The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. Based on the evidence gathered during this short inspection, I am of the opinion that the school has demonstrated strong practice and marked improvement in specific areas. This may indicate that the school has improved significantly overall. Therefore, I am recommending that the school’s next inspection be a section 5 inspection. Since the previous inspection you and your leadership team have driven the school forward with grit and determination. You have built an exceptionally strong team of teachers around you, imbuing them with a sense of pride and ambition. This is keenly felt by the community you serve, as noted by one parent who told me, ‘The care the school has provided for my child has been out of this world.’ Classrooms are typified by the high expectations of staff, and pupils’ determination to meet them. The rooms in the school are organised in a unique way and redesigned in consultation with pupils every term. For example, Year 4 worked in a tepee during their Native American topic, and Year 2 wrote inside a large wooden fire engine during my visit. Pupils adore the opportunity to work in different areas, and this contributes significantly to their high levels of motivation. Teachers’ questioning is first class and they use the information they gather to regroup pupils, reshaping tasks to ensure that they are at just the right level to stretch, challenge or support their learning. The team of highly skilled teaching assistants works well with teachers to offer pupils excellent support. This was particularly evident in the ‘treetops’ class, where pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities were supported to create a meal to be enjoyed by Mr Twit from Roald Dahl’s ‘The Twits’ and to write interesting texts in the style of the author. Pupils love their school and the sense of adventure that it brings. Every topic they learn about has a feature which considers how they will improve their community. For example, Year 2 recently learned about oceans and the impact that humans have on them. In response to their learning, pupils planned and completed a sponsored beach tidy, raising £800 for the Royal National Lifeboat Association in the process. The development of pupils’ ‘moral compass’ is at the heart of the school’s ethos. Since the previous inspection, leaders have opened a Nursery on the site. This matches the very high standards seen in the main school and gives children a great start to their education. Pupils in the Nursery learn to identify and record letters and sounds, the basics of counting and, importantly, how to interact positively with other children and adults. By the time children move into Reception, they are exceptionally well prepared for more structured learning and relish the opportunity to build on their prior achievements. At the time of the last inspection, you were asked to improve pupils’ writing across the curriculum. Pupils enjoy the rich and varied opportunities they have to write about their learning. For example, pupils in Year 1 recorded their observations in science as they tested a range of materials to see which one would be best to make a chair for baby bear from the story of ‘Goldilocks’. Teachers supported pupils to include technical language in their work, such as ‘material’, ‘variable’ and ‘product’. As a result, pupils are confident enough to use these words in their writing. Pupils’ strong writing skills help them to make excellent progress in a wide range of subjects. Safeguarding is effective. Safeguarding documents are well maintained and fit for purpose. Statutory checks are completed on all staff in a timely fashion. Staff are well trained and know how to spot families and children who may need extra support. There are clear systems for communicating this to leaders, who act swiftly, working with external agencies to get families the help they need. Pupils gain a detailed understanding of how to keep themselves safe. The diligent and skilled junior safeguarding champions make sure pupils feel welcome in school. Recently, they put up displays and presented assemblies explaining how to stay out of danger when around bonfires and fireworks. Pupils are well prepared to make good decisions when presented with risks. Inspection findings At the start of the inspection, we agreed to look at: the progress that pupils, including those who are disadvantaged, make in mathematics; the quality of the teaching of writing; the accuracy of leaders’ and governors’ evaluations and how they use these to improve the school; and the effectiveness of leaders’ actions to improve attendance. Pupils make excellent progress in mathematics because they are taught the basics really well and practise them often. Last year, leaders restructured the curriculum to ensure that pupils could recall key mathematical concepts, such as time, calculation methods and times tables, by doing small amounts of work on them every day. As a result, pupils have an excellent grasp of the building blocks of mathematics and use these to reason and solve complex problems. Pupils, including those who are disadvantaged, make higher-than-average progress in mathematics than their peers nationally. Recently, pupils met with staff from the local bank and have set up their own school bank, run entirely by pupils, which encourages their peers to save small amounts of money in their own account, thus developing their financial literacy. This prepares pupils well for their future because they learn key mathematical and financial skills at an early age. Writing is a key strength of the school. Staff work exceptionally hard to ensure that pupils broaden their vocabulary and use this in their speech and writing. The carefully chosen books that pupils read help them to understand and mimic highquality language in their speech and writing. This learning continues outside of the classroom as pupils keep, and take home, each book they read at school. Pupils’ writing has improved greatly, and pupils throughout the school make excellent progress. Nevertheless, few pupils in key stage 2 write at the highest standard because of their historically low starting points. Leaders are skilled, ambitious and creative. They have an excellent understanding of the school’s effectiveness and use this to create well-judged plans to improve it further. They do not follow conventions, and constantly question the best way to do things rather than just copying the methods of others. Governors are skilled and knowledgeable and visit the school often to check that leaders’ actions are having the intended impact. For example, they kept a watchful eye when assessment tracking systems were changed last year to reassure themselves that information was not lost, and that the change was for the better. This is a school which is set to improve further. Leaders’ efforts to improve attendance are highly effective. They work closely with families to promote strong attendance patterns, and challenge, appropriately, when parents’ expectations do not match their own. The rates of absence and persistent absence have decreased consistently over the past four years and now match the national average. Next steps for the school Leaders and those responsible for governance should ensure that: pupils’ progress continues to increase so that greater proportions write at a high standard.