Crabtree Infants' Year 2

Friday 2nd March 2012

2012-03-02T17:15:00.001Z

In literacy this week we used the following websites to find out about Mairi Hedderwick the author of the Katie Morag stories. We had to listen, read and retrieve information from the websites to answer a range of questions about Mairi Hedderwick.

http://www.booksfromscotland.com/Authors/Mairi-Hedderwick

https://www.radiowaves.co.uk/story/16724/title/mairihedderwick

We chose words for effect. We used our best adjectives to describe a variety of settings from the story of ‘Katie Morag and Tiresome Ted’.

The next day we had to describe characters from the story ‘Katie Morag and the Dancing Class’. We had to describe what the character looked like, what we thought they would say and how we thought they would feel.

On Friday we read the story ‘Katie Morag and the Grand Concert’. After reading the story we looked for words that Mari Hedderwick had used instead of said. These are just a few of the words we found gasped, shouted, moaned, answered, replied, shouted, soothed and added to name just a few!

We then had to write our own conversation between Katie Morag and another character and we weren’t allowed to write said. Some of us challenged ourselves to use speech marks correctly.

In maths we have revisited our number bonds to 10 and 20. Some of matched multiples of 10 that make 100 and multiples of 100 that make 1000. We remembered that as we have instant recall of our numbers to 10 we can then use this information to help us work out number bonds to 20, 100 or even 1000! We made sure we recorded our answers in a logical order to check that we had not missed any bonds out.

If your child is still learning their number bonds please help them secure this knowledge. You might like to practise on the following websites:

http://www.ictgames.com/save_the_whale_v4.html (bonds of 10)

http://www.ictgames.com/funkymum20.html (bonds of 20)

We have also revisited our learning about finding the difference between two numbers. We remembered that we can count on from the smaller number to the larger number, or back from the larger number to the smaller number. A blank number line is very useful for keeping count!

We extended our learning about looking for a pattern and continuing a sequence of numbers to look for a pattern and continue a sequence of number sentences. For example we used our maths skills to work out the next 3 number sentences in the following sequences.

10 + 1 = 11, 10 + 2 = 12, 10 + 3 = 13, ?

75 – 5 = 70, 70 – 5 = 65, 65 – 5= 60 ?

85 – 12 = 73, 85 – 13 = 72, 85 – 14 = 71 ?

We have also been practising our problem solving skills again! We have been very good at reading the question carefully, underlining the important information, drawing a picture or number line, writing the number sentence and calculating the answer. We thought about different ways to tackle to problem and realised that if we have instant recall of our number facts it really helps us to be accurate in our calculating. Well done to all those children who have been practising their maths targets at home, it makes such a difference to their maths at school.

In science this week we learnt what how to tell if something is living or not living.

We used MRS GREN to help us.

If something is living they

Move

Respire (breathe)
Senses (see, hear, touch, taste and smell)

Grow

Reproduce (have young)

Excrete (get rid of waste/go to the toilet

Nutrition (food)

This week we used natural objects including a variety of plants, leaves and flowers to inspire us in our artwork. We looked carefully at the shapes, patterns and textures of the plants and used our observational skills to make sketches.

We have began getting ready for our Fairtrade café this week. We have been busy cooking chocolate and banana muffins to sell at our café next Tuesday and designing our own posters to advertise the event.

You make like to look at this website and think about the steps you and your child will take during Fairtrade fortnight.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J60mvcp_Q_E

We hope that you have a great weekend and hope to see you at our Fairtrade cafe on Tuesday 6th March.

Year 2Teachers

Visit to Tring Museum, Friday 21st February 2012

2012-03-02T16:28:00.000Z

Have a look at what we got up to at Tring!

Friday 24th February

2012-02-24T16:43:00.000Z

We can't belive that we have only been back at school for week - look at how much learning we have done!

Today we have all enjoyed a fantastic trip to Tring Museum help with our learning about plants and animals. Thank you very much to all the kind parents who accompanied us. Look out for the photos on the blog soon!

This week in literacy we on the have begun a teaching sequence looking at the work of one author. Our chosen author is Mairi Hedderwick who writes the Katie Morag stories. Mairi Hedderwick lives on the Isle of Coll in the Hebrides and although Katie lives on the fictional island of Struay, it is clearly inspired by Coll. Over the next four weeks we will be reading lots of the Katie Morag stories, researching the real island where the stories are set, investigating the characters and settings and finally writing our own version of a Katie Morag story.

On Tuesday after reading the story of Katie Morag and the Two Grandmothers we had to recall the events in the story using a story map. On Thursday after reading the story of Katie Morag Delivers the Mail we wrote our own book reviews.

In maths we have been using our learning about measures and money to solve problems. We remembered the standard units that we use to measure length, weight and capacity. Then we thought about what we need to do to solve a problem. First we read the question carefully. Then we circled the important words and numbers. After that we worked out which operation we needed to perform. We then drew a picture or used a number line to calculate the answer. Finally we wrote the number sentence and calculated the answer. Here are some examples of problems we solved.

I had 20p.

My brother had 40p.

How much did we have altogether?

I had £2.00. I bought an apple for 50p and a pear for 60p.

How much do I have now?

I weighed 50g of sugar and 40g of butter.

How much altogether?

I need 150g of sugar. My packet contains 500g.

How much will be left?

On Wednesday we made our own clocks to take home and use to practise telling the time. We thought carefully about the position of the hands and what they both mean. We could read the time to the nearest hour, half hour, quarter hour or 5 minute intervals. Please help your child develop these skills at home using their clock!

We used our learning and our clocks to help us solve time problems. Examples of the problems we solved were:

Martin took the dog for a walk at 5.00. He came back at 6.00.

How long was he out for?

The postman takes one and a quarter hours to complete his round. If he starts at 5 o'clock, what time does he finish?

Charlie went to see his friend. He left there at 6 o’clock after staying

for 1 hour.

At what time had he arrived?

A train arrives in Manchester at 6 o'clock. The journey took one and three quarter hours. What time did it leave?

In ICT we have been using our learning from last term about instructions to program a chameleon to eat dragon flies! We had to think about which way and the angle of the turn and how long to lick! You might like to play the game at home from this website.

http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3706

We will be playing the other 'routes' games to help us develop our instruction and ICT skills over the coming weeks.

In science we began our topic about the ‘Local Environment’. We will be learning about plants and animals and the huge variety of living things within the local and wider environment.
On Monday we started the topic by thinking about the basic conditions to sustain life in plants. We set up a fair test to find out what happens to the growth of a seed when there is lack of light, water or warmth. We made our own predictions and explained our reasons for our predictions.

In PE over this next half term we are very lucky to have Mrs Brookes teaching us the skills needed in basketball. We learnt the terms dribbling, travelling and double dribble. We practised dribbling the ball around the hall, keeping a curved shape with our hand and not looking at the ball.

In art this half term we are looking at the work of artists who have been inspired by nature. We begun by looking at the work of Andy Goldsworthy and looked at the installations he has created. In pairs we then used the school grounds to collect a variety of natural objects and we made our own installations in the style of Andy Goldsworthy.

