Welcome to Year 2

Welcome to year 2! We are so happy to welcome the children back to school. We have missed everyone so much and cannot wait for our learning journey to begin together. We have a fantastic year planned for our lovely year 2 children and are so excited to work with you to ensure that your child is enjoying school life. As you know, the class 5 teacher is Ms McGuinness (Ms M) and the class 6 teacher is Miss Bartlam. Miss Gill and Miss Creber will also work with the year 2 children regularly. Our door is always open and if you have any questions, worries or concerns, please do let us know. Together we are going to make this year a wonderful experience for the children. Our year together is going to be fun and exciting as we continue to... 'Be Kind, Be Brave, Be Happy!'

Learning About Life Cycles

Week beginning 22.4.24

We have had another fantastic week of learning in year 2. These children are just AMAZING! This week we have been thinking about life cycles and have just been given some very wriggly caterpillars. We are going to observe our caterpillars over the next few weeks as they grow. As soon as the caterpillars have finished growing they will each form a 'chrysalis.' We can't wait for this stage as we know that, inside the chrysalis, they will be undergoing a 'metamorphosis' and will emerge as beautiful butterflies. We have learnt all about the life cycle of a butterfly and represented each stage with play dough. Take a look at the photographs below. The year 2 children continue to impress their teachers with their amazing attitude to learning. Well done to EVERYONE!

A Super Start to Summer

Week beginning  15.4.24

What a fantastic start to the summer term! We are so happy to have everyone back at school and ready to learn. The children have settled in beautifully (despite the terrible weather) and their amazing learning attitude is stronger than ever. We kicked off our super summer term with an exciting well-being day. The children showed so much reciprocity by working together to create a beautiful, colourful rainbow picture decorated with vibrant flowers. After that, they learnt a new dance and played dodgeball and football. Phew!

We have also read a wonderful book called, 'The Pea and the Princess' by Mini Grey. This is a very funny book based on the traditional tale, 'The Princess and the Pea' but the entire story is told from the pea's perspective. The children have thought very carefully about how to start a traditional tale so that it is funny and grabs the reader's attention. Everyone has used their reflective learning power brilliantly. The thoughtful, hard-working WIS children never stop impressing their teachers! 

Printing Workshop and Exciting Eggs!

Week beginning 25.03.24

What a busy week we've had! We have thrown lots into our last week of the Spring Term and have LOTS of fun! We started the week with a fantastic print making workshop where we all worked together to create a collaborative piece if art. We decided to focus this piece around all of the great memories we have from our time at WIS and each child designed and made their own print. We showed amazing resilience throughout the whole session and are really pleased with the finished product. We're sure you will agree that it looks fantastic!

If that wasn't enough, we also held our annual egg decorating competition this week. As always, the children showed off their artistic side with paints, pipe cleaners, glitter and of course...eggs! We loved looking at everyone's creations and are amazed with your creativity! Who knew that eggs could be made into Hogwarts wizards, farmyard animals and even Gladiators? Take a look at the pictures below and see if you can spot some of them. To end the day, we tried our hand at egg rolling. Even with a few broken shells, it was great to see the children cheer each other on with big smiles on their faces. What a cracking day it was!

Fraction, Fractions, Fractions!

Week beginning 18.03.24

What super mathematicians we have been this week! We have been learning that a fraction is a part of a whole thing and have been making our own fractions from different objects, numbers and shapes. Whilst working resourcefully, we learnt that some shapes and quantities can be split into equal fractions and some cannot. As well as this, we have explored what is meant by 'a half' and 'a quarter' and have even had a go at writing this as a fraction. 

Why are plants so important?

Week beginning 11.03.24

As part of our science lesson this week, we have been exploring plants and thinking about how they are so important to animals. We started by being incredibly reflective and labelling the parts of a flowering plant that we could remember. We remembered lots about the leaves, roots and stem and could explain how each of these parts help the plant to function. As well as this, we explored food chains in a little bit more detail and discussed what would happen to the animals in a food chain if plants did not grow properly. It was so great to hear lots of children using key vocabulary such as producer, consumer, predator and prey in their explanations. What fantastic scientists we are growing into! 

