Welcome to Year 2 

Miss Fowler

Mrs Milbourne, Miss Robinson, Miss Chisholm and Miss Fallon
 

Spring 2

Geography

We will have a Geography focus this half term as we ask, ‘England and Kenya – what is the same and what is different?’. We will begin by identifying Africa as one of the 7 continents and locating some of the nations within it and the oceans surrounding it. We will then look more closely at Kenya as we explore the flag, use atlases to find out key information and discover more about the physical and human features of the country. Towards the end of the half term, we will draw on our prior learning about England and Binley woods to make comparisons between here and there.

English

In English this half term, we will be starting with our first text which is called, ‘Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain’ by Verna Aardema. This is a lovely poem which shows the hardship of living during a terrible drought where the animals leave and a young boy finds a way to save the wildlife on the plain. The children will spend time performing the poem and will then write a setting description based on the poem. After this, we will read the story, ‘Lila and the Secret of Rain’ by David Conway and Jude Daly and the children will be doing some story writing based on the text. We will then move on to writing our own traditional tales using, ‘The Ghanaian Goldilocks’ by Tamara Pizzoli for inspiration.

Reading, as always, will be a crucial part of the children’s learning and will be part of English lessons every day (for example the children will be making predictions, exploring new vocabulary, summarising what we have read etc.). In addition to this, the children will have a variety of reading lessons over the year, including: whole class comprehension lessons, Little Wandle reading groups and one to one reading.

Maths

In Maths, we will start the half term by completing our unit called, ‘Time’. During this unit the children will learn to:

• tell and write the time to five minutes, including quarter past/to the hour and draw the hands on a clock face to show these times.
•  know the number of minutes in an hour and the number of hours in a day.
• compare and sequence intervals of time.

After this, we will start our new unit, ‘Fractions’. The focus of this unit is on recognising, finding, naming and writing fractions of a line, shape, object and quantity (halves, quarters and thirds). We will then start our new unit, ‘Addition and Subtraction of 2-digit Numbers (regrouping and adjusting)’.

It would be fantastic if you could support your child to tell the time at home, as this is a tricky skill that takes ‘time’ and lots of practice.

Science

This half term, in Science, the children will observe animals in their habitats and notice how they change throughout the year.  They will use this developing understanding of the different animals living in a habitat to build up simple food chains. Finally, the children will then move on to learn about different habitats, how the living things are suited to the habitat and the interactions between the living organisms within a habitat.

Art

In Art this term, the children will be exploring African art and sculptors. They will investigate various styles of African art and colours and also look at African masks. They will use their knowledge learnt from these lessons to then create their very own clay masks. They will decorate them in an African style and then evaluate them being sure to explain what went well and what they would like to improve or change if they made it again.

RE

In RE this half term, the children will be focusing on the religion of Christianity and the concept of salvation as we enquire, ‘How important is it to Christians that Jesus came back to life after his crucifixion?’. We will begin by sharing ideas of life and death and reflect on our own individual beliefs as we remember those who have died but live on in our memories. We will familiarise ourselves with the Easter story and the Christian belief that Jesus was sent to offer people salvation. The children will learn that Christians see Easter eggs as a symbol of new life and that they send Easter cards to celebrate this.

PSHE

In PSHE this half term, our unit will be ‘Healthy Me’. We will learn what we need to keep our bodies healthy including the different food groups, exercise and medicines. In addition to our physical health we will also be thinking about our mental and emotional health as we identify what makes us stressed and what makes us relaxed.

Computing

This half term the children will learn how to create a database and binary tree by asking key questions relating to our Science topic changing habitats and animal life cycles. The children will learn how to word these questions so they are able to sort animals into various categories.

PE

PE this half term is timetabled for Tuesday (fitness) and Wednesday (hockey). Children should come to school wearing a white T shirt, black shorts/joggers, school sweatshirt or cardigan and trainers on these days. 

Useful websites to practise key skills at home:

English:

Oxford Owl - provides access to free e-books (You have to create a free account to view them) 

This website is American, but it has some nice phonics and reading games.

This website is currently free with the username: march20 password: home

Your child has an individual log-in for this website. They can play spelling games based on lists of words. I will set 3 spelling lists to practise per week. Try using the code '#710619' to enter a hive game for common exception words! 

Use these links to find an interesting image. What do you think is happening? Can you describe what is happening in your exercise book? Can you write a story about it?

'Mr Thorne Does Phonics' has lots of grammar and phonics short episodes 

This blogger has compiled a list of children's authors with great books to read, each author has a few reading based activities on their website. 

Audible has lots of free audiobooks for children while you're learning at home.

Alphablocks games and some episodes can be found here. 

Maths:

This website has LOTS of age appropriate maths resources and they have produced home learning packs for each year group with helpful videos and activities for each day of home learning. 

This website has lots of interactive maths games. 

This website groups games together well and you can search by subject.

Times Table Rock Stars - your child has an individual log in for this.

This is a story based maths game which your child can log into with their TT Rock stars log ins.

Other subjects:

This is a fantastic website with lots of videos, interactive activities and printable resources around all the subjects as well as current events. Great for exploring if you want some extra material in your home learning. 

Once clicking this link, choose 'Espresso' from the drop down log-in menu in the top right hand corner. You will receive a username and password for this website. 

This website often has child - friendly news items, and they will be uploading some free content when schools close. 

With this link you can take a virtual tour around the British Museum, London. 

This website has lots of activities you can do in the garden, as well a lots of information about animals and plants for research tasks.

Find out information and take quizzes using this link.

These games are the first steps of computer programming, they are very engaging for children. 

This is a typing game for children beginning to learn to type. 

This website has fun movement videos for children

SEND SUPPORTED RESOURCES

We work with a company called SEND Supported at school and they are releasing newsletters each week offering support and guidance to parents of children who many have additional needs in school. Please find below a link to these newsletters:

There are also lots of other resources and information available on their website. The 'Things to do Issue 2 - Resources' file has some lovely activities for all children regardless of whether they have additional needs or not. There are lots of great visual puzzles and games for children to play so please have a look if you can. There are also resources available now to support with developing children's memory skills in 'Thing to do Issue 3 - Resources.'