To view his work use this link

http://www.morning-earth.org/artistnaturalists/an_goldsworthy.html

Thank you for supporting our Bring and Buy sales, the children have really enjoyed planning and organising the event and were very excited. We are delighted to say that Eagles raised £180.50 and Owls raised £189.60 - a magnificent effort. The children have planned what they wanted to buy with this money and will be looking at what else they can buy as they raised so much money! We would like to say a huge thank you to those parents who helped sort, price and sell - we could not have done it without you! Also, thank you very much for supporting your children in sorting toys and books to bring in, making delicious cakes and cookies and, of course, coming along and spending money. The children should be very proud of what they have achieved and we hope they enjoy the rewards!

We hope that you enjoy the weekend,

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 10th February

2012-02-10T17:14:00.000Z

In literacy this week we have continued our poetry sequence Really Looking.

On Monday we thought of our own sights to put in to our magic box. We used the recent snow as a stimuli for our ideas.

One sentence we came up with as a class was ‘A handful of glistening, bright white snow’.

Some of us had to think of things that didn’t really exist like Kit Wright’s cowboy on a broomstick. One phrase we came up with was a friendly smiling giant (we thought giants are often mean), then we used a simile to extend this sentence………….as tall as a sky scraper.

On Tuesday we thought of our favourite smells and sounds that could go into our box. We had to think of words for effect and then challenge ourselves to think of a variety of sentence openers.

I will put in my box

The smell of bright, green, freshly cut grass.

Delicious smells of thick, yummy chocolate.

A loud bellowing sound like a giant shouting.

Whispering sounds as quiet as a tiny mouse.

On Wednesday we had to look at all the sentences we had created previously. Then we had to select our favourite ones to make up our own ‘Magic Box’ poem.

On Thursday we had to write up our poem in our best handwriting for our class display. We had to remember to space our work like Kit Wright’s Magic Box poem, make our letters the same size and position our ascenders and descenders correctly.

On Friday we practiced and then performed our own poem to a large group. We had to make sure we engaged the audience by speaking clearly, loudly, slowly and by looking at them. We then talked about our performances saying what we liked about each others performance and how we could improve.

In maths we have been continuing to learn about measuring. We used a metre stick to estimate and then measure objects around the school, deciding if they were less, more or exactly one metre. We had to remember that one metre is 100 centimetres.

We have also been learning about weighing using grams and kilograms, remembering that one kilogram is the same as 1000 grams. We compared the weight of the objects by reading the numbers on the scales and working out the numbers between them. Maybe your child could do some cooking at home to practise this! We also used the website

http://www.ictgames.com/mostlyPostie.html

to read scales and to work out the numbers between the marked numbers.

In ICT we have been using our learning about the Great Fire of London to create word clouds using words and colours appropriate to the fire. We entered the text using our typing skills and then we changed the colour and font until we were happy with our results. This is a lovely, creative way to practise typing skills that you might like to try at home using this website:

http://www.wordle.net/create

In Science on Monday we continued learning about materials. We investigated what happens to water when it is heated. We made our own predicitions and then tested what happens. We found out that water turns to steam when heated and when it cools it then turns back into water. We recorded our investigation using pictures and captions and concluded this was a reversible change.

On Friday we talked about when water is cooled it eventually becomes solid ice. We set up our own investigation to find out how we could melt some ice cubes more quickly. We talked about making sure the test was fair. The children suggested 4 different places to put the ice and we observed the ice cubes every 15 minutes. We then recorded our observations in a table. Ask your child where the ice melted the fastest in school.

In PE we used our skills of twisting and turning to travel along the appartus. Look at our photos.

Have a great half term!

The Year 2 Teachers

Friday 3rd February

2012-02-03T16:54:00.000Z

We hope you enjoyed our assembly this morning and have learnt lots of information about the Great Fire of London!We are very proud of all the children and were impressed by their clear, confident voices as well as all their learning!

On Monday we reviewed our Great Fire of London books. We had to look at our learning partner’s front cover and read their blurb and then decide whether it made you want to read their Fire of London book.

We then reviewed our own book and identified our next steps in our own writing. We had to check whether we had met the success criteria for each page and underline words that showed we had been successful.

We had to underline all the interesting vocabulary we used in purple pencil, connectives in orange, openers in red and finally punctuation in green.

We are very proud of our Great Fire of London books and hope you enjoyed reading them after our assembly.

On Tuesday we started a new literacy sequence all about poetry called Really Looking. We listened to a poem by Kit Wright called ‘The Magic Box’. We then looked at the poem to see what patterns and adventurous words had been used.

On Thursday we listened, then practiced and then performed the poem in pairs. We had to make sure we engaged the audience by speaking clearly, loudly, slowly and by looking at them,

Use this link to see Kit Wright read ‘The Magic Box’ poem.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/kit-wright-the-magic-box-poem-only/8837.html

On Friday we really looked at objects we could put in our own magic box. We tried to think of interesting adjectives that Violet Vocabulary would like. We looked at a rose. We then used adjectives to build a better picture of the rose.

A rose

A pink rose

A bright, pink rose

A bright, pink rose with petals as soft as ……..

A bright, pink rose with petals like……..

Next week the children may like to bring in their favourite poems to share with the rest of their class.

We have continued with our maths topic of data handling this week. First we looked at block graphs with different scales, for example when 1 block represents 2, 5 or 10 items.

We used the scale to read the information on the graph, working out the numbers between the marked points on the scale. We answered questions using the graphs, such as:

1. What is the most popular colour of puffles?

2. What is the least popular?

3. How many people like red puffles?

4. How many people like blue and green puffles altogether?

5. What is the difference between the number of people who like orange puffles and the number of people who like red puffles?

We also input data into a simple computer program and created block graphs.

We then reminded ourselves about measuring. We used a 20 cm strip to find objects of certain lengths. We knew that to find a 10 cm object we would need to fold the strip in half and to a 40 cm object would be twice the length or our strip. Some of us challenged ourselves to find objects that measures 60 cm or 5 cm.

In Science on Monday we continued learning about materials. We thought about the properties of different materials including wood, plastic, metal and glass. We had great fun thinking about the reasons why windows are made of glass and not wood. Why chairs are made of wood and not chocolate. Why balls are made of rubber and not metal.

On Friday we investigated what happens to materials when they are heated. We tested chocolate, butter, popcorn and bread. We explained what we thought would happen and why. At the end of our investigation we found out some materials change state from solid to liquid and some changes are reversible and some are irreversible. We then tried to explain what we had observed.

We hope you have a good weekend, see you at the disco!
Year 2 Teachers

Friday 27th January 2012

2012-01-27T16:56:00.000Z

This week in literacy we have continued writing our own non-fiction books about the Great Fire of London.

On Monday we used our historical knowledge about eyewitness accounts to explain how we know about the fire. We had to use interesting vocabulary to describe the paintings, diaries and artefacts that tell us about the fire today.