World Book Day!

Week beginning 04.03.24

World Book Day is always one of our favourite days of the year and this year certainly did not disappoint! It is always so lovely to see so many of our favourite book characters in the classroom as we celebrate some fantastic stories and non-fiction books. This year we've had fabulous footballers, wonderful wizards and witches, cuddly cats, spectacular superheroes and a super friendly Fantastic Mr Fox, just to name a few! Our classrooms have been full of bright colours and even brighter smiles as we've taken the time to share our favourite books and remind ourselves why WE LOVE READING! 

Toys, Toys, Toys!

Week beginning 26.02.24

Can you guess what we've been learning about in History this week? Toys of course! We have been talking about some of our own favourite toys and discussing what they are made from, how they are made and how they move, light up and make music. We thought about if the toys we have now would have existed 100 years ago and soon realised that there have been lots of changes in toys over time. But why is this? By being very resourceful with some picture clues, we realised that a lot of toys from the past may have been handmade instead of mass produced in factories. We also explored the different materials that older toys may have been made of and spoke about why newer toys are usually safer. To help us learn even more about how toys have changed, it would be great to hear about the toys that our grown ups played with when they were younger. Let us know if you find out about any more exciting toys.

Wellbeing Day!

Week beginning 19.2.24

Welcome back year 2! We hope you all enjoyed lots of fun, adventures and rest over half term. Can you believe we are half way through the year already? We have started the second part of the Spring term with an exciting wellbeing day where we tested our skills (and patience) in art. With the help of some threading, stapling, cutting and hole punching, we made mini paper versions of ourselves. We thought really carefully about what would be the best way to join different elements together and, as always, remained very resilient when things didn't go to plan.

We also enjoyed some exciting sports activities. We're sure that you know how much we love Laser Tag and this wellbeing day was no exception, even if some of us did get caught in the rain. We also showed off our moves with the pompoms in cheerleading and had a go at playing boccia too. We'll be ready for another half term soon with how busy we've been but we're sure you will enjoy having a look at some of the pictures below.

Science Super Stars

Week beginning 5.2.24

The year 2 children have worked harder than ever this week and have had so much fun. We all enjoyed a fantastic science investigation to find out which material was waterproof. This was not easy as some of the materials had very similar properties. We worked with a partner and used pipettes to measure exactly the same amount of water for each material we tested. The children worked sensibly and methodically too. Amazing work year 2. 

We have also been thinking about internet safety and have had some very interesting discussions about how to stay safe online. We thought about various scenarios and discussed the best course of action in each case. 'Digi Daisy' joined the class to help us with our learning. We couldn't be prouder of these amazing children. They always work hard and make learning so much fun. They are the WONDERFUL!

We Love Reading

Week beginning 29.1.24

It has been an exciting time here at WIS as this week we have had our book fair. Discovering new books is always so exciting and the book fair provides us with a fantastic opportunity to check out some new titles. It is wonderful to see the children excited about books. Watching these very special children become immediately immersed in a new book is so rewarding. A HUGE thank you to you all for supporting our book fair. 

We have continued our work on the story, 'Dear Earth' and this week were inspired to write our own letters to the Earth. We imagined the different places we would like to visit on our planet and thought about how we can protect the environment and keep it safe. The year 2 children did a wonderful job of their letters and showed so much empathy for the different animals and habitats of the world. We fully expect that some of these amazing children will become explorers when they grow up, just as Tessa (the character in the story) hopes to. Well done Year 2!

Busy, Busy, Busy

Week beginning 22.1.24

What a busy, busy week we have had here at WIS. This week, in PE we have been developing our control and balance. We even managed to put a sequence of balances together in our teams. It was so much fun. We have continued our amazing work on the wonderful book, Dear Earth' and wrote some fantastic similes to describe how soft a polar bear's fur is. One of the children had this amazing idea, 'The polar bear's fur is as soft as spider's silk'. WOW! 

In geography, we talked about the symbols used on maps. We made our own maps and added symbols to represent different places such as the helicopter park, Arno Vale, and St Mark's. 

