Week ending 11.12.15

This week Year 2's have been busy with our Topic lessons. The students' task for this week has been to create an exciting new sandwich that they would like to eat. To kick off the week the children had a tasting session of different breads from around the world before deciding which one they would like to use for their sandwich. The children then had to choose their fillings. We look forward to creating the sandwiches tomorrow. In English this week the children have been working on their pirate stories which sound very exciting.  

Week ending 27.11.15

This week Year 2's have been looking at exercising and staying healthy. In Topic, the children worked different parts of their body in lots of different exercises to see how their body reacts. The children will be using the information they learn from exercising to create graphs in next week's ICT lessons. In English, Year 2 has been looking at the story 'The Shopping Basket' and practicing putting commas into sentences. In Maths, the children have been looking at coins and solving problems involving money.

Week Ending 19/11/15

This week Year 2's have been looking at the work of sculptor Henry Moore. In Topic, the children have used clay to sculpt their own versions of Moore's sculptures of human figures. The children used techniques such as cross hatching to make their models which are currently drying and will be available to take home soon. In English, Year 2 worked on writing commands and instructions to show how they created their Henry Moore sculptures. In Maths, children worked on subtraction problems by finding the difference and counting on.

Week ending 5/11/15

Welcome back! We hope you all enjoyed a fun and relaxing half term break. This half term is always a busy one on the run up to Christmas and the children have had to come back and hit the ground running.
In English this week we are looking at the story of a boy who gets lost at a fireworks display and how we can write simple and compound sentences about the story. In Maths Year 2 are looking at ways to solve addition problems by partitioning 2-digit numbers. We are all looking forward to our visit to Norwich Cathedral on Friday and will be spending Tuesday researching the life of Edith Cavell.

Week ending 21.10.15

This week sees the first of this academic year's International Weeks. The school has chosen to focus on Australia. Year 2's started the week off by taking a tour around many of the areas of Australia with 'ozzie' tour guide 'Kangaroo Keith'. The children then spent the afternoon using the facts they learnt on the tour to create tourism leaflets. Tomorrow, the children will be having a go at cooking some Australian biscuits and finding out more about life 'down under'. Our last day of the week will see the children learning more about Australian animals and writing a fact-file about them. 

We hope you all enjoy a relaxing and fun half-term break next week and look forward to seeing the children back on the 2nd of November.

Week ending 16.10.15

What have we been doing in English? This week in English we have been continuing to look at the story 'Traction Man is Here'. The children have created new outfits for Traction Man and planned a new adventure that they will be writing in 'Big Write' tomorrow.
What have we been doing in Maths? This week the classes have been looking at halving, both shapes and numbers. The children have looked at a variety of ways to half numbers and applied their knowledge to various number problems.
Thank you all so much for your support with this year's Christmas cards. We sold many of the children's design and we look forward to the orders arriving back from the printers in the future.

Week Ending 9.10.2015

What have we been doing in English? This week in English we have been looking at the story Traction Man is Here. The children have really enjoyed this funny book about using toys to create imaginative stories. The children have been using the book to find out about adjectives, verbs and conjunctions, while beginning to write their own adventures for Traction Man.
What have we been doing in Maths? This week the classes have been looking at odd and even numbers and ways in which we can identify them. In mental maths Year 2 has continued to look at counting up and down in 2's, 5's and 10's so any practicing at home would be greatly beneficial.
What have we been doing in Topic? The topic for this term is entitled 'How Are You?'. In our first lessons in this topic we have been finding out about what the children know about the difference between living and non-living things. Also we have been listing the things that we need to stay alive.

Week Ending 2.10.15

Welcome to Year Two!  We've had a great start to the year and everyone seems to have settled in very well. Over the last few weeks the children have been working hard, with the main the focus on Maths and English. In Maths we have been looking at counting on and back on a number line, ordering numbers and understanding place value for two-digit numbers. In Mental Maths we have been counting on in 2's, 5's and 10's and learning some songs to help us. In English the children have been looking at questions and answers, statements and re-telling stories. Everyone had been enjoying daily Phonics and applying this knowledge to their writing. It was really good to meet so many parents at the open afternoon and we look forward to a fantastic year ahead.  

