St. John’s Catholic Primary School Newsletter 32 – 19th June 2026

Adapted from Matthew 10:26-33, The 12th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Year A

Jesus instructed the twelve as follows: “Do not be afraid. For everything that is now covered will be uncovered, and everything now hidden will be made clear. What I say to you in the dark, tell in the daylight; what you hear in whispers, proclaim from the house-tops. Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; think more about God who has power over both body and soul. Can you not buy two sparrows for a penny? And yet not one falls to the ground without your Father knowing. Why, every hair on your head has been counted. So there is no need to be afraid; you are worth more than hundreds of sparrows. So if anyone declares himself for me in the presence of men, I will declare myself for him in the presence of my Father in heaven.

Attendance Award – Year  6 & 4 – 100% – Well done!

Whole School Attendance – 97.3%

 Superstars of the Week!

YR –  Maria for her full participation and engagement in her learning this week. She completed all learning challenges without support and could talk confidently about her learning. We are so proud of you!

Y1 –  Orla for always being the first on the carpet, sat beautifully waiting to begin learning!

Y2 –  Bella for being aspirational in English this week.

Y3 – Jacinta for always trying hard in all aspects of her learning. Keep up the good work.

Y4 – All of Year 4 for how well listened, engaged and behaved on our visit on Tuesday and with our visitior on Monday.

Y5 –  Aiden for being a supportive learning partner and consistently helping those around him.

Y6 –  Anthonia for her caring nature which shines through in everything she does.

 Proud Work: 19/06/2026

YR –  Iza for her fantastic independent writing this week! Iza could use her phonics knowledge to write about the pictures with beautiful letter formation. Well done!

Y1 –  Daisie for trying hard to sew her puppet in D.T and persevering even when it got tricky!

Y2 –  Erin for her postcard from London written in thestyle of our class book using past and present tense.

Y3 –  Florence for her inspiring vocabulary used to write a letter of persuasion. Keep up the good work.

Y4 –  Nuhan for how clearly he gave examples of what Saint John’s Church community does to cotinue the work of Jesus.

Y5 –  Noah P for his use of modal verbs explaining who the suspects might be.

Y6 –  All of Year 6 for their fantastic video call today with their French penpals! They asked excellent questions in French with confidence! I was so impressed. Merci Classe 6! Mrs Curtis

Silver Reader – 100 reads

YR –  Ralphie

Y4 –  Izka

Magnificent Reading Award – 250 Reads

Y2 –  Layla

Spelling Shed Certificate of Achievement

Y2 –  Toby

Y3 –  Tymon

Y4 –  Aurora

Times Tables Rockstars

Rock Star:  Evelyn F

Garage Rocker : Kieran W-Q

Headliner : 

Summer Term Chartwells Order Deadline Dates

Please order by the dates below to ensure your child has a hot lunch in the Summer Term.

2026 Term Dates!

Summer Term

Tuesday 23 June: Y5 school trip

Thursday 25 June: Sports Day: KS1 – 9:15am – 10:45am, KS2 – 1:15pm – 3pm

Saturday 27 June 11am – 2pm: Summer Fair

Sunday 5 July: Horsham Children’s Parade. Years 2 & 4 to participate.

Monday 13 July: Teacher led After School Clubs finish this week.

Tuesday 14 July: Y6 school trip

Thursday 16 July: YR school trip

Monday 20 July at 2pm: Leavers Mass at Church

Wednesday 22 July: children break up for Summer holidays

To keep up to date with future school events, please visit the school calendar which can be found on the parents page on our website.

Parents – St John’s Catholic Primary School

🌞 St John’s Summer Fair – Saturday 27th June (11am–2pm)

We’re excited to invite you to our annual St John’s Summer Fair

Join us for a fun-filled day with:
🎪 Inflatables
🎟️ Raffle
🎯 Games & stalls
🍔 Food & drinks

Can you help?
We’re looking for volunteers to support with stalls, refreshments, and setup/clear down. If you’re able to lend a hand, please contact the school office or email friends@stjohnshorsham.school.

Your support helps make events like this possible while raising funds to replace our outdoor hut.

We look forward to welcoming you and your families!

St John’s International Festival 2026!

Wow, what a fantastic day we had today, celebrating all our different nationalities and cultures at St John’s!

The children looked wonderful in their clothes from different countries!

In the morning, the children were lucky enough to taste food from all over the world. The tables looked wonderful, decorated with flags and souvenirs from the different countries. The food was presented beautifully and it tasted amazing! A huge thank you to all the parents who brought in food, and especially to those who stayed to help. Thank you to the children who helped too.

