W/B 22nd April

English This week we have been learning to write instructions. We have been finding out the best way to layout our instructions to make it clear for the reader. We have also used diagrams, arrows and pictures, as well as carefully considered the best nouns and verbs (words and phrases) to use.

Maths We have continued with our learning on Fractions. We have been recognising and finding a third of a shape, object and an amount, as well as finding out what the whole number is (for example 12 is half of ?). Today we learnt about unit fractions. Unit fractions always have a numerator (top number) of 1.

Art This half term our topic is 'Super Sculptures'. We have begun the unit by learning about Anthony Gormley.

Have a great weekend!

W/B 15th April

Welcome back and welcome to the Summer term! We hope you all had a fantastic Easter break.

English We began this week by writing and editing our recounts of the Easter holidays. We really enjoyed reading about what you got up to. Then we started our new unit- writing instructions. Over the next few weeks we will be developing our writing skills to create various sets of instructions.

Maths This week we started our fractions topic. We revised the concepts of whole, part, equal and unequal. We then recapped recognising and finding a half and a quarter of a shape and groups of objects.

History. Our topic this half term is The Great Fire of London. The children are really keen to begin this topic! This week we compared modern London with past London.

Well done everyone for a great first week back!

W/B 25th March

We have had a fantastic end to a very lovely and very busy Spring term. All the children performed beautifully in the dance show with Mr Rae and Year 2 enjoyed their visit to St George's Church, where they took part in lots of activities to learn about the Easter story.

English This week we listened to the poem 'Please Mrs Butler' and then worked with our learning partners to write our own version. We were amazed to learn that teachers are asked 300,000 questions in ten years of teaching!

Maths We have spent this week revising the skills we have learnt this half term. The Easter break provides a great opportunity to practise some Maths. Hit the Button is a super game for recapping learning.  https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button

Mindful Garden The children brought home a template to design a Mindful Garden over Easter. We look forward to see all your ideas.

Thank you for all your support this term. We hope you have a wonderful break and we will see you on Tuesday 16th April.

W/B 18th March

We really enjoyed seeing all your Easter Bonnets today- thank you to everyone who brought one in.

English - This week we completed our story writing unit by writing our own innovated versions of Kassim and the Greedy Dragon. We applied what we have learnt about writing dialogue to add more details to our story. Next week we will be focussing on Poetry and enjoy listening to, writing and performing our own poems on the theme of 'School'.

Maths - We have continued our measurement topic this week by problem solving using the four operations- addition, subtractions, multiplication and division. We have focussed specifically on capacity and volume. Ask your child to explain the difference to you!

Geography - We have learnt all about the Maasai tribe in Kenya and found out about how life in Kenya is both similar and different to our own lives.

Science - This week we learnt about animal diet and food chains. Here is a link to a fun food chain game that we played to support our learning: https://www.sheppardsoftware.com/science/animals/games/food-chain/

Next week - On Monday the Year 2s will visit St George's church to find out all about Easter.

We will also be finishing our DT projects so don't forget to bring your boxes, if you haven't already.

Have a great weekend- we might see some of you at the Easter Egg Hunt on Sunday!

W/B 11th March

Thank you for all your donations for Red Nose Day- the children look fantastic in their red outfits!

English- This week we are innovating the story of Kassim and the Greedy Dragon. We are making changes to the story to add in our own ideas- for example instead of a Greedy Dragon we might have a Poisonous Snake! Next week we will write our innovated stories.

Maths- We have been exploring capacity and volume this week. We have been describing the volume of a container (full, empty, half full etc) as well as learning to measure in millilitres. We will continue this next week. 

Music- This week we have been listening to Spring themed songs and playing intruments to accompany the music. Each week we practise our recorders and have been learning lots of songs. 

Please remember- Parent Consultations take place next week on Tuesday 19th and Thursday 21st. We look forward to seeing you then.

W/B 4th March

Year 2 have had a very exciting week. On Tuesday we went on our school trip to Wisley and on Thursday we celebrated World Book Day!

Wisley We all really enjoyed our school trip and the teachers were very proud of how well the children represented Barnett Wood. Year 2 had the opportunity to plant their own seeds as well as explore the grounds at Wisely- walking around the glass house was a particular favourite!