Week ending 19.6.15

This week Year 2 have started designing bird feeders for work in Design and Technology. The students decided which materials to use and how the bird feeder is going to be supported. Later in the week the students will be following their designs and making their bird feeders using wood, doweling and other materials.  
With the leaving concert set for next week both classes are busy practicing their songs and we're looking forward to welcoming you all to the show. A reminder that parents of children in Mrs. Prophet's class are welcome to Monday's concert and parents of children in Mr Harvey's class are welcome on Tuesday. Having said this if you do wish to come on another day please let the your child's teacher know and we will try to accommodate you.
Could we also use this opportunity to remind you that the deadline for letters and payment for the Year 2 Norwich Castle visit is next Monday the 22nd of June.

Week ending 12.6.15

What have we been doing in English? This week in English we have been looking at the fairy tale 'Goldilocks and the Three Bears', thinking about the view points of the characters and the use of speech marks in the story. 
What have we been doing in Maths? This week we have been looking at ways of gathering data and creating graphs.We then used our graphs to compose and answer questions about the data shown.
What have we been doing in Topic? The topic for this term is entitled 'Flowers and Insects'. This week we have been looking at our Design and Technology task of creating a structure that will stand.
This week the children will be their 'Welly Beat Dance' music video. They have been working really hard in PE during the term to learn the moves for the dance routine. Wellies will be sent home today and could we please ask you to give them a quick clean and then send them back tomorrow.

Week ending 5.6.15

This week the children of Year 2 has been learning all about Thailand in our termly International week. The students have been doing lots of interesting things this week in an effort to learn more about this fascinating country.
In Maths, we looked at capacity and created our own fruit juices designed to cool you off on a hot Thai beach!
The students then had the opportunity to cook a Thai curry, which smelt delicious but was apparently quite spicy! Students have also spent time looking at Buddhism and made a clay tile using images of Buddha and Thai temples.
In English, students will be looking at different forms of transport used in Thailand and creating a poster.
In Geography, the class has spent time looking at the oceans of the world and creatures within them.

Week ending 22.5.15

This week Year 2 has been busy continuing with this year SATs including Maths and writing tests. During the rest of the week the students have been looking at the artwork of Paul Cezanne and Sergei Osipov. We have used this as an entry point to producing our own pictures with pastels, artists pencils of different grades and paints. We have been studying and practicing techniques for shadowing and blending and have shown a big improvement in the quality of our artwork. For our final piece of art we produced a still-life of flowers with both paints and pastels.

Week ending 8.5.15

This week Year 2 has been busy continuing with this year SATs, which are running from now until the half-term break. It is a busy time of year and the students will be working hard everyday practicing or completing the various tests so attendance is, as always, incredibly important.
In English, the children have been working on the middle and endings of their stories and trying to make them as strong as their story beginnings are. 
In Maths, the children have been revising mental strategies and looking again at subtraction in preparation for their Maths tests next week.
In Topic, we have been introducing this term's topic of Flowers and Insects which the children have really enjoyed. 

Week ending 1/5/2015

Last week saw the start of this year's Year Two SATs, which will run from now until the half-term break. It is a busy time of year and the students will be working hard everyday practicing or completing the various tests so attendance is, as always, incredibly important.
This week in English we have been busy practicing our writing, reading and spellings. The students wrote stories using characters and settings from adventure stories and completed riddles about animals, which were really good fun to read.
In Maths, we have been revising different methods of addition and continue to practice our mental methods for solving problems.  

Week ending 19.4.2015

This week is the school's annual Art week and the classes have been busy painting lots of lovely pictures of dragons and knights for our new corridor display.  The reason behind the theme is that this year Garrick Green has their own Go-go Dragon to decorate, which everyone is very excited about.
During this week Year 2 have also been writing dragon stories, creating dragon collages and making dragon masks. The week has been a 'roaring' success. 

Week ending 20.3.2015

This week the classes have been conducting lots of different experiments and investigations for this year's Science Week. As always the children have thoroughly enjoyed finding out about the world around them through science.
During the week Year 2 has had the opportunity to investigate; the differing densities of liquids and how this effects how fast they can race, the changing state of water, investigating magnets and how to design and build a free standing structure that could support the weight of a creme egg! All of the experiments have led to some brilliant discussions and the children seem genuinely excited by the activities.

