Welcome to Seahorse Class 2024-25

Week 1

Wow! What a fantastic first week we have had. We have been so impressed with how well the children have come back to school and settled into Year 2 school routines already.

PSHE - Our ideal classroom

We started the week by imagining our ideal classroom. The children were encouraged to be as imaginative as possible and shared what they would have in their "ideal" classroom. After the children had shared their thoughts - we realised how happy it made everyone feel, so we then discussed what we could all do to make everyone feel happy in our classroom. The children all wrote and decorated promises on cards, that they would do to make the classroom a "happy" place. These were then made in to a paper chain and hung in our class room.

English - Dougal's Deep Sea Diary

This week we started our first Year 2 writing journey - Dougal's deep sea diary. The children explored different sentence starters for asking questions and created their own questions when faces with a slow reveal of the front cover of our first book. We then focussed on the use of adjectives to describe how Dougal's feelings changed throughout the story and used a zone of relevance to sort the most powerful adjectives. 

Maths - Number and place value

In maths this week, we focussed on numbers and place value. To start the week we began by counting by odd and even numbers, in 2's, in 5's and 10's. We then looked at how numbers can be represented in different ways. Finally to help up with teen and tens numbers we compared and ordered numbers and looked at how we can use the greater than and less than symbols (<,>) to show how numbers relate to each other. 

PE - High and low body parts and beanbag control

This week we started our PE units. On Wednesday we explored starting and finishing body positions focussing on the shifting of body weight. The children explored the different ways they could move to make different body parts be as high as possible and then switch to explore movement with body parts as low as possible. On Friday, we focussed on how we can move whilst controlling a beanbag using different parts of our bodies before moving on to using hand - eye coordination to throw and catch a beanbag. The children then invented their own games involving using these skills.

Week 2

English - Features of a postcard, planning and writing

This week the children explored what features are present in a postcard and how they are laid out. They then used this information along with the skills we covered last week to plan and write their own postcards from Atlantis.

Maths - Near numbers and skip counting in tens

To start the week the children used their place value knowledge to create two digit numbers and work out their nearest ten number before estimating where two digit numbers would be placed on a number line in relation to ten numbers. We have then used this knowledge to start counting forward and back in tens from any given number. 

DT - Wheels and Axels

In DT this week we recapped on our woodwork knowledge from last year and in particular the use of winding drills and palm drills. The children learnt the difference between a fixed axle - The axle is fixed to the body and the wheels are free to turn on the axle and a free axle - The wheels are fixed to the axle and the axle turns in a bigger tube called the bearing. The children then used a variety of materials, tools and joining techniques to explore different wheel and axle combinations.

PE Gymnastics - High and low body parts

Following on from our floor work last week the children explored travelling and posing whilst having different body parts being the highest or lowest part of their bodies. We used a dice to randomly choose the body part and then the children had to work out how to shift and move their body weight to help them travel or strike a pose.

PE - Games - Ball skills and games

This week in games we looked at sending and receiving balls to ourselves and others whilst focussing on using our arms to aim accurately where we want to send the ball and the importance on being on the balls of our feet to help us move into the correct position to receive the ball. The children practised these skills before creating their own games sending and receiving.

Week 3

Maths - More and less

This week in maths the children have been developing their place value knowledge by exploring one more / one less, two more / two less, and ten more / ten less than a given numbers. The children were able to spot patterns on a number line and 100 square grid and use this to explain their reasoning and solve problems.

Science - Field study observations

After discussing what all living these needed to survive last week, we went out on to the field to find evidence of life. The children used magnifying glasses to help them explore a variety of habitats and find a variety of minibeasts, plants, food, eggs, feathers and the school chickens!

PE - Gymnastics

This week the children explored how they could shift their body weight onto their hands to enable them to travel in different ways with their feet being the highest part of their bodies. The children performed a variety of "horse kicks" and "bicycles" using different parts of their bodies to support the shifting weight and maintain their balance whilst moving around, through, over and under different apparatus.

Week 4

Maths - Number bonds and partitioning

This week the children developed their place value and number knowledge. We started off reviewing our knowledge of number bonds to 10 and then 20. We then looked at how two digit numbers can be broken down into their ten and ones counterparts before looking at number fact families by finding all of the addition and subtraction sentences that can be linked to a single number.

English - Adjectives, verbs, adverbs, prepositions and rhyming words

This week we focussed on the different types of words that are used to make sentences interesting, informative and exciting. The children looked at pictures of different types of sea creatures and created word banks of adjectives and adverbs to describe the sea creature they had chosen and how it moved. The children then explored the power of the suffix ly and how it can be used to change adjectives into adverbs and the different spelling rules. The children then blew us away by combining all of these to write incredible sentences about sea creatures before finishing the week by creating rhyming word banks. 

Geography - physical features of Portsmouth City

Having compared the difference between a city and a village last week, the children had the task of identifying and naming famous human features that make up a city and specifically are landmarks for Portsmouth City.