World Book Day It was so much fun to see everyone come to school dressed in their fantastic costumes! We began the day with a special assembly and a costume parade so we could admire all the outfits. We also had the opportunity to share our books with our friends and different teachers visited our classes to read us stories. 

English We are learning the story 'Kassim and the Greedy Dragon'. We are able to retell the story and have been learning lots of new vocabulary and story telling language.

Maths Our Maths topic this week has been 'Mass'. We have been finding the mass of different objects and learning to read the scales. We have been investigating with grams and kilograms and discussing when you would use each one.

Have a great weekend!

W/B 26th February

This week we have been working very hard and we were all pleased to see the sunshine today- maybe Spring has arrived!

English- We have been learning to add dialogue to our writing by using inverted commas (speech marks) around what a character is saying. We have then been making this more interesting by using different words for 'said' and including adverbs (such as loudly, angrily) to describe how a character is feeling.

Spelling- We start each day with a spelling session. It is linked to Little Wandle and follows on from the phonics sessions the children had in Reception and Year 1. We learn different spelling rules and learn some 'prickly spellings' (tricky words).

Maths- This week we completed our unit on measuring length and height. We applied our knowledge and understanding to a variety of problems. Next week we will be measuring mass.

DT- This half term our DT topic is 'Wonderful Wheels'. We will be learning to design and make a moving toy.

Reminders

Year 2 will be going on their school trip to Wisley on Tuesday 5th March.

 World Book Day is Thursday 7th March and children can come to school dressed as their favourite book character.

W/B 19th February

Welcome back! We hope you had a lovely half term break. The children have come back refreshed and ready to learn and we are excited for a new half term.

English We began the week by writing recounts of our half term and using our editing skills to improve our writing. We then moved on to writing speech bubbles, where we thought about what the characters might say to reflect who they are.

Maths This week we have been measuring length and height in both centimeters and meters. We have discussed the importance of accurate measuring and used language such as 'longer', 'shorter' and 'taller' to make comparisons between objects. 

Geography We have begun our 'Sensational Safari' topic! This week we used atlases to locate Kenya and identify some of its key features, such as mountains, lakes and cities. 

A really great start to a new term- Well done Year 2!

W/B 5th February

This week we have celebrated Children's Mental Health Week. Each day this week we have thought about ways to support our mental health, including discussing why our voice matters, wearing comfy slippers to school and coming to school dressed in clothes we feel express who we are.

English This week we completed our writing unit on The Three Little Pigs. We used what we know about 'Beat the Baddie' stories and character description to write our own fairy story. After half term we will begin a writing unit about stories with a warning.

Maths We have been revising all the strategies we have learnt to solve multiplication and division problems. Our next Maths topic will be Measurement. 

Art Year 2 completed their own art work in the style of Henri Rousseau. They took great care to draw their design first and then used paint to add colours to their work. They all look great!

It has been another successful term for Year 2, thank you for all your support. We hope you have a great half term! 

W/B 29th January

What a great week we have had!

English We are continuing to innovate our own versions of 'The Three Little Pigs'. We have been planning our stories using story maps and making changes, such as having a 'Cunning, Sly Bear' instead of a 'Big Bad Wolf'. Next week we will be focusing on story writing.

Maths This week we have been learning our 5 and 10 times table. We have used this knowledge to solve a variety of problems as well as practising our quick recall skills. 'Hit the Button' is a great game to play to practise times table skills. Next week we will continue to practise multiplying and dividing numbers.

PSHE This half term our topic has been 'Dreams and Goals'. We have been learning to work together to achieve our goals. Last week we designed an 'Imaginary Dream Bird' in a group and this week we developed our team work skills by creating a bird. Have a look at the photos!

Have a great weekend!

W/B 22nd January

Foxes and Badgers have been hard at work again this week.

English This week we have been innovating the story of The Three Little Pigs by changing the characters to different animals. We also had a visit from the Big, Bad Wolf where we used hot seating to ask him questions. 

Maths We have been practising our multiplication and division skills again this week. We have practised the two times table, divided numbers by 2 and recapped our understanding of doubling, halving and odd and even numbers. Next week we will be practising the ten times table.

History This half term we are learning about the history of Barnett Wood, Ashtead and Epsom. We were lucky to have a visit from Mr Ball who came to Barnett Wood when he was younger. He came in and talked to us about his experience and answered our questions.