On Tuesday we wrote our own index. We had to use words that were in our book and make sure they were in alphabetical order. Then we looked to see which pages the words were on and wrote these page numbers on the index page.

On Wednesday we made our own glossary. We made a list of words that were important Fire of London topic words. Next we put the words in alphabetical order and finally we had to write our own definitions, showing we understood what each word means.

Do you know what a squirt is? To find out read one of our Fire of London books or come to our assembly.

On Thursday we wrote our blurb. We had to make sure that our blurb hooked the reader in, to want to read our books.

On Friday we finished our book by drawing our front cover and title page. We had to make sure our front cover and title page were eye catching to the reader. We drew colourful pictures and a bold title saying The Great Fire of London. We hope you enjoy looking at our books and finding out how much we have learnt about the Great Fire of London next week after our assembly.

We have started a new topic in maths – data handling. We reminded ourselves what this term means and we started by using a Carroll Diagram to sort numbers using 2 criteria. We then thought of ways that we could sort ourselves!

After that we created block graphs using data from last year’s Bird Watch and some of us challenged ourselves to use one block to represent 2 birds. We remembered that it is important to:

1) Give your graph a name

2) Label the axis, including where to write the numbers to show the whole block

3) Draw careful blocks

We used our graphs to answer questions about the data. Questions we answered included:

1) Which was the most popular bird seen?

2) Which was the least common bird seen?

3) Which birds did we see 6 of?

4) There were more blackbirds than crows. How many more?

5) There were more crows than magpies. How many more?

In science we began learning about materials. We sorted materials and talked about their properties. We had to give reasons proving how we knew a material was waterproof or transparent. We also found out that some materials are natural and others are manufactured. We investigated if rubber ducks don’t occur naturally – from a plant, animal or the ground where do they come from?

In ICT we have continued our learning about giving instructions. This week we thought about recording a series of instructions for someone else to follow. We realised that it is much easier if we write the instructions in a code, but it is important to include a key to make sure the reader understands what they have to do!

We celebrated the RSPB Bird Watch on Wednesday by taking part in a bird survey. However we only saw a few magpies, a couple of starlings and lots of woodpigeons and gulls!

Have a great weekend

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 20th January 2012

2012-01-20T17:00:00.003Z

In Year 2 this week we have welcomed two BEd students, who will be doing their 2^nd year placement at Crabtree Infants. Miss Kay will be working in Owls class and Miss Warren will be working in Eagles class, from now until the 23^rd March 2012.

We started the week in Literacy by creating a contents page for our own information book about the Great Fire of London. We came up with these four questions for our headings:

1) When and where did the Great Fire of London start?

2) Why did the fire spread so quickly?

3) How did the fire stop?

4) How do we know about the fire?

On Tuesday we used all our historical knowledge to write about when and where the Great Fire of London started. We had to include the date, the place and how the fire began.

On Thursday we wrote the second part of our Fire of London book. We had to give our reasons for why the fire spread so quickly and think about using connectives to make our sentences more interesting.

On Friday we had to explain how the fire stopped and use a variety of

sentence openers to hook our readers in!

Next week we will be completing our Great Fire of London books and hope you look forward to reading them in a few weeks time.

This week in maths we have been using our mathematical knowledge to solve problems. First we looked at finding the difference between 2 numbers. We discussed strategies we could use and realised we could count on from the smaller number or count back from the larger number. We used a blank number line to help us keep track of the difference. We realised that if we have instant recall of our number bonds of 10 it really helps us not to make any calculation errors.

On Tuesday we used our investigation skills to make 4 number sentences with 3 given numbers. First we needed to work out which of the 4 operations we need to use. We remembered important mathematical knowledge could help us:

· addition and multiplication can be done in any order and the total is always the largest number

· subtraction and division starts with the biggest number as we are not using negative numbers

· the inverse relationship between addition and subtraction and between multiplication and division

e.g.

With the numbers 7, 4 and 11 we can make

7 + 4 = 11 4 + 7 = 11 11 – 4 = 7 11 – 7 = 4

With the numbers 6, 5 and 30 we can make

6 x 5 = 30 5 x 6 = 30 30 ÷ 5 = 6 30 ÷ 6 = 5

We also needed to decide which operation we needed to use when we solved word problems on Wednesday. First we had to read the question carefully, then we underlined important words and numbers, next we drew a picture or number line, after that we wrote the calculation or number sentence and finally we calculated the answer. Examples of problems we solved were:

There are 10 marbles in a jar. 10 more were added.

How many are now in the jar?

Sally had 5 plates of cakes, each with 5 cakes on.

How many cakes altogether?

John needed 28 pencils. They come in packs of four.

How many packets of pencils does he need?

Maybe you could think of some more word problems to solve at home!

We have also been calculating the missing number in number sentences when the missing number is not at the end! Again we had to use all of the 4 operations.

e.g.

? + 7 = 17 32 + ? = 40 ? + 115 = 145

10 - ? = 6 20 - ? = 14 40 - ? = 28

? x 10 = 30 ? x 5 = 45 ? x 4 = 24

20 ÷ ? = 10 50 ÷ ? = 10 18 ÷ ? = 3

In ICT we have been continuing our learning about programmable devices and this week we were machines or programmers! The programmer had to issue clear, safe instructions and the machine had to listen carefully and follow the instructions exactly.

In history we have been thinking about how we know about The Great Fire of London looking at artefacts on-line. We have thought about what happened as a result of the fire and used the websites http://www.fireoflondon.org.uk/game and http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/lessons/lesson47.htm.%20.
We have also made ‘houses’ that look like the houses of the period. We know that they must be stuck together for the display as the houses being close together was one of the reasons the fire spread so quickly! .

In art this term we are learning to develop our observation skills by looking at patterns and shapes in buildings. Please could all the children bring in an A5 printed picture of their favourite building on Monday 23^rd January for the art lesson on Thursday.

In circle time this term the theme is ‘Going for Goals’. The children have set their own individual goal for both home and school which they are working on. On Wednesday we discussed having a class goal, something that we could all work towards achieving. First we had to think of an area in the classroom we wanted to improve. Everyone had lots of good ideas. Eventually we decided on one area for improvement. The Owls have decided to improve their book corner and Eagles want to buy stationery and imaginary play toys for golden time. Please watch this space to see how each class are going to raise the money to improve their chosen area.

Have a good weekend!
Year 2 Teachers

Friday 13th January

2012-01-13T13:04:00.000Z

This week in literacy we have been looking at non-fiction text. We talked about the differences between fiction and non-fiction texts and made a list of all the non-fiction texts we could think of. These included an encyclopaedia, a dictionary, a thesaurus, an atlas, a newspaper, a leaflet, a catalogue, a recipe book.

We were detectives looking for features of non fiction books. We found non fiction books have; a content page, an index, a glossary, page numbers, sub titles, photos and diagrams. We challenged ourselves to describe and explain each feature.

During the week we used a selection of information books about Nelson Mandela to look at the following features in detail: the content page, the index and the glossary.

