The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the previous inspection. You lead the school with kindness and concern, which you balance carefully with high expectations and a demand for the best standards of work. You know your school exceptionally well. Your governors describe you as a ‘courageous leader’ who does not shrink from tackling difficult issues. During the inspection, I saw your passion for what the school and pupils can achieve. Staff share your vision. They are resoundingly positive about your leadership. You are rightly proud of the various partnerships St Thomas More Catholic Primary School has with other schools and the lead role you take within them. Joint work between these partnership schools provides further opportunities to strengthen provision, as staff are able to see and share the best practice. You have worked hard with your governors and staff to maintain the strengths identified at the previous inspection, such as making sure that teachers are trained well so that their teaching is effective. At the time of the previous inspection, you were asked to improve the quality of teaching further. With the support of other senior leaders and governors, you have successfully addressed this area for improvement. Classrooms are vibrant, purposeful places for learning. Teachers and teaching assistants work effectively together to make sure that pupils currently at the school make strong progress from their various starting points. Your staff team achieves this through skilful questioning which confirms and challenges pupils’ thinking. Staff have high expectations of pupils’ attitudes to their learning. This means that pupils play an active part in the exciting activities their teachers plan for them. Teachers and teaching assistants told me they value their training. They gave me examples of how they have adapted what they do in lessons as a result. For instance, following improvements in the teaching of writing, more children in the early years who were previously reluctant to put pen to paper now write with excitement and ardour. Your new chosen approach to the teaching of writing is already having an impact. Children in the early years and pupils in key stage 1 are now making better progress in their written work. Pupils say that the actions you have taken to make the curriculum more exciting help them to learn well. Most pupils know how well they are doing and some know what they need to do next to improve. However, there remains some inconsistency in the extent to which teachers use all aspects of the school’s feedback policy across the curriculum. This means that teachers are not always challenging pupils as effectively as they could in all subjects. You have also introduced your chosen handwriting scheme, which teachers use effectively. The result is that pupils present their work with care and pride. Parents and carers I spoke with during the inspection were overwhelmingly positive about your leadership. The responses parents made to Ofsted’s online questionnaire were also very positive. Parents say they admire your high standards and attention to detail. You told me that pupils’ personal development, behaviour and welfare remain a strength of the school. Inspection evidence confirms this view. Pupils’ behaviour remains exemplary. They are also unreservedly positive about the school. They told me that everyone cares for each other and that they feel very safe. Pupils are kind and considerate while on the playground and moving around the school. They know that, if a pupil is on their own, they should ask to play with them. Pupils know the playground rules and why they are important. All the pupils I spoke to said they have lots of adults they could talk to if they have a worry. They explained to me with great authority how the British value of the rule of law applies to their classrooms when they keep their ‘golden rules’ and the playground rules. Pupils carry out their various responsibilities with keenness. You and I observed pupils in Year 5 taking charge of snacks at breaktime. I saw evidence of the work of pupils in the chaplaincy team, collecting food for the local food bank. Governors share your high expectations for what pupils can achieve. They know the school well. They ask challenging questions so that they hold you and your leaders to account for the performance of the school. Governors take their roles seriously, and this means that they make sure that statutory requirements are fulfilled. For example, governors ensure pupils’ safety because they monitor the school’s safeguarding processes effectively. Governors communicate well with parents through a range of means, including annual surveys and attendance at parents’ meetings. When parents raise concerns, governors challenge you and work well with you to resolve them. They play an active part in evaluating the school’s view of its effectiveness and work closely with you and your leaders to decide on priorities for improvement for the future.