During the rest of the day, each class also chose a country to research, followed up by different activities to learn about the culture of their country. In the afternoon, we had a celebration assembly and each class presented their learning.

Without your help we could not have held this International Festival, so we cannot thank you enough.

Mrs Curtis

Friends of St John’s:

👕 Pre-Loved Uniform Sale – Next Monday 

Don’t forget our uniform sale taking place next Monday – a great chance to pick up good-quality items at a bargain price!

🎟️ Summer Fair Raffle Tickets

Your children brought home raffle tickets for the Summer Fair last week.

Please remember to sell your tickets to friends and family for a chance to win some fantastic prizes. Return ticket and the correct payment to the school office by 9am Friday 26 June, or bring them along to the raffle stall at the fair to be included in the draw.

🌟 Thank You to Our Local Businesses

We are incredibly grateful to the following local businesses for their generous donations. We have some great prizes to win at the fair:

Outdoor Project, Silent Pool, Borde Hill, Druscillas, Fishers Farm, Bocketts Farm, Hobbledown Heath, Major Mindgames, Master Fryer, Tailor Made, The Bridge, ABC Sports Coaching, Cook, Mulberry Bush, Tesco and Toy Barnhaus.

A big thank you as well to the parents who kindly helped distribute letters.

🙌 Volunteers Needed

Thank you to everyone who has signed up to volunteer so far – we really appreciate your support! We’re also delighted to have help from Mrs Farr, Mrs Curtis as well as some of our Governors and Grandparents.

To keep queues moving and ensure everyone enjoys the day, we need at least two volunteers per stall at all times. We are still short of helpers in the following slots:

Reception

• 2 people: 12.30–1.00
• 2 people: 1.00–1.30
• 2 people: 1.30–2.00

Year 2

• 2 people: Set up (9.00–12.00)
• 1 person: 1.00–1.30
• 2 people: Pack away (2.00–3.00)

Year 3

• 2 people: 1.00–1.30
• 1 person: Pack away (2.00–3.00)

Year 4

• 1 person: 12.00–12.30
• 2 people: Pack away (2.00–3.00)

Year 5

• 1 person: Pack away (2.00-3.00)

Year 6

• 1 person: 1.30–2.00
• 1 person: Pack away (2.00–3.00)

If you can spare even 30 minutes, please consider signing up to help support your child’s school — every little bit makes a big difference!

Lastly if you can help us the Friday before the fair to put up gazebos from 5-7pm it would be appreciated.

Many Thanks

The Friends of St John’s

 Good Shepherd Celebration at Worth Abbey

Today we took part in the annual Good Shepherd Liturgy at Worth Abbey. Schools from Arundel and Brighton were represented. Our children presented our decorated anchor and took part in the procession

with the school banner. The children were wonderful.

Year 6 Video call with French penpals!

Yesterday, Year 6 were very excited to meet and talk to their French penpals on a video call! This is the first time we have ever done this. Year 6 had prepared questions for their penpals in excellent French and they were able to answer questions from the French children too. I was so impressed with our children and their French!

If your child would like to stay in touch with their penpal after St John’s, please contact Mrs Curtis. You will need to be fairly quick as the French school finishes at the end of June for the summer holidays!

Merci beaucoup!

Free Trial for After school club – Zumba 

Please see below poster for a possible After School Club on Thursdays from September. This will be offered, dependent on uptake. They are offering a free trial session on Thursday 2 July after school so please get in touch directly with them on the email address below if you wish to book a spot on the trial session.

Free School Meals – Update

The Department for Education (DfE) is significantly expanding Free School Meals (FSM) eligibility in England from the start of the 2026/2027 academic year, making all pupils in households receiving Universal Credit entitled to a free school meal, regardless of their annual income. This means that any family currently in receipt of a FSM will need to reapply to gain eligibility for next academic year, and it is expected that many more families will also be eligible for the first time for FSM if parents are in receipt of the following benefits:

• Universal Credit
• support under Part VI of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999

A pupil is only eligible to receive a free school meal where both:

• a claim for this support has been made
• their eligibility has been verified by the school where they are enrolled or by the local authority.

If you think you may be eligible (and if you are on Univeral Credit, you most likely are eligible), please contact the School Office for a Registration Form for Free School Meals and we will be happy to help you apply. 

We will be in touch with more updates shortly.