Summer Week 3: Printing, 3D shapes and more visitors

 Hello Class 2 Parents,

Well, life is very busy at Little Houghton School at the moment. Following last week's Ofsted visit, today we had our SIAMS inspection focussing on the church school aspect of the school. The children were once again fantastic during our R.E. lesson and when they were talking to the visitor. 

Aside from that...

Reading books. 
Your children have chosen individual reading books this week. We will continue with reading groups next week. This means they may not be as familiar with the book as usual and will need extra practise, and lots of help with fluency and comprehension!

An art project. 
We spent a lot of the week doing art! The children learnt about Orla Kiely and her prints. Theo kindly  brought in a book of hers for us to look at and the children were fascinated by the patterns and colours. They had a go at printing using a range of objects. Then they drew a turtle, mixed shades of green, and used printing techniques to fill it in. It was interesting to see the different prints created by unifix cubes, glue lids, cotton reels and other things!

Maths. 
We've continued looking at 3D shapes, sorting them by their properties. The children have been using the words 'faces' 'edges' and 'vertices' to describe them and to sort them. 

Maths homework is here and will be in book bags. 
The first sheet is for all children.
The second page is for Year 2 children and any Year 1 children who would like to complete it. 

In phonics the Year 1 children continue to revisit previously learnt sounds. They do not have any phonics or spelling homework this week. 

In spellings the Year 2 children have been looking at spelling patterns following a 'w' - 'or' (as in worm, work, worth) and 'ar' (as in war, warm). Their spellings are here and will be in book bags. 

A final note about P.E:
For logistical reasons I have moved P.E. to a Friday morning - but it is helpful to have P.E. kits in all of the time in case we need them!

Enjoy the bank holiday weekend!

From Mrs Simpson

Summer Week 2: Visitors.

Hello Class 2 Parents,

As you know, the main event in school this week was that Ofsted paid us a visit. They came in to lessons and talked to children. Class 2 did a fantastic job - they showed off their learning and really impressed the visitors. One man was particularly impressed with their knowledge of The Battle of Hastings - he said he was amazed by how much they knew! Well done Class 2. 

We have finished our short topic on The Battle of Hastings now - we finished it off by looking at William the Conqueror's legacy of castle-building. The children designed one motte-and-bailey and one stone keep castle for the new king. 

In writing the children have been writing diaries based on 'The Storm Whale.' The aim this week has been to add more detail to make the writing really interesting. For example, 'I put the whale into the bath. He wriggled happily.' It's been a fun and creative week of writing!

In maths we have been looking at sorting 2D shapes and saying how they have been sorted. Then we started to look at naming 3D solids - the Year 2 children remembered a bit from last year.  

Thank you for the 2D shape homework you've sent me. As the homework was to use 15 lolly sticks/pens etc, one child asked what a 15-sided shape would be called: if you're interested, it's a pentadecagon.  

In spellings, Year 2 looked at the 'o' sound spelt 'a' after w and qu. We worked out that most of the words are actually decodeble, but the two words with double letters are a bit harder to remember. Their spellings are here. 

In phonics Year 1 have continued to revisit sounds and look at alien words ready for the phonics screening check. For homework, please go through some or all of the words on this powerpoint. At school, we usually spot the digraphs together first then sound out and blend the words. Some of the children will be quite speedy with the real words - just make sure that when they read the alien words they take their time to check! 

There is no maths homework this week. Instead, if you would like something extra to do, spend a bit of time online looking up some of the castles that William the Conqueror built!

Have a good weekend, 

From Mrs Simpson

Summer Week 1: The Battle of Hastings

 Hello Class 2 Parents,

I hope you had a good Easter, and welcome to the summer term! As ever, it was lovely to see your children's smiling faces after a two week break.

Last half term was a very short one, so this week we have been finishing off last term's history work by learning about the Battles of Stamford Bridge and Hastings. The children have throughly enjoyed this, particulary the role play of the battles. 