What a wonderful team of hardworking children. We really couldn't be prouder of them all. 

Inspiring Stories

Week beginning 15.1.24

This week we have continued our work relating to the beautiful book, 'Dear Earth'. The children are using this engaging story to describe different settings. They have worked so hard on their writing and have made interesting language choices and punctuated their writing accurately. As you you may know, 'Dear Earth' is a story all about a little girl called Tessa who wants to be an explorer just like her grandpa. Tessa decides to write a letter to the Earth telling it how she wants to visit the Arctic, the rainforests and the oceans. Tessa knows that the Earth is full of wonder but is also fragile and needs love and care. The children have responded to this wonderful book with so much empathy and have enjoyed orally rehearsing the story as you can see in the photos below. The year two children are so kind and empathetic and it is heart-warming to hear them explain how we should look after the Earth.

We have also continued our design and technology work and have started to cut out the templates to make our own pouches. Once again, the children have shown so much kindness and reciprocity towards each other. They have supported and helped each other brilliantly. What an amazing team they are!

Chilly Cheeky Children

Week beginning 8.1.24

Well, what a cold week we have had! It hasn’t stopped us from having fun though. This week we have worked very hard on telling the time. We understand that the hands on the clock have very different jobs. The ‘big, fast minute hand’ counts the minutes and the ‘slow, small hour hand’ moves from one number to the next, telling us the hour. Everyone has worked so hard on understanding o’clock, half past, quarter past and quarter to times and some of us have even started to think about 5-minute intervals. Why not continue this work at home? It is lots of fun. We have also enjoyed learning how to sew a running stitch on some felt. We threaded our own needles, tied our own knots and then sewed as neatly as we could. On top of all of this, we have been thinking about the different features of the continents of the world. We played a game which involved guessing the continent using clues. The children were brilliant at this and we didn’t manage to trick them once! We even checked the weather forecast for Nottingham and guess what? It said… c c c cold!

Happy New Year

Week beginning 4.1.24

First of all we would like to say a huge thank you to everyone for the wonderful gifts we received at Christmas and an even bigger thank you for the very kind messages and good wishes.  We have loved hearing about the special holidays your children have had with you. The children were brimming over with exciting stories about the wonderful time they have had and it was a joy to hear their accounts of their Christmas holiday. What beautiful memories you have made for them!

The lovely year 2 children have returned to school so ready to learn. We could not believe how sensibly they came into the classroom on their first day back and how hard they have worked right from the very first moment. We have started a new book in English called, 'Dear Earth' and are really enjoying it. It's an engaging story all about a little girl called Tessa who wants to explore the wonders of our planet. Don't forget that we love to hear the children's reading recommendations. Please do remind them to bring in any new and exciting books they have discovered.  Happy New Year to you all.

Twas the week before Christmas

Week beginning 18.12.23

Twas the week before Christmas

and all through the school

we wrapped up really warm

as the wintery air was cool

On Tuesday we showed up

ready to strike a pose

playing games and doing dances

in our best party clothes

With the year coming to an end 

we've made some Christmas crafts

with plenty of glitter and sequins

and a whole lot of laughs 

We ended the week

singing carols to spread cheer

bringing joy and happiness

to each listening ear

For now we wish you all

a very merry time

we look forward to seeing you soon

when the New Year bells chime

Take care everyone and have a brilliant Christmas

Love from the Year 2 team x

The Sleepy Shepherd

Week beginning 11.12.23

The time had finally arrived this week to share with your our Nativity 'The Sleepy Shepherd'. We put on 2 fantastic performances and it was lovely to see so many of you come to watch us. We're sure you will all agree that the children did AMAZINGLY well! It has definitely made us feel very festive and we hope it had the same impact on you. Once again, a huge congratulations to all of the wonderful children. They have worked so hard putting the show together over the past few weeks and they all gave it 100% throughout the whole 2 shows. What an awesome job they did! If you didn't manage to join us for the show, or would like a reminder of how lovely it was, take a loom through the photos below. One week to go now and lots of festive fun still to be had. We cannot wait!