We look forward to seeing lots of you at the Disco later! 

W/B 15th January

Foxes and Badgers have been working very hard this week (and keeping warm- brrr!)

English This week we have learnt to retell the story of The Three Little Pigs, using our class story map and actions for support. Next week we will begin to innovate the story by thinking about how we can change the characters.

Maths We have continued to pracise our multiplication skills as well as introducing division and the division symbol. We have solved problems involving sharing numbers, for example can you share 20 cubes into 4 equal groups? Next week we will be dividing numbers by 2 and investigating odd and even numbers.

Computing We are currently completing our coding unit. We are learning to create algorithms. If you would like to practise at home, log in to Purple Mash and search for the 'Magician' game.

Have a great weekend!

W/B 8th January

We have had a great (but chilly!) first full week back at school!

English This week we have been using adjectives to write different types of poems. We used pictures of squirrels and bears to inspire our writing and gathered lots of interesting words to make our writing more exciting. Next week we will be using adjectives and adverbs to describe a character in a story.

Maths We have begun our multiplication topic. We practised repeated addition and then moved on to learning to use the multiplication symbol (x). We used words such as 'lots of' and 'groups of' to describe the symbol. Next week we continue to apply our knowledge of multiplication to word problems. 

Art We sketched plants in the style of Henri Rousseau, our focus artist for the half term.

Have a super weekend!

W/B 1st January

Wishing you all a Happy New Year! We hope you had a great break and we are glad to welcome you back to a new term. 

This week in English we wrote recounts about our Christmas holidays. We then edited our writing, thinking how we could make it even better.

In Maths we have been revising money and shape. Next week we will be starting our unit on multiplication and division. 

Year 2 are really excited to look at the artist Henri Rousseau for our Art topic this half term. This week we began by learning about his life, his inspiration and looking at some of his paintings. 

Have a great weekend! 

W/B 11th December 

We had a very festive end of term with lots of lovely Christmas celebrations. The children did a super job leading the performance at the Church and they all had a great time on party day.

In English we planned and wrote Christmas poems, using our senses for inspiration. We thought about how we could choose interesting words to make our poems more exciting.

In Maths we have been learning about money. We have added up coins and notes to find the total and practised working out how much change would need to be given. 
 

Thank you again for all our cards and gifts. It was very kind of you.
We hope you have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

W/B 27th November

This week we especially enjoyed our Christmas themed Art/DT morning during which we made lots of lovely decorations to make the school look festive as we head towards the last few weeks of this term! Thank you to all those parents who were able to spare some time to come in and help and for sending in plenty of cardboard tubes - we made some gorgeous reindeer and snow flakes using these. 

In Maths we have concluded our unit about Shape. We have revised all the shape names and can talk about their properties. We have learnt more about symmetry and have also spent a bit of time looking at patterns with shapes. There are some fun shape activities on this website, which you might like to play at home: https://www.topmarks.co.uk/symmetry/symmetry-matching

Next week we will begin a two week unit on Money. 

In our English lessons we are learning about the tools that we could use when writing suspense stories. This is in preparation for writing our own stories next week, based on Peter and the Wolf.

We have been learning about aerial views in our Geography lessons this week and enjoyed imagining what we might see, hear or smell in different locations around the world, such as the Grand Canyon. 

We have sent home some information about costumes for the Christmas performance - please ask if there is anything you are unsure about.

Have a lovely weekend! 

Week beginning 20th November 

This week we have continued to innovate our class stories in English, which have been based on Peter and the Wolf. The children had some great imagination ideas. In Maths, we have been sorting 2-D shapes. We have been able to sort them by colour, lines of symmetry and amount of sides the shape has. After making our amazing salads last week in D.T. we have been looking at where our food comes from. We had some great discussions around this. In Geography, we have continued to work on our Atlas skills and used an Atlas to find certain countries around the world.

We have also begun to think about our Christmas Show and have started practising the songs. The children who are going to be speakers, will have their lines in their reading records, ready to practise at home.

Have a wonderful weekend and see you all next week! 

W/B 13th November 

The highlight of our week this week was making our savoury salads in DT. The children were able to practise the crucial skills of cutting and grating safely and thoroughly enjoyed making and eating their creations!