We then made up our own

· contents page that was in numerical and chronological order

· an index that was in alphabetical order

· a glossary that included important Nelson Mandela topic words, which were also in alphabetical order

This week we used our knowledge of counting in tens to help us solve addition and subtraction number sentences. As we can count up in tens from any number we can put one number in our head and then count up the required number of tens. We challenged ourselves to use 3 digit numbers and numbers that crossed into the next 100.

40 + 30 =

60 – 50 =

470 + 20 =

370 – 50 =

We also reminded ourselves that when we count up in tens the unit digit does not change. Therefore we could work out addition and subtraction calculations when only one of the numbers ends in ten.

46 + 30 =

71 - 40 =

357 + 50 =

623 – 30 =

The next day we extended this learning by adding and subtracting 11. For addition we first added the tens and then added the units. Some of us used a 100 square and we noticed which way we needed to jump. Then we did subtraction by first subtracting ten and then taking away one more. Some of us used this strategy to add or subtract other 2 digit numbers ending in 1 and also starting with 3 digit numbers.

38 + 11 =

45 – 11 =

368 + 11 =

472 – 11 =

345 + 71 =

631 – 40 =

Some of us consolidated our learning using the ICT Games website at http://ictgames.com/100huntadd11.html and http://ictgames.com/100huntminus11.html

We have also been partitioning numbers this week. First we reminded ourselves about what each digit means and we partitioned numbers into hundreds, tens and units. If you would like to practise this at home http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3700 is a good website to use. After that we looked at different ways to partition numbers, using our knowledge of addition. For example we could partition the following number like this:

537

500 + 30 + 7 (in hundreds, tens and units)

100 + 100 + 100 + 100 + 50 + 50 + 30 + 7 (a different way)

We shared our ideas and challenged ourselves to be as creative as possible!

On Thursday we used our knowledge of place value and working systematically to find out all the possible numbers we could generate using three digits. We realised it is important to use a system in order to check we have all the possible numbers and to make sure we do not have any duplicates.

For example using the digits 6, 3 and 9 we can make the following 3 digit numbers

639

693

369

396

963

936

We used http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3466 to play this game as a class. We then used our knowledge of place value to order the numbers from the smallest to the largest.

Finally, on Friday we used our knowledge of number facts to solve more difficult problems. For example, we can use 7 + 3 = 10 to solve 70 + 30 = ?, or 700 + 300 = ?; 9 – 6 = 3 can be used to solve 90 – 60 = ? or 900 - 600 = ?

Some of use extended this learning to include numbers that do not end in 0, numbers that cross the next multiple of 100 and 3 digit numbers.

In history we reminded ourselves of the events of the Great Fire of London and then we placed the events in chronological order. You could ask your child what this means and if they put the events of their day in chronological order!

We also used the website http://www.fireoflondon.org.uk/game/ to investigate the reasons for the spread of the fire. There are lots more sections on this website that your child might like to explore at home! Next week we will be discussing the role of an eyewitness and finding out about an important eyewitness to the fire who has helped us know so much about the fire today. We will then write a diary account of the fire as if we were an eyewitness.

Have a great weekend.

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 6th January

2012-01-06T15:51:00.000Z

Welcome back and Happy New Year!

We have got straight back into learning. Just look what we have achieved in only three days!

On Wednesday we used our imaginations to plan and then write our own Christmas Eve adventure stories. We used all our previous learning from last term to keep all the Super Heroes happy.

We thought about what ...

Violet Vocabulary would like to read in our stories: interesting adjectives, verbs and even challenged ourselves to use some adverbs too.

Captain Connective would like to read: a variety of connectives including and, so, but, and because.

Ollie Opener would like to read: a variety of sentence openers including time openers ( First… Next…. Then… After…. Finally….) and WOW openers Suddenly…. Out of nowhere…….

Dr Punctuation would like to see a variety of punctuation including full stops and capital letters, ! ? “ “

On Thursday we reviewed our work, looking for evidence of all the above.

We had to underline all the interesting vocabulary we used in purple pencil, connectives in orange, openers in red and finally punctuation in green. By the end of the lesson we could see what our next steps are in our writing.

On Friday we then reviewed our handwriting from our Christmas Eve adventure story. We looked at some examples of handwriting and then scored our own either with 1, 2 or 3 points. We had to assess the spacing of our letters, the size of our letters, whether our ascenders and descenders where positioned correctly and whether we used capital letters correctly.

In maths this week we have been solving word problems, using the four operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. We learnt that:

1) Read the question carefully

2) Identify the words that tell us which operation to use

3) Identify the numbers to use to solve the problem.

We then drew a pictorial representation of the problem, recorded the number sentence and then calculated the answer. Phew! Luckily we worked with our learning partners to discuss strategies and to explain our thinking.

Examples of problems we solved are:

1) Sophie had 6 presents for Christmas. Her brother also had 6 presents. How many did they have altogether?

2) John had 10 grapes in his lunch box. He ate 8 of them. How many did he take back home?

3) A car has 4 wheels. How many wheels are there on 10 cars?

4) There are 60 children in Year 2. On the school trip the children were in groups of 5. How many groups were there?

We realised that if we know our number bonds and times tables it helps us work out the number problems more easily. So we have all decided to keep practising our targets at home!

Our topic this term in history is The Great Fire of London. We found out that this happened a very long time ago, where the fire started and how different the houses in London were from those of today. We read the story on this website:

http://tlfe.org.uk/fireoflondonhistoryks1

Over the next few weeks we will be putting the events of the fire into chronological order, discovering the causes of the fire and investigating what happened as a result of the fire. We will also be using our learning in history to support our learning in literacy, art and ICT.

Have a great weekend.

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 16th December

2011-12-16T15:54:00.015Z

What a wonderful week we have enjoyed! We hope you enjoyed the Christmas performance as much as we did and we are sure you will agree that all the children were amazing!

Everything has had a festive feel this week. We all enjoyed the Christmas party yesterday, thank you for the party food and help with preparing it.

Today we have been really busy! First we said goodbye to Mrs Bird, with the help of three firefighters! Later we walked to Willow Court and entertained the residents with a selection of Christmas songs. After that we enjoyed our Christmas lunch.

We would like to thank you all for your very generous gifts; it is very kind of you and very much appreciated. We hope that you all have a wonderful Christmas and we wish you a very happy New Year.

Year 2 Team

Friday 9th December

2011-12-09T15:50:00.000Z

In maths this week we have been inventing our own games to help us learn and practise our pairs of numbers that total 10, 20 or multiples of 10 that total 100 and our doubles to 5, 10 or 20 and the associated halves.

We have also been assessing the children's maths targets. Keep up the good work of practising these and we will be assessing them again in the new year.

Literacy has had a very festive feel this week as we have been writing our own versions of the Christmas story. We have not written these in our learning books, but in a ‘stable’ book! We have tried to include adjectives, connectives and a variety of sentence openers to make our writing interesting to the reader. We will finish our work by writing a blurb on the back to make people want to read our stable books and then decorating our work for display. We hope that you will enjoy reading our books and that in the future they become a special way to remember the time your children were in Year 2!

