Welcome to Year 2

Class Teachers:

Cedar: Miss Macdonald

Laurel: Miss Vickers

Support Staff: 

Mrs Jay (LSA)

Mrs Cleveland (LSA)

Key Messages/Dates

• PE is on a Friday.
• Water bottles should contain only water.
• Afternoon forest school sessions for all children. 
• Children to be reading at least 3 times a week and recording it in reading records.
• Children need to be playing Times Table Rock Stars (TTRS) at least 3 times a week. 
• Operation Christmas Child Shoebox Appeal - by Tuesday 10th November. 
• Visit to local care home to give Christmas cards and sing carols - December
• Great Fire of London Day - Tuesday 15th December

Autumn 2

What are we learning?

Reading

These are the texts that we cover throughout the year:

At St Margaret's we are passionate about reading! We teach a daily reading session based on a  Curriculum for Unity School’s Partnership (CUSP) text.

This half term, our core texts are 'Paddington' by Michael Bond  and 'The Christmas Pine' by Julie Donaldson. The core texts are supplemented by a variety of additional texts to support children developing their reading fluency and confidence across a range of text types.

Writing

At St Margaret's Primary Academy, we follow CUSP for our writing curriculum. The CUSP curriculum is a vocabulary rich, knowledge-based approach to help develop pupils' retrieval, vocabulary and deepen learning. During this half term the children will have an opportunity to write for different purposes by retelling a narrative and writing formal invitations.

Maths 

At St Margaret's Primary Academy, we adopt a Mastery approach to teach maths lessons. The mastery approach supports children in becoming fluent and confident mathematicians. Maths lessons include ‘Flashback 4’ where children recap four previously learnt skills, fluency activities and opportunities for children to apply their knowledge to reasoning and problem solving. This half term the children will be continuing their learning about addition and subtraction within 100. The will solve problems and using practical resources to answer questions within lessons, before completing an assessment at the end of each unit.

Science

This half term the children will be learning about animals, including humans. The children will be revisiting learning from Year 1 and learning from the previous half term to help embed their knowledge and build on their scientific understanding. The children will learn about how animals change as they mature, what animals need to stay alive and how to be healthy. 

History 

This half term the children will be learning about the Great Fire of London. The children will learn about when and where the fire happened; and how it spread throughout London so quickly. To support their learning the children will be looking at diary entries from Samuel Pepys who documented the events of 1666 first-hand. 

Art

This half term, the children will be learning and improving their painting skills. The children will be exploring different shapes and using geometric patterns to create artwork. The children will be revisiting their learning about the primary colours and use these in their creations. The children will also be learning about the secondary colours and how these can be made and apply this to their own artwork and designs.

DT

In DT The children will be carrying on their learning about textiles. The children will be sewing to complete a piece of patchwork and will repurpose an item of clothing to create something practical and useful. 

RE

This half term the children will be exploring the enquiry: Why do Christians believe God gave Jesus to the world? The children will learn more about the religion of Christianity and will know how Christians might help people in the world by showing them love.

PSHE

This half term the children will be looking at 'celebrating differences'. The children will be learning about different stereotypes that boys and girls might experience and have the opportunity to discuss if they have experienced these. The children will also be learning more about bullying and how it is not okay to do to others and what to do if they see it happening. Finally, the children will learn about differences and how they might differ from others around them and that this is okay and learn to accept the differences that they, or others might have. 

Home learning

We expect children to read a minimum of 3 times a week at home; this should be logged in your reading records. The children must bring their reading records to school every day to be checked by an adult.

Children are expected to practise their times tables at home regularly using Times Tables Rock Stars. 

TTRS

If you need support with logging into TTRS or are unaware of your child's login, please reach out to a member of the Year 2 team.