Christmas Dinner

Week beginning 04.12.23

It's definitely beginning to look a lot like Christmas here at WIS and our delicious Christmas dinner on Thursday certainly helped us to get into the festive spirit. We tucked into a full dinner with all the trimmings, Turkey, roast potatoes, stuffing and even brussels sprouts. We wanted the celebrate the occasion in style so all worked hard to create our very own Christmassy hats. We're sure that you will agree that they looked fantastic! If that wasn't enough, it was also Christmas Jumper Day. What a super festive day we had!

Let's Get Active

Week beginning 27.11.23

What a busy week we have had! We can tell the Christmas is fast approaching as we are the full swing of rehearsals for our Nativity performances. We have been working very hard to learn our lines and lots of new songs and cannot wait to share it all with you soon.  Also this week, we continued getting our bodies moving as we tried out some fun circuit activities. We tried out some tricep dips, burpees and shuttle runs amongst other activities and had lots of fun pushing ourselves and trying something new. Miss Bartlam was so proud of the way we all gave 100% effort to all activities and showed super resilience. What a great team we are at WIS!

Wonderful Writing and Keeping Healthy 

Week beginning 20.11.23

We have had a super week so and have been using our learning powers brilliantly across all of our lessons. You may have heard that we have been exploring a story called 'Stuck' by Oliver Jeffers. It's all about a little boy called Floyd who gets his kite stuck in a tree. Floyd tries to be resourceful to get the kite down but ends up with a much bigger problem on his hands. We have loved laughing along to the story and this week have come up with our own nouns that we would throw into the tree. Did you know that we were strong enough to life sofas, trains full of passengers and even Santa and his sleigh? What fun we've had creating our noun lists!

Also this week, we have been exploring different ways that we can keep our body healthy. We know that our body has so many important parts and we discussed how having a balanced diet, drinking plenty of water, keeping ourselves clean and doing lots of exercise can help to keep everything working properly. With the help of Joe Wicks, we even tried out some exercises and felt our pulses to see how it increased our heart rate. We can't wait to try some other exercises at home!

A fantastic day at Perlethorpe

Week beginning 13.11.23

What a brilliant day we had at Perlethorpe on Wednesday! Luckily the rain held off  and we enjoyed a jam packed day. In the morning, we got stuck in with lots of great activities. We showed great reciprocity when leading our blindfolded partners thorough the woodland obstacle course and were also fantastic explorers when searching for different exciting minibeasts. We were particularly proud of the way everyone carefully (and very resourcefully) created safe habitats for some woodland creatures. In the afternoon, after a well earned lunch, we went into the River Meden to search for some more exciting wildlife. Even though the river was quite deep in parts we all took the plunge and stepped right in. We had a fabulous time doing the 'Perlethorpe Shuffle' in the river and found lots of bloodworms, water skaters and even some water scorpions. 

Everybody showed amazing respect to the grown ups around us and, as always, displayed great use of their learning powers throughout the day. We are very proud of all of you! Finally, another big thank you to all of our parent volunteers, we could not have done it with out you. Take a look at all our adventures with the pictures below.

Welcome Back!

Week beginning 06.11.23

Welcome back everyone! It has been great to see all of our fantastic year 2s again and we have loved hearing all about your half term adventures. It seems that lots of you had great fun dressing up for Halloween and showing off your art skills when designing fabulous fireworks and rockets for our Bonfire Night competition. Take a look at our fireworks in the pictures below, we're sure you will agree that they are very impressive! 

We have enjoyed getting straight back into science with a super material investigation this week. As always we showed great reciprocity in our teams and worked together to sort objects made from different materials by their properties. We were also super brave by using important scientific words such as rigid, flexible, transparent and opaque to sort objects. 

Well-Being Days

Week beginning 16.10.23

What an absolutely fantastic half term we have had. The year two children have made a wonderful start to the year and we have enjoyed teaching them so much. This week we had our very special well-being days during which we enjoyed lots of fantastic arts and crafts as well as a variety of fun PE activities. We painted some new rocks for our school 'pebble pathway' and painted a class picture to represent our new class identities. Most importantly of all, the year two children have made us proud every single day by showing how we always do our best to live our school vision, 'be kind, be brave, be happy!' 

