Year 2 w/b 20th November
Date: 24th Nov 2023 @ 4:00pm
What a busy but exciting week we have had in Year Two!
In English this week, we have focused on improving our vocabulary, using a thesaurus to find adventurous synonyms for adjectives and verbs. We started by ‘improving’ the adjectives ‘big’ (e.g. mammoth, huge, gigantic) , ‘fast’ (e.g. swift, speedy, super-sonic) and ‘mean’ (e.g. merciless, selfish, malicious). The children then created their own bank of adjectives to describe their superheroes and villains, using the thesaurus to help. Later in the week, we moved on to verbs. This began with a recap of verbs and adverbs, including a few rounds of our ‘verb and adverb charades’ game. The children were then able to complete a SPaG task, identifying the verbs and adverbs in some sentences. We then ‘improved’ a selection of verbs: ‘walked’ (e.g. strolled, tiptoed, marched), ‘put’ (e.g. placed, threw, piled), ‘jumped’ (e.g. leapt, pounced, bounded), ‘said’ (e.g. exclaimed, declared, commented), ‘looked’ (e.g. peered, gazed, stared), ‘ran’ (e.g. sprinted, dashed, zoomed). I shall look forward to seeing some of this wonderful vocabulary in the children’s story writing.
In PSHE this week, we read ‘The First Slodge’ by Jeanne Willis and discussed the important meaning behind it. This book is special as it has an emphasis on sharing and how the world belongs to all that inhabit it. We noticed the First Slodge's selfish use of the word 'my' is later replaced for the word 'our' after she realises that all other creatures, including the Second Slodge, are equally important and that sharing is required to make everybody happy. After reading the story, we shared out some books that were important to us, however we could only do this if we gave an example of how they are different to us. For example, ‘I have brown hair, you have blonde hair, we can still share’. Finally, around a picture of a globe, children recorded different people that they share the world with.
In maths, our addition and subtraction unit is coming to an end. At the start of the week we looked at problem solving, requiring us to be maths detectives as we looked for clue words (e.g. total, altogether, difference, fewer) to help us to decide whether we needed to add or subtract. We continued to use the column method, including exchanging, to support us with this. It is important that the children continue to revisit column addition and subtraction throughout the year so that it remains familiar to them; we will, of course, continue to recap these strategies within school and it would be very beneficial for the children to continue to practise at home. Towards the end of our week, we moved on to our next unit ‘Shape’. We have been focussing on:
- Naming 2D and 3D shapes and make links between them and beginning to identify common features of different types of 2D and 3D shapes.
- Counting the number of sides on 2D shapes and learning to use this knowledge to categorise different shapes.
- Learning that vertices are points where two or more sides of a polygon meet. Children will learn that they can classify shapes by the number of vertices.
In RE this week, we enjoyed creating the newspaper headlines for the ‘Bethlehem Times’ telling everyone the good news of the Christmas story.
Much of our week has, of course, been dedicated to our Nativity preparations. It was most exciting to rehearse with Year One as we enjoyed the opportunity to practise on the stage for the first time. We look forward to more rehearsals next week. Please could I ask children to continue learning lines at home and to bring in costumes no later than Friday 1st December. If you have any queries about the performances or need assistance with a costume, please don’t hesitate to ask.
I hope you have a lovely weekend.
Miss Roxburgh
