The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. St Mary’s Catholic Primary School is a much smaller-thanaverage-sized primary school. It is a welcoming, friendly place to learn. You and your team have ensured that pupils enjoy their learning and are well cared for. As a result, pupils are happy and the majority of parents and carers are supportive. For example, one parent praised the ‘very friendly and approachable staff’, while another parent appreciated the ‘family feel’ of the school. You promote a nurturing ethos where pupils are valued and known well by you and your staff. Relationships between adults and pupils are good. As a result, pupils enjoy coming to school. They are respectful, pay close attention in class and behave very well. Consequently, pupils are enthusiastic and aspirational learners. For example, one pupil told me, ‘I love art. I’m not very good at it but I enjoy learning all the skills so that I learn to get better at it.’ Another pupil excitedly told me about how he was using computer technology to create and design an advertisement. ‘There’s so much to learn, and I’m really enjoying it,’ he said. You and your staff are passionate about the role of the school in the community and are determined for pupils to learn through the school’s values of compassion, cooperation, tolerance and respect. Even though the school is small, you have ensured that pupils learn more about the wider world, by participating in events and learning experiences outside their immediate community. This is evidenced in the many awards achieved by the school, such as the religious education (RE) gold quality mark and the terrific science school of excellence award. The governing body provides you with effective support and challenge. Governors are knowledgeable and know the strengths of the school and the areas that need improvement. Governors regularly take part in relevant training and are ambitious to further develop their understanding and improve their effectiveness. They place a particular focus on the school’s support for pupils who have special educational needs (SEN) and/or disabilities and for disadvantaged pupils. However, governors do not always check that the impact of funding for disadvantaged pupils has been precisely evaluated by leaders to ensure that pupils are consistently making at least good progress in line with that of their peers. You have dealt effectively with the areas for improvement identified at the last inspection. From my scrutiny of pupils’ work and observations in lessons, it is clear that you have improved the quality of teaching to ensure that, in the majority of lessons, teachers ensure that work is well matched to the abilities of pupils. As a result, pupils said that they are interested and challenged to do their best in their learning. Teaching assistants support pupils well in their learning. You provide focused training for teaching assistants and ensure that they are involved in whole-school improvement priorities through regular meetings. As a result, teaching assistants work closely with teachers and use skilful questioning to help move pupils on in their learning. In addition, they provide effective phonics teaching and good-quality targeted support for pupils in areas such as speech and language. Safeguarding is effective. You have created a good culture of safeguarding in the school. Governors and staff benefit from regular and relevant training on child protection. They know what to do to keep pupils safe. You work with families and refer concerns in a timely and prompt manner. Staff are vigilant and are prepared to take decisive action when needed, to secure pupils’ well-being. Leaders have ensured that all safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose. Pupils enjoy coming to school and said that they feel very safe. They said that incidents of poor behaviour or bullying are rare but when they do occur staff deal with issues quickly and fairly. Pupils feel well cared for by staff in school. One pupil told me that he feels that school is ‘like a second home, because nobody is unkind to me and everyone is supportive’. Pupils are taught about potential risks and how to stay safe in different situations. These include how to use the internet safely and the dangers from fire. Inspection findings A focus for the inspection was the quality of the teaching of mathematics. For the last two years, the progress pupils had made in mathematics by the time they left the school at the end of Year 6 has been below that in reading and writing.