Autumn term 

Week 1 - Whole school week

Our first week in Year 2 we had a settling in week with a whole school topic of Bridges. We shared the book 'Here to there and me to you' and explored different aspects of the book. 

We developed the strength of team work within our class to design and create a bridge with only paper and blocks! After the children designed their bridge, the other children evaluated each other's designs, highlighting good ideas and suggesting how they could improve them. 

After re-evaluating their designs, the children got to test out their ideas. Some worked for the first time and others had to adapt and be resourceful to make their bridge strong enough to carry a car! Have a look at our bridges. They were all very different!

After building bridges in our own class, we focussed on building bridges with a PSHE focus between both Year 2 classes. One of our activities was to work as a team to create a flat bridge in the UK, this was harder than the children expected and required them to communicate and share ideas for it to work!

Autumn 1 

Each half-term we will have 2 projects which each have a title theme. Within each project we will be focussing on a book and linking some of our learning to this. 

 

Project 1 - Invincible me 

We will be reading the book Izzy Gizmo and will be creating our own invincible inventor.

We will be finding out about what keeps us healthy, focussing on how exercise is important. We will also become explorers and learn how to read and use maps, including following a map to a secret location! Follow our journey to see where we end up!

Writing

In our writing we are creating a character description of our own creative inventors.

We highlighted the features in a WAGOLL, looking at nouns and adjectives which we could use in our own writing. After that, we discussed the structure of our writing, including capital letters and full stops. We had practice at forming sentences on a whiteboard before writing out our character description.

 

Maths

In our maths we have been focusing on place value and understanding numbers. We have been using lots of base 10 as well as place value charts to support our practical working out. We have been learning numerals as words and practising our knowledge in the 10s and 1s. We have been comparing numbers using vocabulary: greater than, less than and equal to.

“I know that 59 is greater than 25 because 59 has 5 tens but 25 only has 2 tens.” - Noah

 

Science

In our science we have been looking at how to stay healthy and invincible. We experimented with exercise and how different types of exercise affect our heart rate.

“Sitting down made out heart rate slow because our bodies weren’t moving.” – Sonny

“When we were running, our heart rate got faster and our pulse was faster.” – Sophie. G

“My heart rate was the fastest when we did the star jumps because I was trying really hard to get them most in a minute.” – Arlo

 

 

We have also been looking at habitats and how we can care for the animals in Idle. We looked at different habitats including: woodland, urban, coastal and pond. The children went around the different habitats exploring who lived in them as well as the features of a habitat.

“A fish lives in a pond habitat and a coastal habitat.” – Olivia

“An owl lives in trees high up in the woodland to protect itself from animals trying to eat it.” – Harry

After exploring habitats and microhabitats, the children made their own 3D habitat.

 

 

 

Project 2 - Thank you, NHS 

Our second project is based on the book Florence Nightingale, where we will be writing a biography and comparing nursing from the past to today.

Writing

In our writing we are organising our knowledge of Florence to create a biography to share with Mrs Mason to tell her all about our special visitor (from history). We have researched using IT facts about Florence Nightingale, including when she was born and the achievements she has made in her life.

We then learnt what features are in a biography and labelled these as part of our toolkit week to help when we come to write.

 

History

Our hook into history this half-term was a visit from Thackray Medical Museum, where Florence Nightingale taught us what it was like to be a nurse in Scutari. We smelt what it was like in the hospitals and explored things that they used or saw including bed pans, rats, socks, scrubbing brushes and lots more.

We then found out about Florence Nightingale and her life, and we ordered it on a timeline. We then went back in time to when she helped in the Crimean War, so we could all experience what it was like for her.

In the 1800’s boys could not be nurses, so all the girls were dressed as nurses and all the boys were porters.

Florence Nightingale went to Scutari to look after injured soldiers. So, as her trusty helpers, we made a bed with a pillow and a blanket.

After the visit, we reflected on what we had learnt, and we drew portraits of Florence to remember what she looked like.

“Today I learnt that Florence Nightingale was a nurse, and she helped the soldiers get better.” – Lucas

“I had the best day ever, and I learnt that Florence worked in a hospital that smelt so bad, and she cleaned it and made it better for the soldiers.” – Lola

 

In history, we have been introduced to Mary Seacole and the children were researching the differences between Florence and Mary. The children found out that Mary faced challenges that Florence didn’t due to her skin colour. We role-played headline news to discuss the similarities and differences between the two nurses.

Through our topic of learning about our nursing in the past and today, we had nurse Charley visit us to share what practices are like in nursing today. She shared photos of the hospital and brought in some resources she uses today.

The children were able to find their pulse using a heart rate monitor, we used a triangle bandage to strap each other’s arms, and we even had a stethoscope to hear each other’s heart rates.

 

 

Science

In our science we have been continuing our work on researching about animals and how they survive. This time we have been looking at food chains and animals’ dependency on other animals.

 

We made a food chain as a class and discussed the vocabulary:

‘A Producer means the plant makes its own food – like grass and trees.’ – Lola

‘A consumer means the animal eats something else like the plant, but it can be another animal too.’ – Orla

‘Prey is an animal who hunts for their food.’ – Harry

 

 

Special visits

Bradford Yellow Bus

Year 2 were lucky enough to visit the Bradford Yellow reading bus who visited our school and shared stories with us. We each wrote our own book recommendations and shared these on the bus. At the end, we were all given a fantastic book to keep! Mr Gum!

