Blackbirds - Year 2

The United Kingdom

Hello! Welcome to Blackbird’s Class web page. We hope that you have had a wonderful and relaxing summer holiday. I cannot believe how quickly time has flown. Here we are back at school and straight into Year 2. So far, we have hit the ground running.

Our topic this term is The United Kingdom. We will be learning all about the country that we live in from both a historical and geographical point of view. Please see the curriculum overview for more details.  

Literacy:

Each term, children will be writing two main pieces of text. Each text will be based on a culmination of classroom experiences. This will include discussion, drama and role play, and will involve the language features that they will be learning as part of the curriculum. For instance, children will initially be writing a character description of Mr Twit (as we are reading this book in class). They will write it after exploring a range of other book characters, learning and understanding specific vocabulary and language features needed to make their writing come to life (adjectives, noun phrases, verbs etc.) and gaining a first-hand experience of the character through emersion (via art, drama etc.). Children will be writing daily.

Spelling and handwriting:

Children will be taught to write ‘cursively’ (joined-up). They will have lessons on a daily basis. Please encourage your child to practise at home; automaticity in handwriting will ultimately help with writing fluency.

As from this week (w/c 23/09), children will be coming home with spellings in a little red book. Each Monday, they will have a selection of words to practise at home – based on a spelling pattern. On a Friday each week, they will have an informal test based on these words which will inform gaps in learning. I have included a spreadsheet (Excel) document on the webpage of the spellings for the term. Also, you will find (both in the book and on the webpage) a list of common exception (or ‘tricky’ words) – specific to Year 2.

Maths:

Our maths this term will be based on place value, numbers and counting. It is essential that children have a solid understanding of this concept in order to carry out other operations (+-x and ÷). Place value is the foundation of numeracy; the position of each digit in a number represents its value. E.g. 23 means 2 tens and 3 ones.

PE and Forest School:

This term, PE will be taught outdoors (weather permitting). It is essential that children have a full PE kit in school at all times – including white T-Shirt, shorts (old jogging bottoms for a cold day might be worthwhile) and plimsolls or trainers). In the interest of health and safety, children will not be able to take part in PE lessons outside in school shoes only. Please also ensure they always have a water bottle on site.

Forest School will be ran on a Wednesday afternoon. Due to limitations in numbers, children will be going to Forest School on a rolling rota basis (every three weeks). Details will be sent home shortly. Children will need to have appropriate clothing including: wellies, old jogging bottoms, T-shirt, jumper, raincoat, hat, gloves, scarf – in a named bag.

In the meantime, see you in the playground!

Mrs Durman, Miss Dawson and Mrs O’Neill

Term 1 Spellings - week by week: