St Cecilia's News

Dear Parents and Carers,

I hope you were able to enjoy a restful half term with your families, finding moments of peace and togetherness despite the rather persistent rain.

The Spring Term has already been rich and busy as we continue our journey as part of the Sancta Familia Catholic Academy Trust. This new chapter in the life of our school is one of growth, partnership and shared mission. Behind the scenes, much thoughtful work has been taking place to ensure we align our systems and processes with those of the Trust.

I am deeply grateful to our dedicated staff for embracing this transition so positively. Mrs Bharkhda has worked tirelessly to establish new finance and budgeting systems. Mrs Saunders is carefully implementing a new online HR platform, and Mrs Martin has worked closely with me to align our procedures. Our subject leaders have also begun collaborating more closely with colleagues across the Trust, sharing best practice and reflecting on how we can continue to augment our curriculum.

All of this work requires time, energy and commitment, but it strengthens us as a Catholic community and helps us to be the very best school we can be — a school rooted in faith, excellence and service.

It was a particular joy to gather with pupils and staff from across the Trust for a shared liturgy at St Elphege's Church — a new annual tradition for our Trust family. Our Chaplaincy Team represented the school with reverence, confidence and pride, alongside the Directors of the Trust and Diocesan officers. We were immensely proud of them and of the way they embodied our school’s values.

As part of our continued alignment with the Trust, we will be harmonising our term dates and staff development (INSET) days for the next academic year. We are currently finalising these arrangements and will share full details with you shortly via our website and Class Dojo.

We have returned to school during the sacred season of Lent — a time of reflection, prayer and renewal. Within our wider community, many of our families recently celebrated Lunar New Year, and our Muslim families are now observing the holy month of Ramadan. These are deeply significant spiritual times, and we give thanks for the richness and diversity of our school family.

During Lent, we turn our hearts towards the saving mystery of Christ’s Passion, Death and Resurrection. In classrooms and assemblies, the children will be reflecting on the events leading to Holy Week, deepening their understanding of Christ’s love and sacrifice.

Our Year 5 St John Bosco Class are preparing to lead their Walking Stations of the Cross on 26th March. We hold them in our prayers as they prepare to guide us in this powerful Lenten devotion.

Thank you, as always, for your continued support, encouragement and partnership, I wish you all a very good half term to Easter

Vince Burke

Headteacher

Booking opens tonight at 7pm!

We have our second set of Parent Teacher Meetings of the school year coming up over the next two weeks. They are on

Tuesday 3rd March

Thursday 12th March

To book an appointment with your child's class teacher please visit the Guardian Consultations area of the Arbor App or Parent Portal. Booking opens tonight at 7pm. Booking closes on Monday 2nd March at midday, please book in plenty of time.

Please remember that it is one appointment per class per child, multiple appointments, for example to both job share teachers, will be cancelled. We have to make sure that we can see all the parents we need to see in the agreed time.

The Arbor App and Parent Portal

Sign in to book a Guardian Consultation

Please see below for a link to a children's calendar for Lent.

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Lent-Calendar-2026.pdf

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4.9 MB

We have expanded our after school club provision for Nursery and Reception, it is now accomodated in the Nursery Class. For information on places please contact Mrs Cahill at childcare@stcecilias.school.

We believe it is important that parents and carers feel well informed ahead of our upcoming Guardian Consultations. Sharing up-to-date information ensures that our conversations are clear, constructive and focused on supporting each child’s progress.

This Friday afternoon, parents and carers of pupils in Years 1–6 will receive updated assessment information in Reading, Writing and Mathematics. The report will also include your child’s current attendance data.

As usual, the report will be sent via email and will also be available to view in the Arbor App under the Reports section.

Thank you for your continued support and partnership. We look forward to meeting with you and working together to help every child achieve their very best.

We are delighted to share that our new log cabin is now ready for use! Installed a few weeks ago, it provides some very welcome additional space for small group learning and targeted support. The cabin also includes a dedicated office area where Mrs Gallant, visiting therapists and other professionals can meet with children in a calm and comfortable setting.

We are extremely grateful to Sutton Local Authority for funding this project through a Department for Education grant. This investment makes a real difference to the provision we are able to offer our pupils.

We have noticed that the surface of our rear playground has started to sink again. We are pleased to say this will be repaired under guarantee during the Easter holiday, minimising disruption to the children.

In addition, we have successfully secured funding from the Academy Trust for urgent improvements to our “green playground”. Over the summer holiday, this area will benefit from improved drainage and a brand-new surface.

Each of these developments strengthens our learning and play environment, ensuring our children have safe, high-quality spaces in which to learn, grow and enjoy their time at school.

Sports Day has been booked for Thursday 25th June. We will then close for staff training on Friday 26th June, the day after Sports Day. This is the last INSET day to be notified.

Mrs Parsons, Subject Leader, English writes,

Monday 2nd March sees the start of book week. We have one of our favourite days of the year, Book Character dress up day on Thursday 5th March, all children can come to school in costume.