Week ending 13.3.2015

What have we been doing in English? This week in English we have been looking at Fairy Tales. The students worked at re-telling and creating their own stories in this genre. Writing in this genre really allowed the children to use their imaginations and they were able to write some great stories filled with fantastic characters and far-away places. 
What have we been doing in Maths? This week we have been conducting our termly assessments of the students ability.
What have we been doing in Topic? The topic for this term is entitled 'From A to B' focusing on different types of transport and travel. This week we have been finding out about different materials and the best way of waterproofing them. The children had the opportunity to make their own boats and to test how long their could stay afloat.  

Week ending 27.2.15

This week the classes have been working really hard creating lots of lovely paintings for our next display. The displays will be charting the history and development of land, sea and air transport. The children have spent the week researching about historical modes of transport and comparing them with how we travel today. Every child has had the opportunity to contribute to the display and it's been a really enjoyable week watching as the paintings have taken shape. We're all very excited to show you the fruits of our labour at the next open afternoon, when we hope to have our completed displays on show in the classroom.
Thank you to everyone who came along to our reading event this morning. The riddles seemed to go down well with the children and we hope you enjoyed yourselves too.

Week ending 13.2.14

This week the classes have been looking at the country of Kenya for this term's International Week. The children have thoroughly enjoyed learning lots of new facts about this interesting country and its culture.
Year 2 started the week by comparing our lives in The United Kingdom with children's lives in Kenya. We found out about lifestyles in both rural and urban Kenya and were able to identify the similarities and differences in our own day to day lives. The week continued with a look at the different types of school lunch children eat in Kenya and other countries around the world and the children conducted interviews to find out what the children of Garrick Green have and enjoy for their lunch. On Wednesday the children went on a trip around the world and looked at information from all of the continents, filling in their 'passports' as they went. The last day of International Week saw the children go on an African safari spotting many animals along the way. We are all really looking forward to tomorrow's trip to The Playhouse to see 'Room on the Broom'. It will be nice reward for all of the childrens' hard work this week and half-term.

Week Ending 30.1.2015

What have we been doing in English? This week in English we have been thinking of how we can create lists of instructions for both existing games that we play as well as some new games that we invented in class. We have been using ordinal words in our instruction,s such as first, after that, next and meanwhile, and will be trying to use these more in our story writing in the future. 
What have we been doing in Maths? This week we have been looking at ways of working out subtraction problems. We looked at a method where a we drew our own number-lines and used them to find the difference between the numbers we are using in our problem.
What have we been doing in Topic? The topic for this term is entitled 'From A to B' focusing on different types of transport and travel. This week we have been finding out about the different types of transport used in countries around the world and comparing them with the transport we use in the UK.  

Week ending 22.1.15

What have we been doing in English? We have continued to look at Traditional Tales this week by reading the story of Anansi the Spider. The children enjoyed the tale of the tricky character and were able to create some further adventures for Anansi in their Big Writes. 
What have we been doing in Maths? This week the children have been revising ways of working out addition problems by using ten sticks and unit crosses. The children applied these maths skills while adding two and three numbers together.
What have we been doing in Topic? The topic for this term is entitled 'From A to B' focusing on different types of transport and travel. This week we have been finding out about the different modes of transport we use to get to school with the children conducting a class survey to find out which was the most popular. 

Week Ending 16.1.15

What have we been doing in English? This week most of the children started the week by focusing on their comprehension skills. For this weeks Big Write the children wrote retells and original stories based on the traditional tale of The Gingerbread Man.
What have we been doing in Maths? This week the children have been introduced to division and the idea that it is the inverse of multiplication. We had a fun lesson sharing Smarties and actually got to eat them, which the children thoroughly enjoyed.
What have we been doing in Topic? The topic for this term is entitled 'From A to B' focusing on different types of transport and travel. This week we looked at how symbols are used on maps to represent made-man and natural features. Tomorrow the children will be creating their own maps showing their journeys to school.

Week Ending 9.1.2015

Welcome back and Happy New Year! 
What have we been doing in English? This week the children have been writing diaries about all of the lovely things they did over the Christmas holidays. The classes looked at connectives and how we can use them to improve our writing and also thought of some exciting and funny, make believe sentences that they could add to their diaries.
What have we been doing in Maths? This week the children have been introduced to multiplication, looking at different techniques they can use to solve multiplication problems. So far we have looked at using repeated addition and arrays. The children will have an extra chance to practice with this week's Maths homework. 
What have we been doing in Topic? The topic for this term is entitled 'From A to B' focusing on different types of transport and travel. To introduce the topic we have been looking at different ways that you can group different types of transport.