The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. Since then, you have focused on developing the capacity and effectiveness of your senior leaders, who now play an active and pivotal role in the management of the school. Leaders have an accurate view of the school’s performance. You have rightly focused on developing the skills of the school’s middle leadership team over the last 18 months. This work has enabled these leaders to focus on whole-school improvement, particularly in improving reading and phonics. You have identified that standards in reading and phonics at key stage 1 need to improve further. The actions taken to address this are proving effective, particularly in the revised arrangements for teaching phonics across early years and key stage 1. Provisional 2017 test results show that these strategies are improving pupils’ progress, particularly for pupils who speak English as an additional language. Assessment information for other year groups also shows an improving picture across the school. The school is a positive and welcoming place. Staff and pupils are friendly, welcoming and demonstrate respect for each other. Safeguarding is effective. The school’s policies and procedures for safeguarding pupils’ well-being are appropriate. Records related to safeguarding are detailed and accurate. The designated safeguarding lead works effectively with other staff and external agencies. Leaders ensure that training for staff and governors takes place regularly, including on the ‘Prevent’ duty. Pupils feel safe in school and are clear about whom they can approach if they have any concerns or problems. They understand the need to keep themselves safe online. Although pupils were aware of the risks associated with online activity, some pupils were less clear about age restrictions for social media sites. Pupils, parents and staff consider this to be a safe, happy and welcoming school where bullying is rare and concerns are dealt with effectively. Inspection findings Standards in key stage 1 were below national average last year, particularly in reading. As a result, we chose this as our first line of enquiry. Our classroom observations showed that the teaching of reading in key stage 1 is lively and engaging, and that teachers demonstrate strong subject knowledge. Teachers use questioning to check pupils’ understanding of what they have read with examples of questions that extend thinking. You have rightly identified teacher-led group reading as an area of development this year and have worked with another local school to support this work. We looked at pupils’ ‘guided reading’ workbooks which demonstrate some early impact of your work in this area. However, other exercise books show pupils’ skills in writing are not consistently applied. You acknowledge that the provision for the lower-attaining pupils is less strong. Further improvement is needed to ensure that all pupils, especially this group, receive consistently high-quality teaching. Our next line of enquiry focused on the progress of middle-attaining readers through key stage 2. Again, your work with the local partner school is securing improvement, for example in developing the reading stamina and enjoyment of reading. The range of texts now in use has also raised pupils’ interest and engagement in reading sessions. You showed me where this work is already having an impact on this group of pupils. We saw that pupils’ comprehension skills are developing well. Nevertheless, we found that, in some reading sessions, the challenge of the most able pupils was not always sufficient. The school’s assessment information shows that the progress of the most able pupils is improving, but senior leaders need to do more to ensure that teachers identify where intervention is needed, to ensure that these pupils are sufficiently challenged to achieve highly. Our third line of enquiry looked closely at phonics teaching in early years and key stage 1. This was because the standards in the Year 1 phonics screening check have been below the national average for the last three years. The school has addressed this by introducing an alternative approach to grouping and intervening where pupils are at risk of not meeting the expected standard. As a result of the improvements to assessment procedures in phonics, teaching is well matched to pupils’ abilities. Although the impact of this work is evident in classrooms and is showing an improving picture, standards remain below the national average. You, together with other leaders, are determined to close this gap and in our visits to classrooms we agreed that a stronger emphasis on writing in phonics sessions would further strengthen pupils’ progress. Finally, we considered how teaching in the early years is providing stimulating opportunities for children. At the previous inspection, there were inconsistencies in the quality of provision between Nursery and Reception classes. Early years provision has developed considerably since the last inspection and teaching now offers clearly planned activities that secure strong levels of challenge for children. For example, on our visits to lessons we saw children writing with time connectives, groups of children estimating with numbers up to 50, and others taking part in a challenging science investigation focused on magnetism. A strength in early years is the way in which adults model language for pupils. We saw good examples of children using information and communication technology to record their role plays related to their bear hunt story. Next steps for the school Leaders and those responsible for governance should ensure that: feedback from senior leaders’ evaluation of teaching leads to improved outcomes for all pupil groups teaching consistently challenges the most able pupils to achieve their potential in reading. I am copying this letter to the chair of the governing body, the regional schools commissioner and the director of children’s services for Ealing. This letter will be published on the Ofsted website. Yours sincerely Jonathan Roddick Ofsted Inspector Information about the inspection I visited lessons to observe learning jointly with members of the school’s senior leadership team. While in lessons, I scrutinised pupils’ work and discussed pupils’ learning with them. I listened to pupils read.