In history we have been thinking about the time that Nelson Mandela spent in prison. We discussed the prison cell he lived in, the food he ate and how he might feel. We then wrote a letter pretending that we were him to demonstrate our learning. We will finish this topic on a happier note next week when we learn about him being released and becoming the first black president of South Africa.

This week we have been busy practising our Christmas performance. Thank you for providing the costumes, helping your children learn their lines and practising the songs. Today we had our dress rehearsal, with an audience from the junior school and we are looking forward to displaying our talents to you all next week!

We hope you have a good weekend before the final week of term!

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 2nd December

2011-12-02T15:54:00.000Z

In maths this week we have been learning about the inverse relationship between

1 addition and subtraction

2 doubles and halves

Inverse means they undo each other.

To consolidate this learning use

http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3517

http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3529

http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3487

We used our doubling and halving skills to solve money problems

Give your child an amount of money eg 15p get them to double it, 22p get them to halve it.

Also keep practising those number bonds to 10 or 20 or 100 and doubles to 10 or 20 as your child will find them very useful in whole class activities and when working independently.

We used our prior knowledge to

· solve the missing number sentences for example

10 + ? = 100 100 - ? = 70 10 x ? = 40 20 ÷ ? = 2

To add even more challenge change the position of the missing number or change the sign.

To consolidate simple addition missing number sentences use

http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3794

We have been writing our own versions of ‘On The Way Home’ in literacy this week. We used the original story and then changed who we met, what it did to us and how we escaped. We used our previous learning to remember to include interesting adjectives and, (of course!) the words said and went were banned! Instead we chose interesting verbs and we challenged ourselves to include adverbs too. As we were writing our stories we tried to remember how the Super Heroes help is to make our stories interesting to the reader by using connectives (Captain Connective), interesting sentence openers (Ollie Opener) and the correct punctuation (Dr Punctuation), in addition to keeping Violet Vocabulary happy. Phew, what a lot to remember! We are very pleased with our results and how our writing has progressed this year.

In D&T this week we completed our vehicles. We used our drawing and computer skills to add the details to them, and remembered to include all the essential features that vehicles need.

Look at our fantastic finished products! Can you tell what each vehicle is designed to do?

We finished the week by learning about the life of Nelson Mandela. We learnt that chronological order means the order that events happen and we put the main events of Nelson Mandela’s life in chronological order. You could revisit this learning at home by asking your child to put the main events of their life in chronological order, or maybe the events of their day or week.

Have a great weekend, and we look forward to seeing you at the Christmas Fair on Saturday.

Year 2 Teachers

Thursday 24th November 2011

2011-11-24T12:35:00.000Z

This week in maths we have been learning about multiplication and division. We have learnt that multiplication can be recorded as repeated addition. We used an empty number line to show our workings out.

To consolidate this learning use

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks1bitesize/numeracy/multiplication/index.shtml

We also learnt that division can be done by sharing equally or by grouping. We showed our workings out when grouping on an empty number line.

To consolidate this learning use

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks1bitesize/numeracy/division/index.shtml

This week in literacy we have been innovating to plan our own stories based on ‘On The Way Home’. First we reminded ourselves of the story, using a Pie Corbett-style story map. Then we thought of different characters that we could meet on our own way home and we acted out meeting them, thinking about how we would feel and trying to show this in our expressions and body language. After that we recorded our ideas for what we met, what it did to us and how we escaped. Finally we made character cards about the characters that we would meet to help us choose exciting words to bring our stories to life. We challenged ourselves to use interesting adjectives, verbs and adverbs. Next week we will use all of our learning to write our own versions of the story. We think we will make the Super Heroes (and our teachers!) very happy!

In science this week we used toy cars and ramps to explore and ask our own questions. Once we had thought of a question we then set up a test to answer it. We talked about making our test fair.

Here are some of the questions we

Does the surface of the ramp affect how far the car travels?

Does the height of the ramp affect how far the car travels?

We then looked at our results and made our own conclusions.

We used http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/scienceclips/ages/6_7/forces_movement.shtmll

In D&T this week we began to make our vehicles. We had to attach the axles to the chassis and choose the body for our own vehicle.

Have a great weekend and enjoy the occasional day tomorrow!

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 18th November

2011-11-18T22:12:00.001Z

This week in maths we have been revisiting our learning about shapes. We have

Recognised and named 2D shapes including hexagon, pentagon and octagon
Talked about properties of 2D shapes

Use http://uk.ixl.com/math/year-2/count-sides-and-vertices to consolidate this learning

Recognised the difference between regular and irregular shapes –

Use http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3246

Recognised right angles in shapes

Use http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3264

Recognised and named 3D shapes including cone, pyramid, cube, cuboid and cylinder
Talked about properties of 3D shapes

Use http://uk.ixl.com/math/year-2/identify-3-dimensional-figures

We solved tangrams by orientating and positioning shapes

Use http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3833

In science this week we used toy cars to explore and ask our own questions. Once we had thought of a question we then set up a test to answer it. Here are some of the questions we asked Do the lorries travel further than the trucks?

Which car travels further?

Does the surface affect the distance travelled?

In D&T this week we designed our own vehicle which we will be constructing over the next few weeks. We had to think about

· Type of vehicle

· Size of vehicle

· Size and number of wheels

· How we could finish it – give it a logo eg collage, paint, computer generated graphics/ text

In literacy we have been listening to, reading and acting out ‘On The Way Home’ by Jill Murphy. On Monday we listened very carefully to the story, without looking at the pictures. After that we then worked in groups to answer questions about the story. We tried very hard to work as a team, taking turns to share our own ideas and also to listen others’ ideas.

The next day we acted out parts of the story, considering that different characters have different points of view. We made lists describing the feelings of the different characters.

On Wednesday we banned the word went! We tried really hard to think of exciting alternative words we could use instead and then we challenged ourselves to include an adverb to make our sentences as interesting as possible.

We finished the week by playing a connective game on Friday. One person says a short sentence. Their partner then adds a connective and then completes the sentence.

For example:

I ran quickly to the shops and bought a toy.

I wandered slowly to the park so I could play on the slide

I tip-toed quietly downstairs because I didn’t want anyone to hear me!

We challenged ourselves to use a variety of connectives to make our sentences interesting. Maybe you could play this game at home and see how many different connectives you can use!

Thank you very much for your donations for Children In Need. We used our maths skills to count how much money each class had raised and we enjoyed making Pudsey bear spotty with the coins! We also made spotty accessories to wear.

Finally, thank you for coming to the consultations this week and we hope you found then useful and informative.

Have a great weekend.

Year 2 Teachers

P.S. I am very sorry for the late publication of the blog this week but we had problems publishing at school.

Friday 11th November

2011-11-11T17:24:00.000Z

In maths this week we have been telling the time.

