Year 2 had a fantastic book week. We read The Sulky Vulture by author Sally Grindley.

We started book week by getting to meet Sally Grindley and talk to her about all of the fantastic books she has written.  It was very exciting.

On Thursday it was World Book Day day and many children came dressed as their favourite book character. Can you guess who they are?

There was something a bit strange happening in Year 2 last week. Instead of a class full of lovely, well behaved children, there was a room full of PIRATES!!!!

Year 2 enjoyed dressing up and acting like pirates for the day. The children had their own pirate crew for the day and tried to win points for their crew. Together they sang their own sea shanties by exploring how to make music using water and glass jars. We found out that we could make a low pitched sound if the jar was full of water and a high pitched sound it if was less full.

Later the children took part in their very own treasure hunt! They were searching for scrolls of information.  If they could answer the question on their scroll they got a gold coin that they could exchange for some treasure!

We have been learning about the story of Grace Darling in our topic lessons. We found out that she lived in a lighthouse and watched out for ships that might be in trouble. One stormy night she saw a boat had hit some rocks and had begun to sink. Grace called her dad for help and the two of them went out to see in their little canoe boat, even though the weather made it very dangerous.  Grace and her dad managed to save 9 crew members who they brought back to their lighthouse and looked after until the morning.

Year 2 have been acting out the events of that evening and we have been discussing how brave and kind Grace Darling and her dad were. 

This week Year 2 has gone pirate crazy!  We have been writing pirate stories and writing character descriptions to see if we can find the terrible Pirate Pete! He is wanted for stealing the treasure map off the Queen and trying to take all of the treasure.  If you see him, let someone in Year 2 know!

This week in maths, Year 2 have been exploring shape and symmetry.

Some of us have been on a shape hunt searching for what 2D and 3D shapes we can find in our environment. We have found footballs that are spheres, plant beds that are cuboids and windows that are rectangles. 

We have also explored symmetry and finding the mirror image of patterns pictures. We have created our own symmetrical patterns using paint, loom bands and peg boards. Then we tried to find the line of symmetry on 2D shapes. This was tricky because we had to be really accurate and precise!

Year 2 have returned to school this week after long and relaxing break  over the Christmas holidays. They have come back excited and enthusiastic for the new term.

We have been introduced to our new Pirate topic this week and the children have been making lots of fun things to turn our classroom into a seaside resort! We have made nautical bunting using red, white and blue as well as making 3D crabs and lobsters to decorate our classroom.

We are really excited to find out more about Pirates and all the different kinds of people and boats that sail on water.

This week was Year  2’s class assembly. We looked at how Christmas was celebrated around the world. We found out that different Christian countries have very different traditions for celebrating Christmas and the birth of Jesus.

In Poland they look for the first star in the sky before they begin their celebrations. This star is called the Gwiazda. In China their celebrations are held on Christmas eve and they decorate their trees with beautiful paper lanterns. In Australia they have a Christmas BBQ on the beach in the hot sun! They all wear Santa hats and eat lots of yummy food.

The children were fantastic. They all had loud and clear voices and sang their songs really well.

This week, Year 2 received a very important letter from The Dog’s Trust. It was asking us to help them find out how to look after a new dog that had arrived. We needed to find out how to keep him happy and healthy.

We investigated ways that we could find information and noticed that we had to use a special type of book, non – fiction.

We then found out lots of facts about dogs and how we look after them. Today we wrote our own non- fiction text that we can sent to The Dog’s Trust to help them look after their new dog.

This week has been maths week at St. Clement’s.

We took part in a workshop by Professor Brainwave who worked with us to do lots of problem solving with shapes.

Year 2 have also been focusing on measuring length and weight.

We have learned how to use meters (m) and centimeters (cm) to measure length. We used tape measures to measure how tall we are and check who was the tallest and smallest!

Then we used scales to measure out the correct weights of dog food. We had to measure them using grams (g) and kilograms (kg). We had lots of opportunities do use our problem solving skills to make sure there would be enough dog food to last all week. Lastly we then compared the weights of different dogs, spotting which was the heaviest and which was the lightest.

This week Year 2 went on an exciting trip to Aston Hall. We went as part of our learning about ‘The Great Fire of London’. Aston Hall was built at around the same time as The Great Fire of London, this meant we could find out about how people lived in the 17th century.

We found out lots about how the fire started and how everybody had to work together to put the fire out. We were able to walk around the cold rooms in Aston Hall to see what the kitchens, bedrooms and great halls would have looked like back in 1666. We had to use our imagination to find out what would have happened when the fire started in Pudding Lane and how it spread all the way through London.

Some children got to dress up as Thomas Farriner, Samuel Peyps and King Charles II, as well as their maids. We acted out parts of what would have happened during the fire. We thought about how the fire started in the kitchen, what Samuel Peyps would have seen and how people had to work together to put the fire out as there wasn’t any fire men like we have today!

Even though we had to walk a very long way, we had lots of fun!