School's out for summer!! We've made it!! On behalf of all of the Year 2 team, we would like to thank all of the parents, Nannys, Grandads, aunties, uncles and friends that have supported the children throughout Year 2. We would like to thank you for your continued support to us and to the children. Thank you for the lovely gifts and cards; we appreciate your generosity. We have all had such a fantastic year and we wish the children the best of luck as they move onto the next part of their school journey in Year 3. Have a fantastic summer, relax and enjoy!

Best wishes, the Year 2 team. 

16.07.19 - CELEBRATE GOOD TIMES COME ON!! Today in Year 2 we have been celebrating all of the hard work we've put in throughout Year 2. We started our day by walking down to Gadebridge Park and spending the morning playing in the park, reading stories and playing football. After lunch, the teachers in Year 2 bought all the children an ice-cream from a real ice-cream van; they were delicious! Finally, we ended our day by having a class party with lots of fun and games. The children have worked incredibly hard over the past year, so the Year 2 team wanted to congratulate them and make the end of Year 2 a blast! Here we are enjoying our celebrations!!

10.07.19 -  Maths of The Day! Year 2 spent their maths lesson outside in the sunshine today! 

The children had addition and subtraction challenges and number sequencing to complete! They used our teamwork skills to ensure nobody fell into the lava! Great team-work and fab maths Year 2!! 

09.07.19 - Today in Year 2, we visited the current Year 3 children in their classroom. We wrote lots of questions about Year 3 and lots of things we wanted to know. Some of the questions were: What day do you go swimming? Do you get any free time? What happens if you forget your PE kit? Who teaches PE? The children in Year 3 were very helpful and they made the Year 2 children feel at ease. We had a lovely afternoon - thank you Miss Bunclark and all the Year 3 children!! 

19/06/19 - The children have been SO excited to make their Bug Hotel in Year 2! As part of our topic, the children have been learning about creatures and climates, our environment and our world. The children came up with the idea to make a hotel for the bugs - what a fantastic idea! They collected natural resources from the field and playground and Mrs Jarvis-Cross very kindly donated a pallet. Today the children assembled their hotel and even put a carpet of leaves down to add those final touches! It is a working project as we still need to add lots more essentials items, such as a swimming pool! 

Please ensure all children hand their home-work books in on a Wednesday. This will then be marked and given back to the children on a Friday. The Year 2 team would really appreciate it if 10 minutes a day could be spent on reading and spellings. This will support the children's learning in school and consolidate their learning. 

Thank you for your continued support, the Year 2 team.

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12/06/19 - This week in Year 2 we have been learning how to interpret and construct simple pictograms, tally charts, block diagrams and simple tables. We have been using the multi-link to support our learning and real life objects to create tally charts. 

04/06/19 - The children in Year 2 were very lucky to have Shahirah's mummy come into their classroom and talk to them about being a Muslim and Islam. Shahriah's mummy talked to the children about Ramadan and the special celebration called Eid. They were very lucky to be given traditional gifts that are given at the end of Ramadan and learn about their culture and religion. 

The children in Year 2 managed to get all 10 marbles in their class jar by making sensible choices and lining up quietly. As a treat, the children enjoyed ice-lollies on the field and the sun was even shining! Well done Year 2, you all deserve it! 

Walk to School Week! 20-05-19

This week the children have been getting active and making healthier choices. On Tuesday we had 'Happy Shoesday'. The children were able to wear their own shoes to school. The children have been making a conscious effort to walk to school or park a little further away and walk.

We would love it if you could continue to make healthier lifestyle choices, not just Walk to School Week!! 

In Year 2, we have been practising our mindfulness techniques and focusing on creating a calm head space. 

We listened to a mediation sequence and looked at different breathing techniques. At first we found it a little tricky but we soon calmed down and enjoyed the peace and quiet. 

Year 2, 5 and 6 had such a fantastic trip to Kidzania! The children were all beautifully behaved and all of the staff were incredibly proud of them. 

The children were able to experience real life jobs, earn and spend money. It was a brilliant opportunity for the children to begin to understand real life and how the real world works. 

Take a look at some of the pictures from our trip!

This week we have been having lots of Easter fun! We have been learning about the Easter celebration, making chocolate nest cakes and basing our Maths around Easter. The children are very excited for their Easter break and all deserve a big rest!

