Teacher Contact Information 

Your teachers are: Mrs Horton and Miss Parker

You can email them at:

Mrs Horton (Horse Chestnut)

sophiehorton@stratton.cornwall.sch.uk    

Miss Parker (Sweet Chestnut)

cherylparker@stratton.cornwall.sch.uk

 Weekly Update 12/02/2026

This week we have been learning about Lunar New Year. We have learnt about the celebrations and have compared these to celebrations we have previously learnt about – Diwali and Christmas. We have created our own dragon dance and finished the week with some Chinese food tasting. What a great way to finish the half term!

After half term, we will be moving onto a three-week block of Traditional Tales. We will begin with The Three Billy Goats Gruff.

Parents Evening:

After half term, on the week beginning Monday 2^nd March, it will be parents evening week. You should now be able to log onto your School Cloud account and book your parents evening appointment. If you are having any difficulties logging into your account, please contact the school office.

Swimming:

During the week beginning the 23^rd February, we will be going to Splash for swimming lessons.

Horse Chestnut class are swimming on Tuesday 24^th February and Wednesday 25^th February.

Sweet Chestnut class are swimming on Thursday 26^th February and Friday 27^th February.

We will be leaving school at 9:20. The children have a 30-minute lesson between 10:15-10:45. They will return to school before lunch.

Thank you to those who have volunteered to help walk with us to Splash. We have sent you through more details separately.

The children need to come to school wearing their swimming costumes underneath their school clothes. The need to have a backpack that they can carry themselves, containing a named towel, goggles and named underwear.

Over half term, please help your child to practise getting themselves dry and dressed independently after their baths/showers. This will make such a big difference to our trip. Thank you in advance.

Phonics:

After half term, the children will join their new phonics groups. Please try to keep reading with your child over half term.

Maths:

We tried to balance scales with Numicon and explored mass with boats – see Tapestry for photos. We then moved on to focus on capacity. We explored the capacity of different sized and shaped containers by seeing how many cubes would fit inside. For your math home learning challenge over half term, explore the capacity of different containers by seeing how many objects would fit inside, for example; dried pasta or lego. Alternatively, you could fill the containers with water and then empty them into a measuring jug to check how much water would fit in each container.

Have a restful break.

Mrs Horton and Miss Parker

Dates for the Dairy

16^th – 20^th February – Half Term

23^rd February – First Day Back of Half Term

24^th & 25^th February – Horse Chestnut Swimming

26^th & 27^th February – Sweet Chestnut Swimming

W/B 2^nd March – Parents' Evenings

With your child, please carry out a variety of the following tasks at least 5 times a week, recording in their reading log each time.

• Practise recognising letter sounds using flashcards daily – this is essential practise to get your child reading.

• Engage in 'Fred Talk Games'. These are games that support your child to orally blend sounds into words. For example, "Fred says, tap your h-ea-d... your head!" Please see the PDF document in the 'Read Write Inc. Phonics' section below for further 'Fred Talk Games' that you can play at home. 

• If your child is consistently recognising most of the single letter sounds from their flashcards, make simple words out of the flashcards for them to practise reading. For example, sat, tap, dog, bed. Encourage your child to point to each letter as they say the sounds. Once they have said each sound, they need to blend them together to say the whole word. For example, s – a –t, sat. They may need you to demonstrate this initially before they have a try.

• Share your child’s lilac book. This book has no words. Your child needs to look closely at the picture and talk about what they think is happening to tell a story. This develops their oracy comprehension and inference skills.

• Based on your child’s most recent phonics assessment, the may also bring home a 'blending book' or a 'ditty sheet' to read at home.

Please keep all of the above in your child’s book bag. They need to bring their book bag to school every day.

Homework tasks need to be recorded in your child's reading log at least 5 times a week so that we know that your child is practising their reading at home. Reading logs are checked every Friday to see how your child is getting on at home. Please make sure that you date and initial each time you record in your child's reading log to show that your child has read their lilac book/blending book/flash cards.

Please speak to any member of the Reception team if you have any questions.

Thank you for your continued support in helping your child learn to read.

The YR Team