Happy New Year everyone!
What a busy start to the Spring term it has been. Once again, I’m continually impressed by the dedication and perseverance of the children (and parents!) in Year two, with ‘virtual’ visits to future schools taking place to show off their skills, they have been working extremely hard and still continue to embrace their daily activities with positivity and eagerness. It is lovely to see their smiling faces every morning during our zoom registration. They always have so much to say each day!
This term in Year 2 our Topic is transport, and we launched straight into it with a timeline activity going back thousands of years! We had some very creative ideas, including one timeline that went all the way down the stairs. We have also been learning a lot about trains, and a particular pioneer of transport who goes by the name of George Stephenson. The children learned all about his life and his invention of the famous steam locomotive, the Rocket, that paved the way for modern railways and the trains that we see now. We also linked this to our literacy work on biographies. The children have been writing about significant individuals and made some amazing choices. We even found out that one of the children has an ancestor who was a pioneer in flight, and the first person to qualify and pilot a helicopter In the British Army. How incredible! Last week we also learned about shape poems (calligrams) and children had the opportunity to create their very own. At the beginning of term, we made some New Year’s resolutions, and this year we are hoping for a better 2021. It is safe to say that the children are very much missing each other, and we all hope to be properly reunited soon.
In maths, the children have been putting their place value skills to work by practising different methods for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. They are getting very good at using a number line and improving their mental methods. We have been building our times table recall through games and they are becoming incredibly speedy.
Our Art topic this term looks at movement in art. We began our focus by looking at Futurist artists and how they create movement in their work through line and pattern. We look to artists Giacomo Balla, Marinetti and Boccioni and how their drawings convey movement, speed and technology. The children use these examples to create their own moving pictures. We then looked at the life of an artist called Matisse, his painting ‘dance’, and used our own movements to create a collage based on his cut-outs. I have to say, I thought perhaps Matisse himself had created them!
We have also had our first few music, dance and violin sessions from Hannah, Amy and Georgie, and what exciting sessions they were! We are looking forward to many more opportunities to sing and dance our socks off.
The grown-ups are all so proud of what the children have achieved since the start of the year. Keep it up Year 2, you are doing great things!
Aisha