‘There are more Mr Gump books, and I am going to get them all and read them!’ – Sam

‘I really liked listening to Ruby’s Worry because it is okay to feel worried sometimes, but our friends can help us!’ – Sonny

 

Harvest Festival

As a school, we visited our local church, Holy Trinity, to give our offerings of food to the North Bradford foodbank for harvest. As a class, we have had discussions about giving and how we can help others who may not have food to eat or a house to live in. We made a promise as a class to give what we can, even if that is a smile to spread love, hugs to our family and share food with people less fortunate.

Our class prayer for harvest

Dear God,

Thank you for everything you have given us,

Thank you for the trees and the freshly smelling flowers,

Thank you for the food on our table,

Our family who love us dearly,

Thank you for the friends we have and share memories with,

Please send hope and love to those people who may be struggling at harvest time,

Please help them find somewhere for them to feel safe and loved.

Amen

 

 

Project 3 - We are what we eat 

Our third project is called ‘we are what we eat.’ We will be reading the book Pumpkin soup and learning how to write instructions.  

We will be exploring pumpkins and making pumpkin soup. But also, within this topic we will be looking at how to stay healthy, making our own healthy wraps and writing up instructions to teach someone else to make a delicious wrap.

 

English

During our immersion week we explored all things pumpkins! We have read the book and drawn our own pumpkins following instructions.

 

We then ordered the story to understand why order is important, so that things make sense. Similarly, when we come to write out our own instructions, we will know the importance of instructions being ordered.

 

Maths

This half-term is all about addition and subtraction. In our maths this week we have been subtracting a one-digit number from a 2-digit number to exchange for a 10.

 

Science

In our science we have been exploring how to stay healthy with our diet. We were finding the difference between what is a fruit and what is a vegetable. We had lots of different foods on the table and the children cut these up to see if they had seeds in them.

“A fruit has seeds and a vegetable does not.” – Betsy

“An aubergine is a fruit because it has seeds in it. – Jude

With our theme being based around the book Pumpkin soup, we explored pumpkins and their contents. We scooped out the contents and counted the seeds in each one. 

We grouped them into 2’s, 5’s and 10s to make it easier to count. The pumpkin with the most seeds had 304!

In our DT we designed our own healthy wraps so that we could make them and use this in our English to write instructions. We all loved making these wraps, the most enjoyable part as definitely the eating!

We then evaluated our wraps about what we might change if we were to make them again. Some people decided that one of the veggies in their wrap was not a good combination and would remove it next time.

“If I made this again I would remove the lettuce because I didn’t like the taste of it.” – Adam

 

Project 4 - Sparkle and Shine 

This project is the last one in the run-up to Christmas! We will be doing lots of fun-filled Christmas activities as well as practising and performing our nativity!

 

Science

In our science we have been looking at materials and what material would make the best bag for Santa's sack. We explored the properties that it needed to have, and we decided they needed to be:

- Strong enough to hold lots of presents

- Waterproof in case it rains 

- Have handles to be able to cary it

- And be opaque, so presents can't be seen!

We tested our 3 bags to see which one was the best. A plastic bag, a paper bag and a fabric bag. Which bag do you think won?

The plastic bag won. Although it was transparent, we decided it would be the best because it could hold the most whiteboards without breaking, and it was waterproof. We discussed that the presents would be wrapped anyway, so it didn't matter that the bag was transparent. 

 

RE

In our RE this half-term we are discovering incarnation and the story of the birth of Jesus. We started by visiting the big frieze to see that incarnation is part of the big story. 

"Incarnation is when Jesus was born." - Sam

"It means he is alive, and the king is born." - Noah 

 

We then compared nativity sets from around the world to see similarities and differences to how people celebrate the incarnation.

 "The nativity sets are the same because they all have Jesus in the middle because he is important." - Lucas

"Some nativity sets are different because Poland had 6 angels but ours and Vietnam only has 1 angel, Gabriel." - Jude

 

We made Christingles in class ready for our trip to church for our Christingle service. We sang songs, lit our candles (snapped our glowsticks) and prayed for everyone at Christmastime. 

"The orange represents the earth." - Ezekiel 

"The candle is the light of Jesus." - Reba

"The sticks are the 4 seasons." - Olivia

"The ribbon represents the love and blood of Jesus." - Sonny 

 

As part of our RE topic we discussed the lessons from the story. We shared that being kind and generous was shown by wise men but also appreciating people who don't have a lot of money and cannot always give physical presents, such as shepherds. 

We made our own Christmas cards as gifts to someone we love at Christmas. We followed instructions and worked on our sharing and pencil pressure to create beautiful Christmas trees. 

 

We then made our own Christmas ornaments which we will wrap in our home-made wrapping paper to spread joy this Christmas. 

Throughout the term, we have been practising and preparing our lines for the nativity. Year 2 showed great courage when performing in front of an audience. They did it with joy and love and represent all the values of Idle. So proud of you Year 2!

Our Class prayer for Christmas:

Dear God,

We give thanks for the great things that you have given us, especially the birth of Jesus.

We thank you for this special family time, a time to spread joy and love.

Please support those people who are not able to be around family and provide them with the courage to stand strong.

Help us to reflect on the year we have had, to be grateful for the opportunities given to us and be thankful for another year of memories. 

Amen.