The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. You have created a strong ethos where the school’s Christian values underpin all aspects of its practice. A harmonious environment exists in which children are happy, safe and secure. The growing sense of partnership among staff contributes strongly to the vision you set for the school. Your arrival in September 2014 has brought a renewed focus on improving outcomes for pupils following many changes to staffing over the last 12 months. In your work, you are building on the strengths from the time of previous inspection well. Your drive to improve standards is supported by an effective governing body and recently appointed chair of governors. Governors have a clear understanding of both the needs of the school and how the school fits into the community as a whole. They share, support and challenge you to address the priorities you have identified as the areas the school needs to work on most, in order to improve the quality of education even further. These include a continued focus on the improvement of pupils’ mathematics, phonics and the early years, and increasing the level of challenge for the most able pupils, especially in writing. You have successfully addressed the issues identified at the previous inspection. Training and support for teachers is enabling pupils to move quickly into activities that are well matched to their abilities. Pupils are also devising their own ways of extending learning for themselves. Pupils are pleased with the effective feedback that they receive from teachers. Your focus to improve writing and raise standards in phonics in the early years and Year 1 so that it impacts positively on reading and writing standards further up the school is proving successful. The presentation of written work in upper key stage 2 is testament to the impact of the teaching of writing skills. However, you recognise that pupils, including the most able, are not yet developing their writing skills in other curriculum areas well enough. The majority of parents spoken to are very pleased with the quality of education and care their children receive. Parents of pupils who have recently arrived at West Coker Primary School speak of the welcome their children received and how smooth the transition has been. A few parents are less positive regarding the level of communication from the school, which you and governors recognise as an issue to address. Overall, it is clear that the school is at the centre of a learning community in which staff and parents work well together to improve the educational outcomes for pupils. Safeguarding is effective. A culture of strong safeguarding is evident across the school. Pupils feel safe and parents agree that their children are happy and well looked after. Records relating to safeguarding are fit for purpose, detailed and of high quality, reflecting the school’s determination to keep pupils safe. Staff are vigilant and are clear about the procedures in place. Regular training and updates ensure that staff have a good awareness of a range of issues around child protection and radicalisation and of any problems or changes to legislation. Staff know children well. This, in turn, means that they are very well placed to spot concerns early to notice if a child’s behaviour changes and whether this might indicate a deeper concern. Pupils know how to keep safe when using the internet and have a secure understanding of the misuse of social media. They report that there is no bullying in school and are confident that if it did happen, staff would deal with it swiftly. Minor issues with the safeguarding policy on the school website, which you and the governors are aware of, are being amended. Inspection findings In the past, pupils have tended to perform better in reading and mathematics than in writing. This pattern was repeated in the recent 2016 national curriculum assessments at both key stage 1 and key stage 2. Work in pupils’ books across a range of abilities, including the most able, shows that pupils are now making good progress in their writing skills. For example, pupils in Years 5 and 6 confidently write complex sentences for a range of purposes and use punctuation to improve meaning and convey imaginative thoughts. Actions to improve pupils’ writing and mathematics skills has ensured that the achievement gap between boys and girls has closed. The most able pupils do not routinely apply their formal writing skills in other writing areas of the curriculum in order to extend their understanding further.