Welcome to Year 2S!

Teacher: Miss Sweeney

Spring 2 2025

Hello and welcome back Year 2!  I can't believe we are half way through the school year already! I can't wait to continue with all our amazing learning. We will be doing lots of fun learning activities as well as learning some new school and classroom routines. 

Literacy

Our literacy focus for the start of our Spring 1 half-term will be poetry. We are going to be exploring, creating an performing poems based on 'The Sound Collector' by Roger McGough. Imagine a world without noises – no whistling kettle, no purring kitten, no drumming raindrops. That is the world left behind after a stranger comes to visit, packs up every sound, and takes them away. Following on from this, we will be focusing on Mr Wolf's Pancakes by Jan Fearnley. In this story, Mr Wolf wants to make pancakes but is unable to read the recipe book, write the names of the ingredients or count the money to buy them. His neighbours are unwilling to help him, but are soon lured by the delicious smell of pancakes when he successfully completes his task. 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 Shape, Money and Multiplication and Division. 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. As part of the KS1 curriculum, children are expected to perform geography and history studies within their local area. The hope is to enable children of all ages to gain a knowledge and understanding of significant historical events, people and places from their locality. The geography focus of our lessons will help children to explore both the human and physical geography of the local area. Throughout the topic we will be introduced to historical facts linked to Manchester and begin to explore their wider impact. 

During this unit, children will learn to:

•             name, locate and identify characteristics of the four countries and capital cities of the UK and its surrounding seas using atlases & globes.

•             use world maps, atlases and globes to identify the UK and its countries, or countries I may be studying.

•             identify and recognise characteristics of the four countries and capital cities of the UK and its surrounding seas.

•             use four compass directions (North, South, East and West in simple ways when referring to the four countries in the UK).

•             identify seasonal/daily weather patterns in the UK

•             investigate my local surroundings and make observations about where things are in my local area.

•             Use a tally chart to collect simple data.

•             Create plans of a familiar environment and look down on objects to make a plan view.

•             Add labels of features to a map.

•             Understand the need for a key and create agreed symbols to make a key.

•             Have special awareness on maps.

•             Carry out a simple survey in my local area.

Science

In Science this half term we will be learning all about Living Things and their Habitats. We will be learning to:

• explore and compare the differences between things that are living, dead, and things that have never been alive
• identify that most living things live in habitats to which they are suited and describe how different habitats provide for the basic needs of different kinds of animals and plants, and how they depend on each other
• identify and name a variety of plants and animals in their habitats, including microhabitats
• describe how animals obtain their food from plants and other animals, using the idea of a simple food chain, and identify and name different sources of food.

Religion

In our RE lessons this half-term, we will be focusing on Special People and Lent. We will be learning to:

• prepare for the Eucharist 
• understand why we celebrate Shrove Tuesday.
• Understand why we celebrate Ash Wednesday.
• Understand Lent as a time for opportunities.
• Understand why we celebrate Palm Sunday.
• Sequence the Holy Week and orally retell the Easter Story.

PE

This half term you will need to come into school wearing your PE kit on our PE day which is a Monday. In PE you will be learning about invasion and team games  skills with Mr Siddall 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