We drew the minute hand and the hour hand to show

o’clock times
half past times
quarter to and quarter past and some of us even challenged ourselves to telling the time to the nearest 5 minutes

Please help your child practise telling the time at home.

We have also been looking at number patterns.

On a 100 grid we marked counting in

2’s, 5’s, 10’s, and extended this to 3’s and 4’s

We continued a number sequences counting in

2’s, 5’s, 10’s, and extended this to 3’s, 4’s, 20’s 100’s, 25’s

What comes next in this sequence? 33, 36, 39………

To practise this at home use http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3556

What number is missing from the sequence? 75, 70, 65, ? 55, 50,

Say a number sequence to your child, can they tell you what comes next or which number you missed out?

In literacy this week we have been continuing learning about poetry. First we remembered the fireworks we watched at the weekend and then we made lists of words and phrases to describe the fireworks. After that we re-read the firework poem from last week and, using our learning about interesting describing words, we completed our own firework poems. Finally, we tried very hard with our handwriting to present our work for display. We hope that you are impressed with our results!

In science this week we found out that by using a force we can make our scooters speed up, slow down and change direction. Thank you for bringing scooters for us to use. The children had lots of fun in the playground with them!

We have started our new history topic this week about a famous person – Nelson Mandela. Today we have identified famous people from the past and present and discussed why they are famous. Over the next few weeks we will be finding out about Nelson Mandela, putting the events of his life in chronological order and thinking about why he acted as he did and what happened as a result. This topic will link in with our PSHE topic this half term, ‘Say No to Bullying’, and we will discuss trying to be fair and trying to always do the right thing.

‘Doing the right thing isn’t always easy to do, but it is always the right thing to do.’

Have a great weekend

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 4th November

2011-11-04T17:33:00.000Z

We have been assessing the children’s maths targets this week. Well done to all those children who have been busy practising them at home, this will help your child in their maths problem solving in school.

In our maths lessons we have been revisiting our learning about adding and subtracting ten or multiples of ten (20, 30…) to 2 digit numbers. We know that that the unit digit always stays the same when adding or subtracting 10 or multiples of 10 eg 51+20=71 99-30=69

Some of us challenged ourselves to add and subtract multiples of 10 from 3 digit numbers. We found using an empty numberline a good strategy to show our working out.

We also used this learning to solve word problems eg

Sam has 79 pens. He gets 20 more. How many pens does he have altogether?

Jen has 62 sweets. She gives 30 to her friend. How many sweets does she have left?

We finished the week by revisiting our learning about telling the time. We read quarter past and quarter to times on clock faces. Some of us challenged ourselves to reading times to the nearest 5 minutes eg twenty five past the hour, five to the hour. Keep practising at home using both analogue and digital clocks.

In literacy we have been reading a poem about fireworks. We looked for pattern and rhyme and we worked in a group to perform our poem to the class. We thought about speaking clearly, speaking loudly, speaking slowly and using expression to engage our audience. We then added actions to make our presentations even more interesting. Next week we are going to think about words to describe fireworks, words that rhyme and finally make our own versions of the firework poem. If you see any fireworks during the weekend it would be helpful if you could discuss with your child interesting and exciting words that the children could you in their poems.

This week we started our science topic on forces by investigating how we can change the shape of objects including playdough, pipe cleaners, elastic bands and tin foil by exerting a force on them. We then talked about whether the force was a push or pull or both.

For next Monday’s lesson could the children please bring a scooter to school as we are going to investigate how by using a force we can make our scooters speed up, slow down, stop and even change direction.

We started our D&T topic about vehicles this week. We looked at a variety of vehicles and talked about the purpose they are designed for eg an ice cream van to carry, advertise and sell ice-cream.

We had a fantastic time at Stockwood. Thank you very much to the kind parents (and Aunties!) who were able to come and help us. We enjoyed looking under different vehicles in the Mossman collection, to identify the chassis, the axle and the wheels. This will help us in our learning when designing and making our own vehicles later this term.

We hope you have a safe, warm and dry Bonfire Night, and we hope to see some of you at the Crabtree Firework Display.

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 21st October

2011-10-21T16:37:00.000+01:00

Year 2 became authors this week when we wrote our own stories based on Pumpkin Soup. We changed the setting, characters and reason for the argument and then make a story map in the style of Pie Corbett to help us record our ideas so we could concentrate on our word choices as we wrote our stories. We have been trying to include noun phrases and speech to give the reader a picture in their head as they read our story. As you might know, the word said has been ‘banned’ and Violet Vocabulary (and the Year 2 Teachers!) were impressed with the alternatives that the children used. Some children also challenged themselves to include speech marks and time sentence openers.

On Friday we reviewed our work, considering if our work shows that we met the learning objectives of choosing words for effect and using speech to make a story interesting. We gave ourselves a point for every interesting descriptive word or phrase that we used. Finally we assessed our own handwriting, giving points for correct acenders, decenders and relative size of letters. This gave the children a focus for their review and we have challenged them to beat their score next time!

We have been very impressed with the progress the children have made with their literacy over the last seven weeks and we would like to encourage them to continue this progress during half term. Regular reading is essential to develop writing skills, as well as reading skills and it is also great fun! Please encourage your child to read as much as possible over the coming week. In addition, you could ask your child to re-tell the story to you, or maybe to draw a story map to help with the re-telling? The more stories children have listened to, or read for themselves, the more ideas they have for their own stories! We are great fans of reading books to ‘magpie’ ideas for use in our own writing. As you read with your child please discuss any interesting words or phrases that might be good to ‘magpie’ and use in their own stories! Thank you.
This week in maths we have been continuing our learning about measuring. Can your child tell you what standard unit of measurement the following items are measured and sold in; lemonade, flour and fabric?

We read scales on a ruler, a measuring jug and weighing scales. We had to work out the scale by looking at the numbers given and work out the marks not numbered. We found out often the scale went up in 10’s or 50’s or 100’s, so we needed to be able to count in these number sequences.

We also learnt about grid reference this week. We learnt a rhyme to help us give and follow instructions on a grid. We chanted ‘into the house and up the stairs’. We always give the letter of a grid reference first and then the number eg B4

We had great fun outdoors putting ourselves on a giant grid and also played a game like Battleships in which we had to find the pirate’s treasure! We had to work in pairs remembering to look and listen to each other, think about what our partner said and take turns. To consolidate this learning you may like to play Battleship’s with your child.

At the end of the week we revisited our learning about time and estimated how long a minute was. We then challenged ourselves to see how many times we could do an activity such as writing our name or throwing and catching a beanbag in one minute. Can your child tell you how many seconds there are in a minute and how many minutes in an hour?
We have finished our Geography learning this term by thinking about how to stay safe at the seaside. We considered the dangers of the sun and the sea and we watched some short video clips to help us consider how to stay safe on the beach. We consolidated this learning by making some splendid beach safety posters.

This week was the final session of making our hand puppets. We looked at our original designs and reproduced them carefully. We used a range of fabrics to finish our puppets. Look at all the amazing, colourful characters we have produced! Many, many thanks to our team of volunteers – your help has been invaluable and we hope that you enjoyed yourselves as much as we all have and are as proud of our results!