We have started a new unit in our English lessons - we are learning the story of Peter and the Wolf which is a warning story, and we will be learning how to create suspense in our writing. 

In Maths we have started a new unit on Shape. This week, we have revised our knowledge of 2D shapes by naming shapes as well as counting sides and vertices. Next week, we will be learning about symmetry, sorting shapes and we will begin learning more about 3D shapes.

This week we started a new Science unit all about Materials. We sorted materials by type and discussed the importance of recycling. 

In Geography, we practised using atlases to find given places. We revised our knowledge about the countries and capital cities of the UK.

Have a lovely weekend! 

Week beginning 6th November

We have had another productive week in Year 2. It was lovely to see so many of you at parents evening, it's been great to share with you all how well the children have settled into Year 2. The children were very proud to show you their books and all the learning that they have done so far.

This week we had a go at writing our own recounts in English. We wrote about our trip to St George's church for Harvest Festival. The children used lots of different conjunctions, varied adjectives and similes. It was great to read about what a brilliant time they had. In Maths, we have been looking at which numbers were greater than, less than and equal to. The children were able to use tens frames and counters to help them find the correct answer. In DT, we continued to discuss what methods we will use to make our savoury salads and what equipment we will need. In computing, we were learning about how to create an online quiz, our friends had a go at answering the questions we created about The Three Bears. 

W/B 30th October 

Badgers and Foxes have had a lovely first week back at school this week.

We've enjoyed sharing our half term news with each other and are looking forward to all the exciting learning that will be taking place this half term.

Our addition and subtraction skills are developing well and in Science we are learning about what humans need to survive and to be healthy. We did an experiment to see which types of exercise did and didn't raise our heart rate and learned about the five food groups, thinking about which ones we need to eat plenty of food from, and which ones we need less of. Next week we will learn about hygiene, including hand washing and tooth brushing.

In English we are learning about the tools needed to write exciting recounts and next week we will be writing our own recount.

We can now play notes b and a on our recorders and we are learning to sing a range of songs. We are exploring pulse and rhythmic patterns.

In DT we are planning to make a savoury salad and we enjoyed tasting some different and more unusual vegetables in order to help us to plan what we would like to make. 

Lots of us love olives!

Please remember to send a warm, waterproof coat with a hood to school every day now that the weather is getting a bit chillier!

Enjoy the fireworks this weekend, if you are going to see any. 

Week beginning 16th October

We have had a productive week in Year 2 this week.

In Maths, we have been adding 10 more and taking away 10 less. The children did brilliantly and used 100 squares to help them. In Art, we created some bright and colourful pop art. Our teachers took black and white photos of us and we coloured them in brightly with felt tips. They look so effective. In History, we have been persuading others to remember Florence Nightingale, Edith Cavell and Mary Seacole. The children remembered lots of facts about them. In Computing, some of us continued our research about dinosaurs using the internet to search facts. The rest of us created a leaflet to help someone search for something on the internet. We have been continuing to learn our lines and our songs for the Harvest Festival. The children did brilliantly in church! We are very proud of Year 2!

Have a brilliant break and we can’t wait to see you all back for Autumn 2.

W/B 9th October

The weeks are flying by and it's hard to believe we only have one week left of this first half of the Autumn term!

This week we have enjoyed practising playing our musical instruments and learning songs and words for our Harvest Festival celebration, which we can't wait to present to you next Thursday. 

We are loving our PE sessions with coach Reece and our ball skills are developing really well. 

Our story writing in English has been very impressive - we had a special visitor in this week who couldn't believe their eyes when they saw our fantastic writing!

In Maths we have been practising adding numbers. Next week we will focus more on subtraction.

Keep practising recalling those number bonds!

This week in Science we have learned all about reptiles and played a fun classifying game. Can you tell your adult an interesting fact about reptiles?

In Computing we have been using Google to search for information about dinosaurs.

We hope to see lots of you tomorrow morning at our 'Bake and Taste' coffee morning between 10am and 12pm. 

Have a lovely weekend.  

Week beginning 2nd October 

We have had another busy but fun-filled week in Year 2 . 

