Y2 Weekly News: 10.3.23

This week we have been writing poems, building upon our knowledge of fractions and learning new songs all about the UK.

In reading, we explored the book "Grandpa's Garden" and used it as a basis to develop our comprehension skills. We answered a range of questions. We also learned some new vocabulary words, such as "sowing," "discourage," and "pests," which helped us better understand the text. To enhance our reading fluency, we participated in phonics sessions, where we practised pronouncing words accurately and quickly.

In Maths, we continued our fractions unit and focused on finding halves and quarters. We practised and became really quick at working out quarters by halving a half. We then progressed to learn about unit fractions and even sang a song about numerators and denominators. To make it more interesting, we used maps from different countries to figure out how many equal parts each flag had. For example, Belgium was split into thirds. We also spent time practising arithmetic and reasoning questions throughout the week.

In English this week , we had an enchanting time writing poems about a wizard's spell. We mixed different ingredients using a range ofSPaG techniques to create our magical potions. We used possessive apostrophes and expanded noun phrases to craft sentences such as "A giant, green anaconda's scale". To further improve our skills, we began each verse with a question to practise our question sentences. By the end of the week, we had created a wonderful collection of wizard spells that showcased our creativity and SPaG skills. Well done, team!

In R.E, we started our new unit on resurrection and the Easter story. We explored various versions of the same story and compared their similarities and differences. Then, we discussed the key elements of the story and their significance, such as the cross and the tomb. We examined the meaning behind the resurrection. We were then given a task to write a small paragraph summing up the story, including the key pictures of the cross and the tomb. We will think about why this story is important to Christians next week.

In My Happy Mind, we focused upon our new unit all about "relating to others". We discussed how we relate differently to others and spent time thinking about how our brains adapt when doing so. We finished by journaling and drew pictures about a time when we'd related differently to someone else.

In HeartSmart, we started our new unit on "Don't hold on to what's wrong". We talked about little and big problems. We thought about our own perceptions of this and shared some of our worries. Well done, team!

For Geography, we recapped our learning on villages, towns, and cities before moving on to a new topic: the United Kingdom. We learnt a catchy song that helped us remember the four countries and their capital cities: England (London), Scotland (Edinburgh), Wales (Cardiff), and Northern Ireland (Belfast). After singing along and repeating the names a few times, we were tasked with using our atlas skills to locate these places using the index. A fantastic effort, team.

 In music this week, we discussed the interrelated dimensions of music. Dynamics was new learning for us. Sometimes we can get this confused with the pitch. We will use our Music Words sheet as a handy tool to support our future learning. We also looked at a rhythm notation chart. We learnt the beat value of some 'new to us' note names. These were – quavers and semiquavers.

This week in Science, we continued our learning on living things and their habitats. We researched a range of habitats, such as woodlands, deserts, oceans, and rainforests, and used the book "How to Help a Hedgehog" to help structure our posters full of pictures and facts. We then moved on to thinking about how all living things depend on each other. By looking closely at a picture of a rainforest, we realised that all the animals depended on the trees. We will continue our study of habitats by looking at food chains next week.

On Friday, we had our first cricket session with Harry. We used our catching, throwing and batting skills to help us take part in a range of skills. Well done!

Have a lovely weekend,

Mr Dale