Welcome to Year 2!

Teacher: Miss Sweeney

Summer 2026

Hello and welcome back!  I am so happy that you are in my class and I can't wait for all the exciting and fun learning we will be doing together this year. We will be doing lots of interesting activities and challenges as well as learning some new school and classroom routines. 

English

Our literacy focus for this half-term will be writing a narrative based on 'The Dragon Machine' by Helen Ward. We will be following George on his adventure and thinking about what might happen next. We will be developing our writing skills by creating our own imaginative stories about dragons, using adjectives to describe characters and settings. We will also focus on building sentences with capital letters, full stops, and conjunctions like “and” and “because.” We will be doing lots of our learning through drama, drawing, and storytelling. During this unit, we will be recapping all of our Year 1 phonics and sentence writing skills and retelling the story in our own way. We will aim to include:. 

- Capital letters

- Finger spaces

- Phonics

- Full stops

- Adjectives

- Adverbs

- Commas

- Conjunctions

- ?!

Maths

During our Maths lessons this half-term, we will be learning about Measurement. We will be using lots of practical resources and using our learning to solve real life problems. To support us in our learning we will be using Base 10, place value charts, ten frames and part-whole models.  Below are the objectives we will be learning and the order that we will focus on them. 

Topic

Our topic for this half term is... Magnificent Manchester. While learning all about our city of Manchester. We will be answering the enquiry question - 'What makes a city?' During the unit, we will be learning to:

• Know and explain what a county is.
• Know and explain what a city is.
• Recognise and identify the key landmarks of Manchester
• Know and explain the difference between a river and a canal.
• Know and explain what a coast is.

Science

In Science this half term we will be learning all about Plants. We will be learning to:

• Life Cycles & Growth:
  • Describe how seeds and bulbs grow into mature plants (germination).
  • Identify and describe the stages in a plant's life cycle.
• Plant Needs:
  • Find out and describe that plants need water, light, and a suitable temperature to grow.
  • Understand seeds have food inside to start growing.
  • Conduct simple fair tests (e.g., with/without water/light) to see what plants need.
• Plant Parts & Types:
  • Identify and name common wild and garden plants.
  • Describe the basic structure of flowering plants (roots, stem, leaves, petals, fruit, etc.).
  • Compare and contrast seeds and bulbs, and different types of plants.
• Scientific Skills:
  • Observe closely (with magnifying glasses) and compare plants.
  • Record findings using drawings, simple tables, bar charts, or pictograms.
  • Use simple equipment and perform simple tests

Religion

In our RE lessons this half-term, we will be focusing on 'To the Ends of the Earth'. 

In our learning this half-term, the children will come to a simple understanding of what happened after the Resurrection. The events conclude the life of Jesus and begin the life of the earliest community which would become the church. As children learn about the community of believers (followers of Jesus) which formed after the events of the Pentecost day, they will begin to consider how the Holy Spirit can change people.

PE

This half term you will need to come into school wearing your PE kit on our PE days which are Monday and Friday. In PE you will be learning about invasion and team games  skills with Mr Cassey outside and circuits skills in the hall. 

Homework

Reading – 10 minutes a night

Listening to your child read for 10 minutes a night makes a significant difference in their progress and attainment. It helps them practice key reading strategies and skills, develop their comprehension skills and supports their overall fluency and accuracy, which are vital skills they need for the future. Every Friday an eBook will be assigned to your child’s online account based upon the sounds they have learnt in phonics that week. The children will have practiced this book in their guided reading sessions so will be familiar with the text. The purpose of them practicing it again at home is to become more familiar with these sounds and fluent when reading them.

Your child will also choose a reading for pleasure book. This is a book that you can both read and enjoy together and encourage reading for pleasure. This will be a physical book that your child takes home and they will be given the opportunity to choose and change every Friday. As it is a reading for pleasure book, it is not necessarily aimed at your child’s reading level, therefore can be challenging, which is why we are asking for an adult to read this and your child to join in where possible. The reading for pleasure book is important as it is how we will help build a love of reading together.   Please ensure your child brings this back to school every Friday ready to change in our school Library.

Reading eggs – once a week      https://readingeggs.co.uk

Reading eggs makes learning to read interesting and engaging for kids, with great online reading games and activities. Children love the games, songs, golden eggs and other rewards which, along with feeling proud of their reading, really motivate children to keep exploring and learning.

My Maths and Mathseeds – once a week       https://mathseeds.co.uk/

Every Friday, your class teacher will set home learning for your child on MyMaths.co.uk. This will be based upon what they have learnt that week so your child can practice the skills taught at home to reinforce key strategies.  

Mathseeds is an online website that your child can use to develop pupils’ confidence and fluency in Maths and the interactive lessons provide step-by-step examples to break down learning into manageable chunks. The log in for this is the same one you use for reading eggs.

Phonics home learning – once a week

Every Friday, we will send home a phonics sheet in your child’s book bag for them to practice over the next week. The sheet will have the list of sounds your child has learnt that week, words and sentences for them to read and write with these sounds in and then a list of tricky words that the children need to know. These words will be familiar to them and ones they have practiced in phonics sessions.

You can then practice these sounds further on fastphonics (www.readingeggs.co.uk/fast-phonics-games), which is the same log in as reading eggs.

Learning logs – Autumn  2, Spring 2 and Summer 2

Last year we introduced our project-based home learning to replace the homework board we previously used. Pupil, parent and teacher voice all showed that project based home learning was the preferred style of home learning as it gave children more freedom to learn about real life world events, share personal experiences and it has helped motivate them to engage in home learning as it is child managed. It encourages the children to be more independent, inquisitive and provides more opportunities for outdoor learning together. This can be completed in your learning log, a scrap book of your choice or it can be uploaded onto Seesaw.

Instead of completing these every half term, we have reduced this to three half terms a year to make it more manageable. They will therefore be given out on the first Monday of Autumn 2 (31^st October), Spring 2 (27^th February) and Summer 2 (12^th June).  We ask that their project is brought into school on the last week of that half term to share and celebrate with their peers. You will be given a sheet of paper that will be stuck in your child’s learning log that will outline what the project is and ideas of activities you can do.

KS1 Creative ideas: https://sway.office.com/izWF4eAOc7u0rCfS?ref=Link