We look forward to seeing you all for the Summer term on Wednesday 24th April. Enjoy a well deserved, rested break. 

The Year 2 team. 

A visit from the Dentist! 

Year 2 had a very special visit from the Dentist this week. The children were all very excited and asked lots of interesting questions. 

They taught us how to keep our teeth healthy, how often we should visit the dentist and what it is like being a Dentist. 

The children had a fantastic time and are now very keen to keep their teeth nice and healthy at home. 

On the 26th April, Year 2 visited Dacorum Sports Centre and took part in the Interhouse Sports Fair with lots of schools from the local area. The children took part in multiple sporting activities such as: dancing, archery and golf. 

We had a fantastic morning and the children all participated and had fun! 

Thursday 28th March 2019 

Year 2 have been very busy with their learning! They have been working incredibly hard in Maths and Literacy and have made the teachers super proud. 

We have been practising our Common Exception Words and trying to use them within our writing. 

The children have really enjoyed their Literacy lessons based on the famous 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'. They have produced some fantastic work, including: diary recounts and descriptive writing.

The children are now very excited to have a break over the Easter holidays, and we all look forward to the new learning ahead. 

Thank you for your continued support. 

The Year 2 team.  

Attached below is the Year 1 & 2 Common Exception Word mat. The children are encouraged to use and spell these words correctly within their work. We have provided a copy of the mat for additional practise at home. 

The Common Exception Words are statutory words provided from the Government. 

Please see our Spring Newsletter below for all of the exciting learning we have coming up in Year 2. 

Come and join us! We are very excited to announce our 'reading breakfast' in Year 2!!

We would like to invite you to an exciting morning in the Year 2 classroom. We are going to be to running a ‘reading breakfast’ on Wednesday 30th January 2019. This will be from 8.30-8.55 and will be held in our classroom. This is a great opportunity for you to sit and enjoy reading with your child, explore our books that we have in school, gain new ideas to help your child with reading at home and of course, enjoy some light breakfast refreshments!

Please see below the attached letter with further information. 

Thank you for your continued support, 

The Year 2 team. 

Welcome back! Happy New Year to you all. 

We are glad to be back at school and ready for an exciting year in 2019! We have been off to a flying start and enjoying a fresh start already. The children in Year 2 have enjoyed coming back into school, seeing their friends and getting back into the school routine. 

Keep a look out for all of our new and exciting learning we have to come! 

The Year 2 team. 

We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!

From all the staff and children in Year 2, we would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. We hope you have enjoyed looking at our fantastic work we've done throughout the Autumn term, and we look forward to posting our new learning in the Spring. 

Merry Christmas and have a safe and relaxing break. We return to school on Tuesday 8th January 2019. 

Best wishes, the Year 2 team :) 

The Sleepy Shepherd Nativity 

The staff in Year 2 are extremely proud of all the children who took part in the Key Stage 1 Nativity performance. The children did really well and performed beautifully to friends, family and Key Stage 2. We all had a fantastic time practising for the Nativity - well done Year 2. 

Congratulations girls!!

Congratulations to 2 of the girls in Year 2 for reaching 50 dojo points! They've had a had a great afternoon enjoying hot chocolate and marshmallows! 

Child Initiated Learning in Year 2!

It has been great to see the children in Year 2 become investigators and explore learning through Child Initiated Learning (CIL). They've had lots of fun, as well as developing new skills and and independence. The children have been exploring their learning inside and out - they have really enjoyed this! 

Our sports trip to JFK!

Visiting John F Kennedy Secondary School was very exciting for Year 2! The children took part in the Sports Festival run by Dacorum Sports. The children participated in lots of fun and exciting team work games and met other children from local schools too. We had a fantastic time and the children made their teachers incredibly proud. Well done Year 2!

A fun-filled afternoon at Gadebridge Park.

We loved our trip to the park this term! We planned a trip to the local park to help us write a fantastic recount in Literacy! 

We really enjoyed playing with our friends, building our resilience and running around. Take a look at some of our pictures - we had SO MUCH fun! 

Interactive Maths!!

We have had a very busy term in Year 2! We have really enjoyed problem solving in Maths and using our classroom resources to help support our work. 

Amazing Super Soup...

