Year 2

This half term the children have settled in well into their new routines and environment. We have covered so much learning in a short space of time.

In English we have explored two new texts – The Bear Under the Stairs and The Bear and the Piano. Within these texts we have covered letter writing, writing information text, contractions, story writing and making information posters.

 In Maths we have been working hard on place value – understanding what tens and ones are. Working with numbers up to 100, writing numbers as words, estimating numbers on a number line, ordering and comparing numbers and objects as well as counting in 2s, 5s, 10s and 3s. We have also started a unit on addition and subtraction – learning about 10 more and 10 less, adding and subtracting 2 digit numbers, number bonds to 10 and 100.

In Science we have been learning all about materials – describing properties of materials, how they can change shape and their suitability for their purpose.

In Geography we have been learning all about Our Country – we know that there are four countries in the UK and their capital cities. We have also looked into more detail about London and have spoken about our experiences there.

In Art, our topic was Can Buildings speak? We have been learning about different architects, looking at shapes and patterns in buildings. We learnt about a famous artist called LS Lowry and have explored his paintings. We even painted our own buildings by colour mixing to make different shades of brown.

In PE, we are exploring ball skills using our hands. We have been practicing dribbling, chest passes and developing increasing control over a ball.

  In PSHE, we have been exploring our feelings. We thought about what we would our ideal classroom to feel and be like. We made pledges as to how we will help to make our classroom a happy place.

In Computing, we are developing our coding skills. We have been exploring how to code something so that we can make it move in a particular way on the screen and have also been thinking about debugging and finding solutions when the code doesn’t work.

In French, we have learnt greetings – how to say hello, goodbye and ask how someone is feeling.

In RE, our big question was Why are signs and symbols important? We have explored the idea of what symbols are and looked at the different symbols that are important to different religions – Christians, Hindus, Buddhists and Sikhs.

Music - As part of our charanga scheme we have been learning the song ‘Hands, Feet, Heart’. The children listened to and appraised different styles of South African music and have been learning to find the pulse in a piece of music.

Year 2 were lucky to have Forest School this half term. We have explored the woods, created minibeasts using clay, went on a hunt for animal footprints, toasted marshmallows and made quesadillas on the fire!

Year 2 have had a very busy term! In science we have been busy exploring and classifying materials. We looked at their properties and why some materials are more suitable for their purpose than others. 

We have also had lots of enthusiasm from the children during English when we learnt all about Wolves! We have created warning posters warning others about a wolf on the loose in our school, made video documentaries, wrote information leaflets and so much more. 

We have also had the lovely opportunity to have bicycle training where the children got the develop their riding and safety skills through fun games.

In DT we have been learning all about fire engines, we have learnt about all the parts of a fire engine and explored making axles and chassis. We even made our own fire engine following a specific set criteria of what it needed to include. This linked in nicely with our History topic The Great Fire of London, where we explored how and why the fire started and also how it as put out and what changes were put in place after the fire.