We would like to say well done to all the children for their effort this term and we hope that you all have an enjoyable, safe and very happy half term holiday.

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 14th October

2011-10-14T15:59:00.000+01:00

This week has been Book Week and we have been learning through activities connected to ‘Alice In Wonderland’. We stared our week with aninspiring trip to the local library and we would like to thank all the kind parents who volunteered to help escort the children. We really enjoyed our visit and we learnt how the books are coded and located, how to use the self-service kiosks, we had a quiz and we had time to browse the books available. We hope that this experience has encouraged the children to use their local library and most importantly to read as much as they can! We continued our literacy learning by listening and re-telling the story of Alice in Wonderland using a story map, adding actions and descriptive vocabulary to ‘hook the reader in’.

On Tuesday we selected pictures of character and setting from Alice in Wonderland and wrote a sentence to describe them. For example, Alice could be described as; ‘A young, pretty girl with a blue dress and white apron.’ The hole where Alice fell could be described as ‘A deep, dark hole that never seemed to end’. We were very careful to check we had used all the correct punctuation! Maybe you could help your child develop their descriptive writing skills by finding some pictures to describe in the books you read together

On Thursday we decided that the word said was banned and we worked in groups to look in books and ‘magpie’ other words we could use instead that would be much more interesting. Violet Vocabulary would be very impressed! We also learnt about speech marks and putting them around direct speech, or the words that actually come out of the characters’ mouths!

The week finished with us writing our own, independent story based on the plot of Alice in Wonderland. We tried very hard to use all of our learning to show what talented authors we are becoming!

In maths this week we continued our learning about measuring. We looked at a metre stick and a 30cm ruler and talked about what we would measure with each. We decided shorter objects like pencils, books and laminated labels were best measured using a ruler and objects longer than a 30cm ruler were best measured using a metre stick. We measured objects to the nearest cm and ½ cm using a ruler. To measure accurately we agreed you need to start at 0. Encourage your child to measure with a ruler or tape measure at home.

As it was ‘Book Week’ we solved some puzzles like this using the clues can you work out where the Mad Hatter will sit?

Clue 1: Alice, Tweedledee and Tweedledum, the Cheshire Cat, the White Rabbit, the Queen of Hearts and the Mad Hatter sit at a table.

Clue 2: Alice sits in the middle

Clue 3: Tweedledee and Tweedledum must sit at opposite ends of the table

Clue 4: The Queen of Hearts sits next to Tweedledee

Clue 5: The White Rabbit must sit in between Alice and the Queen of Hearts

Clue 6: The Cheshire Cat cannot sit next to Tweedledum

Can your child make up their own Alice in Wonderland puzzles.

We used playing cards to practice our doubles, bonds of 10 and addition and subtraction facts. We also used playing cards to reach a given target for example if the target number was 26 which cards from the pack could you use?

This week in D&T we have begun to make our hand puppets. We learnt how to join the fabric using a running stitch. Thank you very much to all the parents who were able to come and help – you really made the afternoon lots of fun! We all showed amazing concentration and perseverance whilst sewing. Next week we will be finishing our puppets and giving them all characters. Look out for the photos next week.

We finished the week by celebrating Book Week by dressing up as a character from Alice in Wonderland we think we all looked splendid! During the afternoon we watched a DVD of Alice in Wonderland and enjoyed a ‘Mad Hatter’s Tea Party!’ Book Week has been a fantastic way to encourage the children to enjoy reading and to read as much and as widely as possible. We hope that the children will continue to be as enthusiastic and keen about books and reading as this will help with their learning, but most of all – books are great fun!

We hope you enjoy the weekend,

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 7th October

2011-10-07T16:46:00.000+01:00

What a fantastic assembly, we hope you enjoyed it!

In maths this week we have been continuing our learning about data handling.

We carried out our own enquiry. We were given a statement to investigate ‘are 5 letter names the most common?’

We talked about how we could collect and then present this information so it could be easily interpreted.

Which of these is easier to see at a glance?

On Tuesday we made a graph using the information we had collected on Monday. We learnt to label the graph.

The following day we used our graph to answer questions including there are more children with 7 letters in their name than 4 letters. How many more? We had to work out the difference which we found challenging.

Can your child tell your child tell you the difference between 18 and 24. How much bigger is 24? Talk about how they worked it out did they count on from 18 to 24 or did they count back from 24 to 18?

Visit http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3228 if your child would like make their own graph at home

On Thursday and Friday we revisited our learning about measuring.

We had to choose from a selection of equipment and units the most suitable for measuring weight and then capacity. Ask your which equipment would they use to weigh an object and which to measure the capacity of a bottle. Ask what unit of measurement is lemonade sold in and a bag of flour. What else would you measure in litres and millilitres or grams and kilograms?

We also we read the numbered division on weighing scales and on measuring jugs. Your child could practise this at home when cooking by measuring out the ingredients or by visiting http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3228 to practise making a litre and http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3279 to practise making a kilogram.

In literacy we have been listening to and reading ‘Pumpkin Soup’ and we discussed what we liked about the story and why. When we listened to the story again we added actions, in the style of Pie Corbett, to help us remember the story, in order for us to re-tell it to each other. We then annotated story maps with time sentence openers and descriptive vocabulary in order to make our re-telling more interesting for the listener.

Today we have played ‘Change It’, based on sentences from Pumpkin Soup. This is when we start with a sentence and then take turns to change a part of the sentence and finally end up with a totally new sentence. For example we could start with:

Deep in the woods there is an old white cabin with pumpkins in the garden.

This could be changed to:

Deep in the woods there is a tumble-down cottage with pumpkins in the garden.

Change again to:

Deep in the woods there is a tumble-down cottage with woolly sheep in the garden.

Change again to:

On the edge of a meadow there is a tumble-down cottage with woolly sheep in the garden.

This then gives us a totally new start to a story and therefore different things will happen in our story!

This week in art we have been revisiting our learning about colour mixing, We used blue and white powder paint to make different shades of blue.

Monday

Thank you very much to all the kind volunteers who have offered to walk with us to the library on Monday. If you are accompanying Owls please arrive in the Owls classroom by 9:15 and if you are accompanying Eagles please arrive by 10:15. Many thanks!

Monday afternoon sees the return of sewing! The children have been busy designing their hand puppets and will be sewing and decorating them during the next two Monday afternoons. Thank you very much to those people who have offered to help – your support will be invaluable. We aim to start sewing at 1:45 each week and look forward to seeing you then.

Year 2 Teachers

Friday 30th September

2011-09-30T17:14:00.000+01:00

In maths this week we have been learning about how subtraction undoes addition. We used the word inverse to describe this.

We noticed that if you start with 10 and add 5 the total is 15. If you then subtract 5 you get back to the number you started with.

