The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. Since taking up your appointment in September 2016, you have established a successful working relationship with the governing body and staff. School leaders know the school well and have high aspirations. Collectively, you have the confidence of parents and the wider community to lead the school forward. You and the staff are very approachable and the close-family nature of the school ensures that all pupils are known as individuals. Leaders and staff track pupils’ progress carefully and make sure that any extra help needed is arranged promptly. The school has an inclusive and caring environment. Because of this, pupils behave well and enjoy coming to school. Pupils are keen to learn. They listen carefully to guidance from teachers and other staff. Pupils enjoy taking part in a range of activities linked to carefully chosen topics such as ‘monsters’, and the book, ‘Where the Wild Things Are’. Pupils are polite. They talk happily and confidently about their school, and were keen to tell me about the wide range of extra-curricular activities available to them. At the time of the last inspection, inspectors highlighted the many strengths of the school, including the quality of teaching, resulting in pupils’ good progress overall, and their polite and courteous behaviour. The inspectors also identified the need to ensure that the most able pupils were challenged in mathematics, and that tracking systems needed to be more reliable and accurate. The school’s new system for assessing pupils’ progress is effective and reviewed regularly by leaders. Currently, the levels of challenge offered to the most able pupils in mathematics are appropriate, although you agreed with me that this has not always been the case. Since the last inspection, school leaders have continued the process of selfevaluation in order to identify priorities to improve the school. You were able to describe the school’s many strengths, as well as the areas that need to be improved. Action points on the school’s improvement plan include a focus on the most able, as well as accelerating the progress of boys. During my visit we discussed your self-evaluation and the way it links to development planning. As a result, you agreed with me that school improvement planning needs to be further refined, making sure there is a sharper focus on the key priorities for improvement. Safeguarding is effective. Leaders have ensured that safeguarding arrangements are fit for purpose. Records are up to date and staff trained at an appropriate level. The curriculum teaches pupils how to stay safe and they talk confidently about e-safety and ‘stranger danger’. Pupils are supervised well throughout the day and they know that they can talk to staff if they have any concerns. The school premises and environment are maintained well, although since taking up your position you have identified aspects of the site that you want to improve. The school website contains a range of useful information for parents. All parents I spoke to, and who completed Ofsted’s online questionnaire, are confident that their children are safe at school. Inspection findings Leaders analyse tracking information regularly and have identified the progress of boys as a point for action. Many boys enjoy reading and are well supported by parents at home. The school has begun to enhance its curriculum by using books and topics of interest to boys, organising visits from ‘Bella’ the reading dog, and introducing a forest school. Consequently, some boys are reaching high levels of attainment in reading, but this is not always the case and there is more work to be done. The school’s very few pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds are monitored well. Their progress is tracked closely and extra support is put in place swiftly when required. Because of this, most disadvantaged pupils make good or better progress. Currently, most, but not all, higher-ability pupils are making good progress. You recognise that small year groups can mean that there are low numbers in some classes. Accordingly, extra opportunities have been organised, such as workshops or visits to other schools, giving these pupils a chance to work with pupils of a similar ability. These events have been welcomed by pupils, who told me they enjoy being challenged. However, there is more to be done to ensure that the most able pupils achieve to their full potential. Small numbers in each year group mean that comparisons to national averages for outcomes at the end of Reception are difficult to make. Because of the quality of provision, children make good progress from their different starting points in the early years. However, leaders know that boys do not make as much progress as girls across the school, including in the early years. The planned changes to resources and curriculum content should help to address this difference. Next steps for the school Leaders and those responsible for governance should ensure that: provision for boys is improved across the school so that their outcomes more closely match those of girls the most able pupils are challenged more consistently to enable more of them to attain at higher levels self-evaluation and development planning are sharpened, in order that key areas for improvement are addressed quickly and effectively. I am copying this letter to the chair of the governing body, the director of education for the Diocese of Chichester, the regional schools commissioner and the director of children’s services for West Sussex. This letter will be published on the Ofsted website. Yours sincerely Dr Rosemary Addison Ofsted Inspector Information about the inspection During the inspection, I met with you, the chair of the governing body accompanied by four other governors, and a group of pupils. I also spoke to representatives of the local authority and the diocese on the telephone. You accompanied me on visits to all classrooms, talking to pupils and assessing their work. I looked at a range of learning journals from Reception, and heard pupils read. I observed pupils’ behaviour in the playground before school and talked to parents. I took into account 28 responses to Ofsted’s online questionnaire, Parent View, and 29 free-text responses. I also received a letter from a parent. I considered seven online questionnaires from staff and 28 from pupils. I scrutinised a wide range of documentation, including the school’s self-evaluation and improvement planning, the school’s website, safety records, minutes of meetings, records of visits by the local authority, and pupil progress information.