The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. Year after year you have improved all aspects of the school. In helping the school move forward from the previous inspection, you have provided dedicated and insightful leadership. You lead with quiet, humble determination. This is appreciated by the staff of the school, who feel valued and respected and understand what is expected of them. It is very much a team approach at Duke Street Primary, and all pull together with a strong, dedicated work ethic to do their very best for the pupils in your care. Staff are happy, motivated and fully committed to the school’s mission and high expectations for good teaching and learning. You have worked hard to ensure that all leaders have the skills and confidence to lead on the areas for which they are responsible. They are appreciative of their development opportunities and, as a result, they have all made improvements in their specific areas of responsibility. You and your leadership team have a good understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of your school. Along with the deputy headteacher and governors, you have accurately identified the school’s strengths and priorities for improvement. The school’s detailed self-evaluation and improvement plan clearly identify the priorities for improving the school further. This has ensured that pupils receive good teaching in a calm and purposeful learning environment, which enables them to grow personally and improve academically. Governors are skilled in their roles and determined to become even more effective. They know the school very well and the journey it has taken to reach this point. They have individual links to key areas of school. Governors take nothing at face value, questioning and challenging school leaders very effectively. The governing body carefully monitors plans for improvement to ensure that all pupils are making progress. For example, writing is now a strength of the school because the governing body has challenged the quality and progress being made by some pupils. Writing is displayed with great pride throughout the school. The focus of governors has ensured that the attainment and progress in writing is now good. The school’s core values statement ‘I CARE’ (Individuality, Community, Aspire and Achieve, Resilience and Empathy) is manifest in the daily life of all within the school community. The inclusive nature of the school is driven by an urgency to provide highquality opportunities which allow pupils to thrive within the school’s caring and supportive environment. The value you place on the need to ensure, as you said during the inspection, ‘that all the children need to feel loved’ is appreciated by the pupils and parents. As one parent said during the inspection, ‘Duke Street Primary is a great school and my children love being here.’ The pupils were keen to tell me about the quality of the curriculum and the range of additional activities that they experienced. At the last inspection it was stated that pupils were not always fully engaged in their learning. They now fully appreciate their role in contributing to the development of the school and to ensuring that classrooms are of a high quality. Pupils’ behaviour in class and around school remains good. They show good independence in lessons, and work enthusiastically and cooperatively with their classmates to share ideas and discuss their understanding. They are rightly proud of their books and always try to produce work to the best of their ability. Pupils appreciate the opportunities they have to learn about different faiths and cultures. In religious education, pupils explore moral issues and develop a good understanding of right and wrong. They take care of their school and understand that it is their job to look after it. They take great pride in the well-ordered school environment, both inside and outside, benefiting from high-quality displays in classes and shared areas. An area for improvement after the last inspection was to raise the quality of teaching so that all is at least good, by ensuring that all pupils benefit fully from lessons. You have worked hard to raise the quality of teaching and learning in all phases. During the inspection, pupils benefited from stimulating resources and useful tools that helped them learn. Teachers create a very positive climate for learning through their detailed preparation and effective questioning. Pupils are appreciative of the efforts of their teachers and they say that lessons are always fun and interesting. In the early years, children benefit from outstanding teaching and learning in a vibrant and stimulating learning environment, with a wonderful outdoor space. They experience a rich curriculum and are provided with many opportunities to develop their imagination. As they enter key stage 1, pupils continue to enjoy learning. During the inspection, Year 2 pupils had great fun and developed some high-quality scientific language when learning about the life cycle of a sunflower plant. There is some good mathematical learning and Year 5 pupils benefited from precise explanations and made good progress in their understanding of the relationship of angles.