You will have received an email from the office (or will do soon) outlining this week's Mantle of the Expert story - Turtle Watch. Please don't give anything away to your children - it's more fun if the learning unfolds as the story goes! I think the class will really enjoy this term's story. 

In reading and writng this week we have been looking at a book called 'The Storm Whale'. We've been doing a bit of whole class reading and have started doing some diary writing in role as the main character, Noi. 

The children have started a new unit of maths on shape. This week, they've been learning to name and describe 2D shapes. 

Maths homework is this:

Use 15 lolly sticks, pencils, felt tips, strips of card, sticks, or something else straight.
What different combinations of 2D shapes can you make using these 15 shapes?
What is the highest number of shapes you can make, and what shape are they?
Can you make one large shape with 15 straight sides and 15 vertices?

If you want to take some photos and put them in this folder, please do. However, please don't feel like you have to - you can just have fun with the homework! If you can't add photos to the folder and would like me to see them, please email them in.

In phonics the Year 1 children are revisiting a range of sounds and have started to look at alien words and real words in preparation for June's phonics check.

Due to this, their spelling homework will be a bit different this half term. To begin with, their challenge is to learn to spell numbers to 10 (some are easy, some are quite tricky. If your child finds them tricky, help them to learn as many as possible but don't worry about learning them all!)

In spellings the Year 2 children have been looking at words ending -ey. Their spellings are here and will be in their folders as usual. 

I think that's everything for now,

Mrs Simpson

Happy Easter!

 Happy Easter!

It's been a short but busy half term - the children are ready for a break!

The children have done a great job with their Mantle of the Expert story this half term. It started with creating  medieavel village and becoming serfs, working the land, and it ended this week by finally building a castle for Queen Matilda and being knighted by her. 

Below you can see photos the children's castle, complete with their individual coats of arms on flags. We talked about the symbolism of the different animals and colours, so the children took their time designing their flags to represent themselves. 

Aside from that, the children completed an independent writing task and some reading assessments this week, and got ready to perform in church and for Mrs Barnes. If they haven't already sung you the Bunny Hokey Cokey, see if they would like to - it's good! We used this YouTube backing track but the words are all about a bunny. 

Reading books: 
I haven't sent home our group reading books as I wanted to sort them out over the holidays. Instead, your children have two different books they have chosen to keep them going. I have collected all Badger books in. 

Spellings:
I've updated your children's spelling cards, or photocopied their school ones if their cards weren't in their bags. Please continue to practise these words a few at a time. 

I think that's everything for now. 

Have a good couple of weeks!

From

Mrs Simpson

Spring Week 10: Rockingham Castle (and a bit of dragon taming)

 Hello Class 2 Parents,

What a busy, busy week!

Important note: reading books
Due to the trip and the different teacher set up this week, we have not had time to do all of the reading groups. I therefore won't be sending new books home but will read this week's books again with the children next week. However, the children will come home with new Badger books as usual, and I will collect in their current reading books ready for the usual school Easter holiday book sort out. 

Class 2 have had the pleasure of Mrs Barnes' company this week. I've been teaching Class 1 each morning while Mrs Barnes has been with Class 2. I've had excellent reports about their work, which has been good!  They've been:

• Writing instructions for 'How to Tame a Dragon'. For this, the children
  took inspiration from exerpts of the animation 'How to Train a Dragon'.
  
  
• Learning to measure accurately using cubes and centimetres
  
  
• Showing Mrs Barnes how good they are at doing their passport jobs.
  

Today, of course, we took a trip to Rockingham Castle! The children were given a thorough tour of the castle; the best part was spotting some of the features they've been learning about. As we appoached in the coach there were many cries of 'arrow loops!' We also saw the towers, battlements, dungeon, very thick walls (see the picture below of the children measuring them with their arms) and the space where the portcullis would have been. 

