The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. You play a pivotal role in the ongoing success of your school. You use your detailed understanding and knowledge of your pupils to identify any potential barriers to learning and improve the quality of education across all levels in the school. Your approach to developing a nurturing community in a secure environment is evident from first entering the school. This is important because of the high number of pupils who join your school other than at the normal times. Often, these pupils have had poor school experiences elsewhere. Pupils settle quickly and learn together in a positive way, at ease with their peers because adults teach them to respect each other. Your advocacy of ‘community’ and ‘all-rounded’ values is at the heart of the curriculum and underpins everyone’s approach. Pupils’ understanding of sustainability, democracy and tolerance is strongly promoted and taken very seriously. Pupils know that such qualities will enable them to become responsible citizens of the future. Differences are celebrated and the importance of equal opportunities advocated. Overall, you are proud of your school and the learning that is taking place but are aware that there is always room for further improvement. Your revised curriculum planning is now delivering the academic rigour needed, alongside the personal care required to cater for pupils’ individual needs well. Pupils’ personal successes and academic achievements are celebrated through the colourful and informative displays that also showcase the exciting and rich curriculum you offer. Parents, staff and pupils all recognise the benefits of the approach to the curriculum offered. Visits to local agricultural shows and residential experiences on Bodmin Moor provide memorable experiences to all, which is important for years to come. You continue to address the areas for improvement identified at the previous inspection successfully. Your strong focus on pupils’ learning habits is developing their ability to reflect on their achievements and identify the next steps in learning well. Pupils routinely review one another’s work and provide clear points for developing aspects of writing and mathematics, for example. As a result, pupils are clear about what they need to do next to improve their work and achieve well. You are aware that pupils’ standards and the quality of teaching dropped last year due to an absence of leadership at the school. You have acted swiftly to arrest any further decline and raise the quality of teaching and pupils’ learning back to the typically good standards. Work in pupils’ books indicates that pupils’ current progress is good. The majority of parents who responded to Ofsted’s online questionnaire, Parent View, are complimentary about you, your staff and all you do to make their children feel happy and well cared for. Most parents feel that their children are safe in school. Parents typically commented on the rich curriculum and projects studied that engage and motivate their children by bringing learning to life. A few parents raised concerns about how behavioural issues were dealt with. Discussions with pupils and staff and reviewing the school’s work did not support these views. Teachers are benefiting from the primary sport premium (the additional government funding to increase pupils’ participation and competition in school sports) by working alongside specialist coaches to improve their practice. However, the current allocation of expenditure to fulfil the statutory requirements for swimming does not meet the spending criteria as set out by the Department for Education. Safeguarding is effective. The welcoming and caring atmosphere created, allied with up-to-date training for staff, ensures that your school has a strong culture of safeguarding. You and your governors ensure that safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose and records are detailed and comprehensive. Members of staff are knowledgeable about the signs of abuse and fully understand more complex issues, such as child sexual exploitation and radicalisation. Parents are positive about the school’s work and the difference it has made to pupils’ lives. A particular strength is the way the school works with other agencies and providers at the time of transition in and out of school. This helps to ensure the smooth flow of information and so ensures that pupils’ individual needs are met. Pupils report that they feel safe in school due to the care and attention they receive from adults. Pupils know how to report concerns and understand the process for doing so. They are confident that staff will help them if they have any issues. Your commitment to pupils’ welfare is evident in the way that you follow up matters when brought to your attention. Safety also features strongly in the curriculum, which helps pupils to keep themselves safe in a range of situations and settings. Pupils are made aware of online safety and taught how to manage risks when working outside in the local environment. Inspection findings Together we agreed to focus on how well boys were achieving in reading and writing. We also explored how well boys’ early reading and phonics skills were being developed. Another area we investigated was how well pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities were supported to achieve well from their starting points. Finally, we examined how well the most able pupils were being stretched. The teaching of writing is technically accurate and precise. Teachers use their good subject knowledge to ensure that pupils understand grammar and punctuation conventions well. For example, in English, teachers know how pupils’ report writing should progress as they become more skilled at this genre. Typical work in older pupils’ books includes accurate writing, featuring, for example, fronted adverbials and expanded noun phrases. Your chosen approach of focusing on activities that engage boys more and spark their enthusiasm for writing is working. When this is coupled with an emphasis on getting the technical aspects of composition correct, pupils make swift progress in their writing. This was seen, for example, in pupils’ written accounts of their trip to the Farm and Country Show at Wadebridge Showground. Activities the school has planned are therefore making a positive impact on boys’ engagement with, and attitude to, writing. Teachers are also linking activities well to other areas of the curriculum. During our learning walks, it was clear that boys were writing well across a wider range of subjects. However, teaching does not focus closely enough on the impact that word, sentence or punctuation choices have on the reader. In these instances, the basic literacy skills for pupils are not developed well enough. Strategies to improve boys’ performance in phonics last year are also proving successful. On our learning walk, we particularly noted pupils’ accuracy in their knowledge of phonics. Pupils confidently identify individual sounds in consonant vowel consonant words such as h/a/m. Such approaches are ensuring that boys’ attainment in the Year 1 phonics screening check is rising to at least the national average. Therefore, the firm foundations on which to build future successes in reading are being established. You are aware that there is still work to do to ensure that the achievement of pupils in key stage 1 continues to improve. Historically, younger boys’ physical development and motor control skills did not receive close enough attention. Currently, younger children receive a broad range of experiences through ‘dough disco’ and ‘funky finger’ exercises that successfully build muscles and develop pencil control. Older boys’ work illustrates the legacy of weaker provision earlier in their school life. The presentation and handwriting of many boys’ writing are weaker than those of girls. Across the school, boys enjoy reading. They are confident reading to their peers and sharing their own compositions with expression and fluency. Where planned activities, such as rehearsing rap poems in Year 3 or creating stories about Minions in Year 2, spark boys’ enthusiasm, their productivity is particularly impressive. Boys’ sense of intrigue and curiosity are stimulated when researching topics such as crime and punishment, especially when activities are combined with trips to local places of interest such as Bodmin Jail or Launceston Castle. Pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities are supported well. Your careful analysis of pupils’ individual needs enables you to identify where pupils have genuine barriers to cognition and development. You contrast these pupils’ needs well with those of others who simply need to catch up with their learning to reach the standards expected for their age. Termly checks on the progress of pupils with identified needs ensure that more pupils are making good or better progress from their starting points. The most able pupils respond positively to the stimulating challenges set. Pupils extend their fantasy stories using flashbacks and similes for added detail. They read their creations with passion and enthusiasm. When questioned, they demonstrate a good understanding of more complex reading strategies, such as inference and deduction. The new approach enabling pupils to challenge themselves towards the highest standards is meeting their learning needs more closely. You are aware that, while recent developments are proving positive, this raised expectation now needs to be embedded in the practice of day-to-day lessons. Next steps for the school Leaders and those responsible for governance should ensure that: the focus on stretching and challenging the most able pupils during routine lessons is maintained the handwriting and presentation of boys’ work improve pupils fully understand what impact their written word, sentence and punctuation choices have on the reader the achievement of pupils in key stage 1 improves further the additional funding to increase pupils’ participation in physical activity and improve their performance in physical education is used in accordance with the guidance as set out by the Department for Education.