress in writing, especially at key stage 2. I also considered how the school was providing challenge for all pupils, in particular the most able, and examined historical and current rates of pupils’ attendance. During the past three years an increasing proportion of pupils are working beyond the expected standard in reading, writing and mathematics at the end of Year 2. Across key stage 2 the most-able pupils in writing do not have enough opportunities to use more complex styles of writing and consequently do not write to a high enough standard.