We then used this knowledge to find 3 more related number sentences when we had been given only 1 for example 10 + 5 = 15

The other 3 related number sentences are

5 + 10 = 15, 15 – 5 = 10, 15 – 10 = 5

To reinforce this learning use iboard – inverse relationships

http://www.iboard.co.uk/curriculum.htm#3529

We noticed that addition

can be done in any order
always has the biggest number as the total

and subtraction

always starts with the biggest number

We have also been revisiting our learning more about data handling.

We found out that lists are a very useful way of presenting information. If we write our number bonds randomly it is difficult to check we have them all e.g. 5+5 1+9 7+3

However if we write them in a logical order it is much easier to check e.g.

0+10, 1+9, 2+8, 3+7, 4+6, 5+5 …………..

We also sorted information using a Carroll diagram. We sorted using a given criteria and made up our own criteria too. We sorted numbers by odd/even, 1 digit or 2 digit, multiples of 10 or not. We also sorted shapes by 4 sides and not 4 sides, red shapes and not red shapes.

We have pretended to have been captured by pirates and have written 'messages in a bottle' asking to be saved. We carefully chose words and included:

A bold, exciting heading to 'hook the reader in'
A description of what the pirates have been making us do
A description of the pirate ship so our rescuers can find us

We then copied out our messages onto 'bottles' for display. We hope you find them when you come to visit our classrooms after the assembly next Friday!

In design and technology this week we have been making our own finger puppets by joining the fabric by sewing simple stitches. We then gave our finger puppets characters by decorating them. Look at our fantastic finger puppets!

In ICT we have been used our geography learning to create Wordle word clouds. This showed our ICT skills of entering text, changing the font and arranging the layout. We hope that you will be impressed with our excellent results! Why don't you try making your own word cloud at home? Choose and topic and enter as many words as you can before creating your cloud. You can then choose the layout, font and colours to suit your topic. http://www.wordle.net/create
We would love to see the results!

We hope you enjoy the beautiful weather this weekend!
Year 2 teachers

Friday 23rd September

2011-09-23T16:51:00.000+01:00

Our stories based on 'Our Mammoth' are finished and ready to be read by the teachers, supported by Dr Punctuation and Captain Connective. Can your child tell you what they needed to include to keep these superheroes happy? Next week we will be pretending we have been captured by pirates and will write a 'message in a bottle' asking to be saved. If you have any books about pirates at home perhaps you could 'magpie' some ideas about chores the pirates are making us do?

During reading session this week we have been looking for ideas and sentence openers we can 'magpie' and use when writing our own stories. Maybe during the weekend you might find some super sentence openers in the books you read together. We would be delighted to hear about them so do, please, send them in for us all to share!

In maths this week we have been revisiting our learning about number bonds of 10 and talked about recording them in a logical way to help us check we have got all the possibilities e.g.

0+ 10 = 10

1 + 9 = 10

2 + 8 = 10

3 + 7 = 10

Can you see the pattern occurring?

Please help your child learn to recall these quickly. Once they know these they can apply this learning to solve problems.

Also This week we talked about multiples of 10 eg 10 20 30 40 50 60 …….. noticing they all end in a 0. We then had to say which multiples of 10 thirty one lay between eg 30 and 40.

The following days we learnt about rounding to the nearest 10. We learnt this rhyme to help us.

1 2 3 4 round down to the 10 before

5 6 7 8 9 round up on the number line.

Our rule was to always look at the unit digit to decide whether to round up or down.

Can your child round the numbers below to the nearest 10.

31 45 17 22 59

On Friday used our counting skills to solve problems such as how many 2p’s in 18p, 5p’s in 35p, count in tens from 21. Will 55 be in the count?

In design and technology this week we have been using a template to cut out two identical pieces of fabric. Next week we will use these to make our own finger puppets. Thanks to those parents who have offered to help with the sewing over the next few weeks, we look forward to seeing you on Monday at 1:45pm.

In geography we have continued our learning about physical and human features and this this week we have compared the geographical features of the seaside with those of Harpenden. We looked at Google Maps and Google Street View to give us different views of the seaside and Harpenden and to help us identify features that both places share and those that are different.

We hope you enjoy the weekend and see you on Monday

Year 2 Teachers

At last the Owls at Southend!

2011-09-19T16:48:00.000+01:00

Friday 16th September

2011-09-16T16:56:00.001+01:00

It was lovely to see so many of you at our Year 2 Induction sessions; we hope you found them useful. The slides are on the main website if you would like to view them again or you were unable to come to the meeting. Please ask if you would like to discuss anything with us, or have any concerns or questions regarding you child.

In maths this week we have been revisiting our learning about two digit numbers.

We have been positioning missing numbers on a hundred square and explaining how we can prove it is that number. Also we have been listening carefully to instructions given by the adults to find a given 2 digit number and then record 10 more and 10 less than that number. We looked carefully at the 2 digits and noticed the unit number stays the same and the ten number changes when adding or subtracting 10. We extended our learning by using 3 digit numbers as well.

We also learnt to use the < and > signs. Ask your child what they mean and how they can remember which one is which!

Can you child make these statement true by inserting the correct signs?

14 10, 44 54, 25 7

On Thursday and Friday we revisited our partitioning skills.

14 is made up of how many tens and how many units? (1 ten and 4 units), therefore 14 = 10 + 4

37 is 3 tens and 7 units, therefore 37 = 30 + 7

How are 23 and 32 different?

Visit http://www.ictgames.com/sharknumbers.html to consolidate this learning.

Some of us partitioned 3 digit numbers into hundreds, tens and units.

Visit http://www.ictgames.com/arrowCards_revised_v4.html to consolidate this learning.

In literacy we have been planning our own versions of ‘Our Mammoth’ that we will be writing next week. We have kept the setting and beginning of the story the same, and changed the characters. This means that our story will be different from the original – something else will come out of the iceberg and therefore they will have a different adventure together! We have used a story mountain to plan our ideas and next week we will be using all of our previous learning to ‘hook the reader in’ by making our story as interesting and exciting as possible. We are especially concentrating on the use of a variety of sentence openers and the correct use of full stops and capital letters. We hope that you will enjoy reading the stories after our year group assembly on Friday 7^th October.

We have been using our trip to Southend to support our learning in geography this week. First we looked again at our photos, identifying the geographical features that make it the seaside. Then we sorted the features into physical and human features. Maybe your child could give you examples of each? You could also extend you child’s learning by looking for geographical features in Harpenden, discussing if they are also found at the seaside and if they are physical or human features.

In design and technology this week we have been finding out how different types of puppets move. We had a selection of finger and hand puppets to investigate. We looked at what they were made of and how good the designs were. All this learning is in preparation for making our own finger and hand puppets!

We are looking for a willing bunch of parents/carers who can help the children re-thread their needles etc. The dates are as follows – Monday 26^th September, Monday 10^th October and Monday 17^th October. Please let us know if you are available to help. No previous experience required!

Another week has flown by; we hope you enjoy the weekend,

Year 2 Teachers

PS Sorry if you are hoping to view the Owls' photos from Southend. We are experiencing some difficulties uploading them but we hope to resolve this soon!