Year 2

On Friday 6th October, it was History Day for Year 2!

The children have been looking at the topic ‘Norwich’s Past’ and have been learning about castles and how they were made and the different parts of them, as well as the different jobs people may have had.

The children were invited to dress up as something historical and we were so impressed with the range of costumes! We were thrilled to see a range of costumes including knights, maids, jesters and Royal Kings and Queens! Many children had some wonderful homemade creations too, including swords and shields as well which was great to see!

During the day we were lucky to have a visit from Janet Marshall, focusing on Edith Cavell. Janet talked about Edith’s life and training, and how doctors made their own medicine. The children were able to ask questions and were particularly interested in how medicine had changed and how the shops were different. The children also worked in small groups to build a castle out of card, thinking about how to make it stand up, as well as include the different parts that they had learnt about including a drawbridge!

On Wednesday 5^th July, the Year 2 children were able to share their amazing art work with children from Reception, Year 1 and Year 3, as part of ‘Toftwood Tate.’

Throughout Year 2, the children have produced art work inspired by artists including Van Gogh, Monet and Kandinsky as part of their foundation subject learning.

In the afternoon, the children were able to share their art with family members, and it was lovely to welcome parents and other adults into our school again. They were able to share some art activities with their adults, and share a blueberry muffin that they had made in school with their adults too.

The children were so proud to share their art work with so many people, and we are very proud of them too!

On Friday 30^th June, Year 2 went on a trip to Pensthorpe. The children have been learning about habitats and could use their prior learning to answer questions during our trip.

The children took part in a discovery walk to identify different creatures and thought about other creatures that may live there.

We discussed the order different animals that might be found at Pensthorpe in a food chain!

We saw different types of ducks and geese and visited the flamingos. It was so exciting to see the animals close!

The children went pond dipping too! The children used identification sheets to identify the different minibeasts and pond creatures. They found many exciting creatures including pond snails, pond skaters and even a newt!

We had a brilliant day and learnt lots about the different animals and habitats at Pensthorpe!

As part of our Habitats and Environments learning, we welcomed some very unusual visitors to our school! Ed Mackay brought along his ‘Mini Monsters’ to meet the children to introduce our new topic and the children were very excited to meet them all.

The Mini Monsters included Winston the Bearded Dragon, Trinny the Tarantula and Ghosty the Corn Snake.

The children learnt about what the different animals eat, the habitat they live in and how this helps them to survive as well as some fascinating facts about these creatures!

The children were able to see all the animals up close, and were even able to touch or hold some of them!

All of the children found the animals really interesting to learn about and enjoyed their visit to Year 2!

This term the children have been working really hard. They have written their own stories based on information from the Federal Literacy Investigators! They made up their own character, setting, problem and resolution to create their story.

In RE, the children have been learning about Passover and how this is celebrated in Judaism. They learnt the story, retold this in groups, and then created their own Seder plate.

We finished the term with a visit from Lorraine Theobald who shared her Brazilian Samba Dance Workshop with us. She taught the children a range of moves which they then put together to make a dance. To add to their dance, the children wore amazing headdresses! We performed to Mrs Pedlow and Mrs Bell who loved it!

As part of our RE learning in Spring 1, we invited Clare from Norwich Cathedral to spend the day with us to talk about how Christians belong to their faith family. She spent time in each year 2 class, as well as the year group together.  

The children learnt about the special parts of the Cathedral including the font, stained glass windows and the Bishop’s chair. In classes the children acted out a Christening, looked at different types of statues and talked about The Last Supper. 

The children were really engaged with their RE learning this week and asked some fantastic questions to further their learning! 

Year 2 enjoyed learning about and celebrating Christmas. The children listened to the Nativity story and re-told this using the stop motion app on the tablets. We also looked at different designs of stained glass windows and discussed what they represent. The children enjoyed creating their own stained glass windows using craft materials.

As part of their DT learning, they followed a recipe to make Speculaas biscuits. In English, they wrote the instructions for how to make these biscuits and tried carefully to include all the features.

As part of our topic learning about Habitats, the year group went on a trip to Pensthorpe.

We learnt about the different habitats that can be found in the park and went on a discovery walk to identify these and the creatures that may like to live there.

We then played a habitats game to match animals and plants to the correct habitat and order these in a food chain.

We saw different types of ducks and geese and visited the cranes and flamingos. Some of us were even lucky enough to see a swallow feeding her babies in the nest!

The children went pond dipping too! The children used keys to identify the different minibeasts and pond creatures and were fascinated about how many different insects live in a pond! They found many exciting creatures including pond snails and pond skaters!

As always, we were so proud of all of the children who were superbly behaved during this visit.

On 29^th April 2022, the year 2 children took part in a multi-cultural dance workshop. The children listened to Samba music and looked at different musical instruments. The children learnt different Samba dance moves and performed a choreographed routine. After that they worked in groups to create their own routine using the Samba moves they had learnt.