Good afternoon everyone,
This Sunday marks the commencement of this year’s Advent preparations. Advent is an important time in our faith. Not only is it the beginning of our liturgical year but it also a time of preparation, reflection and change as we prepare ourselves mentally and spiritually for the arrival of Jesus - the gift that God gave us to show His amazing love for us. During this time, we will be encouraging the children to think about how they can prepare for the coming of Jesus and allow them to think about how important Advent is and that it is about so much more than just waiting for Christmas.
When we light our first candle we will be thinking about hope. The hope we have for Jesus’ return, the hope we have for the coming year and the hope we have for ourselves and our family’s happiness and health. We will also be thinking about how we can be hopeful people and use this gift of hope to help our friends and family who might not be feeling quite as hopeful.
English - This week we planned and wrote our Great Fire of London historical narratives, based on Vlad and the Great Fire of London by Kate Cunningham. We have been trying to include our key features of conjunctions, expanded noun phrases, adverbs, exciting past tense verbs and thoughts and feelings. We will be finishing these off on Monday and will then edit and improve our work where we can.
Maths - We have been exploring addition and subtraction with ten. We added and subtracted a single ten using base ten and hundred squares and attempted questions worded differently to aid our fluency and variation. We then developed our skills in adding and subtracting tens by drawing tens and ones. We also discussed patterns we noticed and began to develop our mental methods for adding and subtracting these amounts. We then began to explore adding ones to a two-digit number where we cross a ten and use tens frames and number lines to support this.
Science - This week we explored the importance of hygiene for humans to be healthy. We discussed germs and their role in making us poorly and we considered how we could improve our own hygiene. We suggested ways to keep hygienic and how these have a positive effects on our health and appearance. We set up an investigation to explore the importance of washing our hands, using soap, water, hand sanitiser and bread.
RE - On Monday we described our Holy Trinity models, explaining their three symbols and how and why these were chosen to represent the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. On Friday, we learned all about Advent. We learned why we observe it, what we are preparing ourselves for and discussed and wrote about different things that Christians do to prepare themselves for Jesus during Advent.
Geography - We identified and labelled the five oceans of the world on a map. We then learned some information about each ocean and wrote sentences to describe key features of each.
PE - In dance, we practised moving like ocean waves. We explored music at different tempos and related this to calm, choppy or stormy waves. We thought about how we could use our bodies to display this. In our outdoor PE we developed our skills in dribbling and moving with a ball whilst bouncing it.
Art - We explored geometric and organic shapes and began to create our own versions of these using lines.
Nativity - We continued to practise our nativity songs and read our lines out.
Computing - We learned more about algorithms and how we need to be clear with the instructions we use. We followed an algorithm to create a model and then considered how these instructions might need to be improved to make them clearer and easier to follow (debugging).
Please continue to practise the Year 1 and 2 Common Exception Words - both reading and spelling!
Please also continue to practise counting in 2s, 3s, 5s and 10s.
We have sent home the words your child will be saying in our Nativity. We ask that the children practise these at home until they can recite them without reading their sheet. Please continue to leave them in their school bags so we can take opportunities to practise at school.
We have also sent home song lyrics for our Nativity songs. You can access the tracks to play at home by going to the homework page of the Year 2 site.
Other Tasks
Spelling
Mr Whetnall’s group - practise the various /ee/ sound words.
Mrs Bowdell’s group - practise the /igh/ and /i_e/ sound words.
English
Adverbs worksheet - Rewrite the sentences, using an appropriate adverb to describe the verb (doing word).
Reading
Advent comprehension worksheet.
Maths
Adding and subtracting 10s worksheet
As always, the MOST important way that you can support your child is by reading regularly! Please do this as regularly as possible over the break!
Golden Award - Willow - for always trying her best, wanting to do better and caring for everyone.
Writing Award - Penny - for working so hard on her hand writing.
Maths Award - James - for using mental methods to add and subtract tens.
Discipleship Award -
The Wednesday Word is now available online, rather than the paper copies we used to send home pre-covid. Please click this link to access this week’s gospel.
Just a reminder of the KS1 Christmas movie night on Friday 2nd December from 4.30pm until 5.30pm. The children can wear Christmas pyjamas or clothing. If your child would like to attend, please pay the requested £2 via parentpay.
Year 1 and Year 2’s Christmas Nativity performance will take place on Wednesday 14th December at both 9.30am and 2.00pm. Due to space limitations in the hall, each parent will get 2 tickets for each performance. We hope you enjoy the performance.
After our Nativity performances (date to be confirmed), the PTA will providing refreshments (non-alcoholic [sorry!] mulled wine and mince pies) in the dining hall for a small fee. The PTA will also be selling raffle tickets at each performance - there will be some fantastic prizes on offer and all funds raised will go towards PTA funds.
Finally, here is a letter about our Advent liturgies which will be taking place every Tuesday at 8.20 in the school hall until Christmas.
Have a lovely weekend,
Mr Whetnall, Mrs Bowdell and Mrs Gibbons