Monday 22nd October 2018 

In Year 2 this afternoon, we were cooking. We had to prepare the vegetables for our soup.

The ingredients that we used were:

- Potatoes

- Carrots

- Parsnips

- Onions

- Leeks

- Vegetable stock cubes

"We peeled the skin off of the vegetables first." Isabella

"We sliced them into small chunks." Alice

"We washed the vegetables because they were dirty and we wanted to make sure there was no mud on them." Sophia and Lola

"We took it in turns to peel the skin off. We practised that sharing is caring and our teamwork." Archie, Rachel and Lola

"We put the vegetables into the pot." Bojan

"We tasted some of the vegetables when they were raw, which means not cooked, and the leek was very spicy."

"The onion was a bit slippery." Sophia

"The onion tasted a bit sour." Alex

"The leek and the onion had a strong taste." Alice

We really enjoyed making our soup this afternoon and can't wait to taste it!

Number Representation in Maths...

22.10.18

This morning in maths we looked at how numbers can be represented using a range of equipment including:
 

Beadstrings

Place value and arrow cards

Base-10

Money
 

Miss Gabriel showed us a number on a beadstring and we had to identify it. Then as a class, we made the same number using base-10, then money and then arrow cards. We explained what we noticed and what was the same and what was different. We then carried on making numbers with different equipment in our pairs.
 

Some examples of what we said were:
I notice that even with the different resources, the numbers are still the same.

I can see that both numbers have the same amount of tens and the same amount of ones. That must mean the numbers are the same.

I think that if you add extra on one side you need to do the same to the other one. Otherwise, they won't balance.

Golden Learning...

This week in golden learning we used the Maths resources to play lots of different games. We had a carousel of different activities and got the chance to play them all! All of the games helped to consolidate our learning that we have been doing recently in Maths.

The games were:

- Dominoes

- Playing Sumdog on the Chromebooks

- A version of 'Go Fish'

- Rolling a dice and making the number on a tens frame in different ways

- Rolling a dice and making the number with cubes. Our partner did the same and the person with the highest number got to keep the difference. 

We loved these activities and were excited at the chance to develop our learning further. We enjoyed using the resources in an exciting way!

Here's what we thought:

"I liked playing dominoes because it helped me with my counting." Alex

"It was fun when you were able to join the dominoes together." Reuben

"I liked the dominoes because it was fun to make different patterns." Rachel

"I liked playing on Sumdog because it's the best." Lydia 

"Hit the Button was fun because it helped me with my times tables." Louis

Our Journey So Far...

Wow! What a busy 4 weeks have had!

The children are well and truly settled into their routines now and have been busy working away on the Year 2 curriculum.

In Maths, we have been continuing our work on number fluency up to 20 and have been using physical resources to practise adding, subtracting and comparing numbers. This week, we were introduced to Sumdog! Sumdog is a fantastic online resource for children to practise their Maths at home. This is a 2 week trial and therefore, any feedback would be greatly received. All children should have a password now if not, please ask. 

In English, our own versions of 'The Enormous Turnip' are well underway! We have even had a lesson where we were able to act our stories. We discussed our grammar aspects of the story including, expanded noun phrases, conjunctions and exciting adjectives whilst showing our freeze frames. 

Our cress seeds have grown in our Science lessons!  We have really been enjoying our investigations and have learnt a lot about what plants need in order to be able to grow. 

Welcome Back!

We've been busy enjoying our first two weeks in Year 2. 
In Maths, we have been working on recognising and ordering numbers. We have been having some fantastic mathematical conversations about why numbers are larger or smaller than other numbers. Additionally, we have been placing numbers on a number line and explaining why we have put them there. We even had a go at creating our very own human number line!

In English, we have been looking at traditional tales and have been writing character descriptions. In the coming weeks, we will be writing our own versions of 'The Enormous Turnip', changing the characters, setting and even which vegetable is stuck in the ground! 

In Science, we have started our topic of Plants. We have planted cress seeds in groups and have changed one thing in each investigation to see which plant will grow best. We discussed what a prediction is and how we can make an accurate one. 

In our topic lessons we have been comparing farming of the past and farming in the present. In the coming weeks we will be making comparisons between farming in Indonesia and farming in the UK.

We can't wait to keep you updated with all of the exciting things we are doing!