We have enjoyed learning our Harvest songs, in preparation for our Harvest Festival and have been using musical instruments to support our wonderful singing. In English, we have been finishing our stories about Zig the Alien. We changed our main character from Zig to Ben the Astronaut in Badgers and Rosie the Astronaut in Foxes class. Well done for using some great punctuation in your writing Year 2! In Maths, we have been learning about number bonds to 10, 20 and 100. They have all tried their best and are beginning to understand that there are many different ways we can make these numbers. In Art, we have enjoyed using water colour to create backgrounds with patterns and movement. We found it very relaxing. Next week we will be adding moving images to the background. We can't wait to see the finished product. We have started our learning based on safe searching in Computing and had a go at coding ready for when we start our coding unit in Year 2. 

Well done to our Year 2's, who took new prospective parents around our school on tours this week, they did our school proud. If you didn't get a go this week you will be able to during the next open morning. 

We hope you all have a lovely weekend and enjoy the warm weather.

See you all Monday!

Week beginning 25th September 

We have had a wonderful week of learning in Year 2 this week!

In Maths we have been practising counting in steps of 2, 5, 10 and even 3!

This was our last week of our unit on Place Value. Next week, and for the next five weeks, we will build on our knowledge of addition and subtraction. 

You can practise your quick mental recall by playing games on Education City as well as 'Hit the Button'. https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button

In our English lessons we have been innovating the story of Zig the Alien, and next week we will begin to write the story, plot point by plot point. Ask your child if they can tell you the new versions of the story!

We enjoyed looking closely at a real fish earlier in the week during our Science learning. We learnt lots of facts about fish. Did you know that there are over 30,000 different species of fish and that the biggest fish is the Whale Shark, which can be more than 12 metres long?

In Art & Design we found out about and looked at the work of Pablo Picasso. We then created abstract portraits using collage materials.   

We are continuing to learn to play the recorder during our Music lessons - so far we have learnt note B. We are also learning about rhythm, tempo, mood, timbre and pitch as we learn a range of new songs. 

We learned about our 'Digital Footprint' in Computing, how we should be kind online and never give away any of our personal information. 

We have sent home some of the learning that we have been doing in Phonics over the past few weeks, which you might like to review with your child. 

Next week we look forward to the Year 2s showing prospective parents around the school on Thursday afternoon. Don't forget that we are having our individual photos taken on Thursday morning as well.

Have a lovely weekend! 

Week beginning 18th September

This week the children have enjoyed continuing their learning on number lines in Maths. They have been great at estimating where the numbers go on the line. In English, the children have been looking at different suffixes -ed and -ing. They have also been understanding characters emotions and feelings. In Art, they have enjoyed learning about cool and warm colours and how artists use these to portray emotions of sadness and joyfulness. In Computing, we have learnt how to create an email, with a subject in our 'online safety' topic. The children were great at understanding that it is like a letter that you send just not in the post. 

Just a polite reminder that children should be reading their Little Wandle book at home, 3 times a week. This is to help consolidate the learning that takes place in school. There have been some questions regarding reading assessments and reading records. The reading records should come home everyday with the children, to give you an opportunity to record their home reading. They then should be taken back into school the next day, for teachers to record their daily reading in class. We will continue to remind the children to take these home with them everyday.

Reading assessments will take place over the next couple of weeks, which will reassess the children's reading level. 

Have a wonderful weekend!

Week beginning 11th September 

Our learning in Maths this week has been focussed on 'place value' - understanding what the digits in a number are worth. We have enjoyed practising our quick mental recall by playing 'Hit the Button' (Number Bonds). If you want to practise at home the website is:  https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button

We had an alien visitor in the Year 2 classrooms this week! His name is Zig and we are learning a story about him off by heart - ask your child to tell it to you!

In Science we have been learning about mammals - how we know whether an animal is a mammal or not and what they need in order to survive. 

We are learning about online safety in our Computing lessons and this week we practised safe searching on 'Purple Mash'. The children should practise logging on to Purple Mash at home as often as possible, please. They might like to change their avatar over the weekend as well.

If you were unable to attend our 'Meet the Teacher' presentation on Wednesday, the slides can be found below. 

Any questions, please do ask!

Have a lovely weekend! 

Week beginning 4th September

Foxes and Badgers have had a great first week back!

Thank you for your support in getting the children to school on time and ready to learn. 

Have a wonderful weekend.