Cross country star
Congratulations to our Year 3 runner who represented Leeds today in the West Yorkshire cross country final. Competing against pupils from Calderdale, Bradford, Wakefield, Kirklees and Leeds, he ran a fantastic race at Temple Newsam and should feel very proud of achieving a top 15 finish.
Being biologists and safe online
For our science learning this week, we used secondary sources to find out about animals that live in polar and desert habitats. Using non-fiction books and the internet, this gave us chance to put into practice some of our safer internet day learning. Not everything we read on the internet is true.
We could check more than one website to see if it tells us the same thing.
The National Geographic website is a website I’ve heard of. We could look at that one.
The children were also being safe online by showing an adult if something popped up on the screen before continuing.
Help at home: have a look at a non-fiction book at home with your child. Ask them how to use the contents and index pages.
Times tables rock stars
Welcome back!
This week, all children will be receiving their login details for Times Tables Rock Stars. These are the same logins as for Numbots.
In Year 2, the children learn the two, five and ten times tables and these are the tables that have been assigned to the children. There will be division questions related to those times tables too.
Soundcheck is used in Key Stage 2 to check all the times table facts up to x12 so this isn’t recommended in Year 2 as the children haven’t learned these other times tables yet.
We encourage the children to continue to use Numbots too to help to secure their addition and subtraction number facts.
Another resource to support times tables and other number facts is Hit the Button. This is a great, fast-paced game and children can choose which times tables or number facts to work on during each game. This game is free to play online.
If you have any further questions regarding the resources mentioned, do not hesitate to contact us.
Living and Learning: Safer Internet Day
This week, it was Safer Internet Day and we spent the day focusing on these two key areas of online safety.
- I know that some things online may not be true (people and information).
- I know that I shouldn’t share personal information online.
We used a few different texts to support this learning and our daily poem too.
Hot seating the characters helped to think about their feelings and actions.
This video also reinforced key messages about not everything online is true (this could be people or information) and the importance of not sharing any of your personal information.
Throughout this learning, we reinforced the message that if the children were unsure or something didn’t feel right they should always Start Telling Other People and let a trusted adult know.
We talked through this sequence of seeking help.
Help at home: Can your child tell you the key messages from the texts we read?
Also, our online safety section has further support available for parents.
Living and Learning: being safe
Being safe is a key part of our Living and Learning curriculum including a Staying Safe themed week coming up next term in July.
Year 2 learnt about being safe around the concept of consent (giving and receiving permission) in particular with their friends.
We use the term consent in different contexts in class including asking consent to post a photo of a child or their learning online. In this learning, we had some different permission scenarios to discuss and we did some role plays to test out some ways of asking for consent and what to do.
Help at home: look at the following prompts and talk this through with your child.
We also took part in the NSPCC Speak out Stay Safe online assembly.
During the assembly, we heard about different situations where children might not feel safe.
We thought about which grown-ups would be good to talk to in school and out of school (start telling other people). Brothers, sisters and friends would also be good to talk to and discuss feelings but telling a grown-up (over 18) would be the best thing to do to get help.
Our Living and Learning box, in the classroom, is another way the children can speak out and write down any worries.
We also heard about Childline – ask your child to show you the way to remember the number.
Help at home: Buddy Zone, on the Childline website, has some games and activities for the children to do.
Living and Learning: drug education
A drug is a substance that changes the way the body or mind works.
In year 2, we have been learning about different things that go into our bodies and onto our skin and about keeping safe around household products and medicines.
Firstly, we considered what should go on and in our bodies and also what shouldn’t go in our bodies.
Our second lesson focused on medicines; what they look like, how they are used and why people use them. We talked about how some medicines are used to treat people when they are ill as well as how some medicines can help protect people from becoming ill in the future such as vaccinations.
We thought about the people that can help us stay well and who might help us if we are ill.
The children had a lot to share in this learning and were very clear about the message of keeping safe around these products.
This learning was also reinforced by a visit from D:side. Dave’s session helped the children to understand
- How to keep our bodies clean and healthy.
- Reasons for choosing a healthy lifestyle and the negative impact a lack of personal hygiene / sleep / activity can have on physical and mental wellbeing.
- How to identify internal parts of the body and their position and function to help with a healthy lifestyle.
Help at home: talk about products and medicines that are at home and how and why they are kept safe.
We are editors!
Yesterday, we wrote ‘The next adventures of the Naughty Bus’ and the story writing was brilliant. We included adjectives to add more information about nouns in the story and conjunctions to add more detail to our sentences.
Today, Year 2 have done some excellent editing. We edited a piece of writing together, did some paired editing and then we independently edited. All the children were responsible and respectful whilst listening and giving feedback to their partner. Well done for being fantastic editors Year 2!
Help at home by asking your child to edit some writing you have written with some simple mistakes in. Can they correct missing full stops, capital letters and commas or up level a sentence with an adjective or conjunction?
Spring term after-school clubs
*UPDATE*
We do have the following availability for clubs should your child wish to sign up.
The after-school clubs for this term are available for booking. We hope your child/children can get involved with our extra-curricular activities.
Please contact the office if you have any queries about the after-school clubs.
Year 2 trip to Abbey House Museum
What a great day! Year 2 learned a lot about the past by being transported back to Victorian Leeds. At Abbey House Museum, the children found out how people lived over 100 years ago and explored the street and all the shops, including the grocers, the chemists and an ironmongers.
Help at home by discussing how life was different in the past. Ask your child what they remember from our trip to Abbe House Museum.
Children’s Heart Surgery Fund
This week, Lauren from Children’s Heart Surgery Fund came to visit.
Children’s Heart Surgery Fund is our new school charity, voted for by the Junior Leadership Team, and we learnt all about their work and how our donations will support the charity over the next year.
Here are some of our Junior Leaders with Lauren.