Thank you so much to everyone for coming to our parents' evening. It was lovely to see you and talk about your very special children. We hope you have a lovely half term holiday with your families and look forward to hearing all about it when we are back at school. Have fun everyone!

Hello Yellow Day

Week beginning 9.10.23

We have had another fantastic week in year 2. What a wonderful group of resilient, respectful children we have. This week we made the most of the nice weather and went outside to find and identify the different stages of a plant's life cycle. The amazing year 2 scientists found lots of interesting examples. On Tuesday, we had our 'Hello Yellow' day. Everyone wore yellow to show that no one is alone with their mental health and that we look after each other. In year 2, the children are fantastic at using their reciprocity learning power. Here are some of the year 2 children showing each other that they are a special team! Just look at those happy, supportive and kind faces. 

P.S. Thank you so much to everyone who is writing in their child's reading diary. We absolutely love hearing about the books the children are reading at home. 

Kind, Brave, Happy and Hardworking

Week beginning 2.10.23

Oh my goodness, these children are amazing! They are working so hard and have settled in to all the year two routines brilliantly. We have been working hard in maths learning about place value and the meaning of the = symbol. The children are using their learning powers to solve all sorts of maths problems and we couldn't be prouder. We have also been thinking about what all living things have in common and went out onto the playground to find living and non-living things and discussed the differences between them. In geography, we have been discussing the difference between human and physical features and which of these you might find in a village, town and city. Take a look at these resilient, respectful learners working their socks off. In these photos the children are being resourceful and are using equipment to prove their answers to some addition equations. They really are wonderful!

Continents,  Oceans and Compasses

Week beginning 25.9.23

Thank you so much to everyone who took the time to come to our curriculum presentation. It was so lovely to see so many of you and share how year 2 works with you.

It's been another fantastic week for our wonderful year 2 children as they continue on their amazing learning journeys. This week we have worked on place value in maths, action verbs in English, discussed lifecycles in science and in particular looked at the lifecycle of a butterfly.  On top of all of this, we learned the compass directions, north, east, south and west. We made up some funny rhymes to help us remember the compass points. One of them was, 'Never Eat Silly Worms!' After that, we looked at some maps of the world and worked out which direction we would need to travel in to get to different continents and oceans. It was very good fun. Well done year 2. 

Hardworking  Heroes

Week beginning 18.9.23

The year 2 children continue to settle in brilliantly. They are getting used to the year 2 routines and are making friends in their new classes. This week, we have worked hard to learn different units of time such as minutes, hours, days and months as well as finding out about the different hands on an analogue clock. We have continued our work on the story of the 'Gingerbread Man' and our 'oral rehearsal' has been so much fun. The children know the story so well and can retell it with exciting voices and actions too. Here is a photo of the children all working together pretending to be the Gingerbread Man. Why not ask your child to retell the story for you. We promise you, you're in for a treat! Well done year 2. We are so proud of each and every one of you.

By the way, don't forget our curriculum evening next Monday the 25th. We are looking forward to seeing you all then.

A Super Start!

Week beginning 11.9.23

We can't believe it's nearly the end of our first full week back! The weather was very kind to us (at least for the first few days of the term) and we certainly made the most of it whilst it was sunny as you can see from the photos below. A huge WELL DONE to all of our wonderful year 2 children. They have settled in brilliantly and have made us smile with their kindness and respect. We can tell it is going to be an amazing year! For those of you who aren't already aware, we have brand new class names. You will now find the 'Happy Hedgehogs' in Class 5 and the 'Optimistic Otters' in Class 6. Since we have been back at school, we have had lots of fun looking at everyone's 'Gingerbread Character' projects. It has been so lovely to hear about the wonderful summers the children have had. Thank you so much for supporting your child with their summer learning challenges and for the support you give them every single day. With your help our lovely year 2s have settled back really well and we can't wait to get to know you and them better as the year unfolds. 

Love Ms M and Miss Bartlam