We are looking forward to welcoming the Author Annemarie Anang to school. Annemarie Anang is the author of the children's books 'I AM NEFERTITI' and 'DANCE LIKE SO'.

I AM NEFERTITI is described as 'When Nefertiti plays the drums, the band plays as one. "I am Nefertiti" she says, and she feels ten feet tall. But when the new music teacher shortens her name to 'Nef', bit by bit, she starts to shrink. Without Nefertiti to keep the beat, the band is in disarray . . . "I am Nefertiti!" she whispers to herself. Drawing on her inner strength and with the support of the other children, they help Miss Potts recognise the importance of honouring Nefertiti's name. Now, when Nefertiti keeps the beat, the music sounds so sweet! A heartwarming, joyous, empowering story of identity and belonging'

DANCE LIKE SO is described as 'It's dance class day and Gran will teach Kwesi and the neighbours her trophy-winning dance, the Shooby-Doo Mambo. But Gran hurts her knee before Kwesi can learn all the steps. How will he learn the special dance now? Slowly Kwesi finds the confidence to practice the steps on his own, but dancing without Gran is not the same...Kwesi's inventive solution delivers a heartwarming surprise. Next dance class day, he and Gran dance the new Shooby-Do Mambo. Twirling their glittery canes in the air while seated on chairs, they wow all the neighbours Just Like So'

Annemarie will be signing books during the day. If you wish to purchase either of these books these can be brought on Amazon and sent into school with your child on Monday.

Miss Moore writes: Children’s Mental Health Week 2026 has been a wonderful celebration across our school! This year’s theme, ‘This is My Place’, reminds us just how important it is to feel that we truly belong.

Belonging helps us feel connected, valued and accepted for who we are. Throughout the week, we have been exploring how our sense of belonging – in our friendships, our classrooms, our school family and our wider community – plays a powerful role in supporting our mental health and wellbeing. When we know we belong, we flourish.

To round off the week before half term, we came together with our buddies from across the school for a special mindfulness doodling session. The hall was filled with smiles, calm creativity and wonderful conversation. It was a beautiful reminder that our school is a place where every single child matters.

We are so proud of the kindness, encouragement and friendship shown throughout the week. Together, we continue to build a school community where everyone feels happy, safe, supported and ready to learn and play.

Thank you to all our families for supporting this important week. Parents can check out our whole-school celebration video, shared on Class Dojo.

We are really pleased to have been chosen to work with a special Mayor for London project to engage with school communities on air quality. We have already had an audit, special visitors will now visit and work with the children in class and in assemblies to look at the issue of air pollution and clean air routes to school. We have been helped with the move to more electric vehicles in recent years, especially with all of the new electric buses that we have going by. It would be great to get families more involved and one of the sessions will be with the Walk, Wheel, Cycle Trust at pickup time so that parents can get more information on the project.

This term, our children have enjoyed an inspiring creative journey, working alongside a professional artist to develop their technical skills in sculpture, with a particular focus on large-scale forms. We were delighted to welcome artist Steve Porter, who collaborated with pupils across Key Stages 1 and 2, guiding them as they brought much-loved storybook characters to life.

Inspired by the children’s own ideas, the project centred on creating bold, imaginative sculptures of Elmer the Patchwork Elephant, the Grufalo, and the BFG. Using cardboard and wirework, pupils worked in teams through each stage of the sculpting process, learning how ideas are transformed into impressive three-dimensional artworks.

Children worked with Steve in small groups, completing a sculpture each day. Subsequently, each evening Steve added final refinements before the pieces were left to dry, ready for the next stage of their journey. Now beautifully finished, the sculptures are touring the school, delighting pupils and staff alike, before taking pride of place in their permanent home in our school library — a lasting celebration of creativity, collaboration and a love of storytelling.

Unfortunately, counting the birds proved quite challenging this year due to the persistent rain! Despite our best efforts, the ECO group noticed that there are not currently many birds visiting our school grounds.

We began to wonder whether our lively presence might have frightened some of them away.

However, this has only strengthened our determination. We are now planning to install additional bird feeders and bird houses around the school site, in the hope of creating a more welcoming habitat and encouraging a greater variety of birds to visit us over the coming year.

We proudly submitted our results to the RSPB — with 22 pigeons soaring to the top of our tally chart! We look forward to seeing how our numbers grow next year as we continue to care for and improve our local environment.

Reigate and Redhill Festival have written to ask if we could distribute the attached flyer to let parents know that entries are now open for the 2026 Festival in May.

They are a charity who run an annual festival of music, speech and drama, providing children and young people with the opportunity to perform in front of a friendly audience and to receive feedback from an expert adjudicator.

The Festival includes over 250 competitive and non-competitive entry categories: some with medals and trophies to win and all with certificates for taking part.

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Festival Flyer - Jan 2026.pdf

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1.1 MB

Primary Family Support Group
Empowering parents to build healthy relationships with their children
Please see the attached poster for details of upcoming parenting support groups, starting early March, in person, on Wednesday lunchtimes at the Limes College. This has already been sent on Class Dojo.