After an indoor tour, we went for a walk around the grounds. The children noticed how high up the castle was (another good feature they've been learning about) and went searching for Wentworth's missing armour. Wentworth is a griffin - an emblem of the castle. 

The children were fantastically enthusiastic and well-behaved and did us all proud. 

There is no homework this week. 
I'll be checking the children's common exception word spelling as usual next week, but it hasn't been very long since the last time they were tested. If you have time, please practise them over the weekend. 

Mrs Simpson

Enjoy a few photos from the trip!

Spring Week 9: Castles!

 

Hello Class 2 Parents,

The theme of this week has been castles!

The children have learnt about the features of a castle and have been writing reports for the Queen outlining those features. They also carried out a D.T. project to make paper models of a castle by:
* cutting paper
* joining paper using glue
* creating flanges so that the towers would stand up
*creating tabs so that the walls would stand up
*using l-braces to join the towers to the walls. 

The children did a brilliant job - lots of perseverance and team work was required! You can see the finished castles below. 

In maths:
Year 1 have continued their work on place value to 100, learning to compare numbers by looking at the tens first and then the ones. 
Year 2 have been solving problems involving division. 

Both year groups also looked at odd and even numbers. 

In phonics, the Year 1 children have learnt that:
g can make a 'j' sound (giant, gem, magic)
ph makes a 'f' sound

Blue group spellings are here

Green group spellings are here  

In spellings, the Year 2 children have learnt yet another rule! When adding a suffix to a word ending   consonant-e, you have to drop the e first. 

Their spellings are  here.

There is no maths homework, but as children can't bring their castles home to you (they made them in pairs) optional D.T. homework is to have another go at making a paper castle using the skills the children have learnt this week. Please put any photos of castles in this folder if possible, or email to the office if that doesn't work!

Bye for now,

Mrs Simpson

Spring Week 8: World Book Day

Hello Class 2 Parents,

It's been another good week in Class 2. 

Our Story
The children finishing writing up their descriptions of the giant they met on the road to Wales. Now, they are writing them up in neat - there is some beautiful work happening!

Having decided that Queen Matilda should build her kingdom in Wales, the next job was to decide where exactly. The Queen explained that she needed the perfect location, so the children set about finding it, and creating maps to present to her. The children used geographical language to describe the features - such as rivers, waterfalls, lakes, hills, mountains and farmland. 

World Book Day
We had a lovely World Book Day (morning) on Thursday. The whole school heard the story 'After The Fall' by Dan Santat, a book all about what happened to Humpty Dumpty after he fell off his wall. Then they rotated around three activities: sketching Humpty Dumpty at each stage of the story (learning to use a range of sketching pencils to draw and shade); making and testing paper aeroplanes (a good test in resilience and perseverence!); and writing some instructions for Humpty Dumpty to help him to feel better (such as 'Have a warm bubble bath and listen to music). 

Phonics
The children have looked at three digraphs this week:
oe - as in Joe and toe
ow - as in snow, glow, blow, throw
y - as in fly, sky, try 

Blue group spellings are here and will be in their folders. 

Green group spellings are here and will be in their folders. 

Spellings
The Year 2 children have been learning yet another spelling rule!

When you have a short word, with a short vowel followed by a single consonant at the end...
you must double the consonant before adding a suffix. 

eg:  skipped, hummed, running, flapping, tripped. 

There are no particular words to learn this week! Instead, I will be giving children words to spell that use this rule. They will know how to spell the root words, so they will just need to remember the rule and the suffix. 

You can practise this at home by giving your child words like the ones on this page to spell - the sheet will of course be in their folders too!

Maths
Year 1 children have continued to look at numbers to 50. They have this game to play this week - with a 3-digit option for those who are already confident with numbers to 100. 

Year 2 children have finished off their work on division! Their homework is here and will be in their folders. 


I think that's everything for now. The term is flying by!

Mrs Simpson