Welcome to the Summer Term in Year 2. 

Class Teachers - Mrs Jury and Mrs Guy     Learning Support Officer - Mrs Hemming and Mrs. Morris

            Class Teachers - Miss Davies      Learning Support Officers - Mrs Steptoe

• May - Co-operation and Being a good citizen within society

• June - Showing gratitude, and care and generosity

• July - Taking and managing risks

Our first book this term is called 'Rosie Revere, Engineer' by Andrea Beaty. The children find out about a little girl who has experienced disappointment when her inventions do not work. They will write short explanations, reports, and adverts before receiving a letter from Rosie asking for help writing a series of leaflets about local landmarks.

The final book that children will read is 'The Dragon Machine' by Helen Ward. Children will create a guide, exploring descriptive and positional language. They engage with the main character’s thoughts and emotions through letter writing. Throughout the activities, children will also explore various spelling patterns and rules. 

In addition to literacy lessons, children will continue to participate in whole-class phonics sessions. These will reinforce the Read Write Inc framework and allow children to consolidate and apply their sound knowledge when decoding, blending and spelling. 

Children will also receive weekly spelling sessions, focusing on a range of spelling patterns and high-frequency sight words. These spelling patterns will be revisited and consolidated as part of our phonics sessions.

Children will continue to consolidate and reinforce their understanding of the Welsh language by participating in daily Helpwr Heddiw sessions. They will also learn to discuss both their own and others' likes and dislikes in Welsh and will be revisiting language patterns previously taught and extending their answers to include more detail.  They will also continue to work on their reading skills in Welsh by reading familiar texts such as Tedi Twt and progressing to titles; Dora and Fflop.

For their individual reading books, children will be reading books from the Oxford Reading Tree scheme and a choice of 'chapter books'. These will be sent home and need to be returned on your child's set reading day.

During their numeracy lessons, the children will enjoy a range of activities some of which are listed below:-

• Fractions - practical activities to recognise halves and quarters. Exploring simple joining of fractions and simple equivalent fractions.

• Statistics - pictograms, block graphs - both digitally and in their work books, interpreting graphs and creating questions.

• Time - reading analogue and digital clocks, seasons and months of the year.

• Position - turning to the left, right, through 90 degrees, following directions.

• Measure - weight, length, height, capacity

• Number - revise and extend knowledge of the four operations - add, subtract, multiply, divide

• Place Value [revision] - ones, tens, hundreds and thousands

The children's experiences of these areas will be delivered through a variety of activities - both indoor and outdoor - using meaningful and exciting contexts to add curiosity and interest to their learning. 

Within our classroom, we will continue to encourage the children to take age-appropriate responsibility whilst continuing to be clear, firm, and compassionate. We will be supporting the children to become more independent in their learning and decision-making as they get ready for Year 3.

We will continue to explore the school values, focusing on the topics listed above.  We will explore these values every morning as well as in school assemblies. Children will also have the opportunity to continue to explore the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) and what this means to them.

Activities will provide opportunities for children to take different levels of responsibility for a range of tasks. We will also create scenarios with different roles to explore them from each person's perspective.

During P.E sessions, the children will enjoy athletic activities such as hurdles, egg and spoon, relay, javelin, and obstacle races to practise skills needed for Sports Day.  They will also further develop their gross motor skills and hand-eye coordination e.g when throwing, catching, batting or kicking a ball in preparation for rounders, football and cricket.

This term, pupils will continue to take part in a rich programme of enrichment activities designed to broaden their learning and develop important life skills.

Throughout the term, children will explore music by learning to play the recorder, building their understanding of rhythm, pitch, and musical notation, and strengthening concentration and coordination. They will also take part in coding sessions using Chromebooks, where they will learn key computing skills such as sequencing and logical thinking as they create simple programs on child-friendly coding platforms.

In addition, children will enjoy hands‑on cooking activities that encourage them to follow instructions carefully, measure accurately, and work safely and hygienically. These sessions also support teamwork and healthy eating. Pupils will also design and create their own board games, a project that nurtures creativity, problem‑solving, communication, and collaboration as they develop rules, strategies, and visual designs.

We are looking forward to seeing the children’s enthusiasm and growing confidence as they take on these exciting challenges.

During our afternoon sessions, children will explore various concepts through our unit of work, Incredible Inventions and Inventors. The children will begin by finding out about famous inventors throughout history. They will then research different inventions and sequence these on a timeline. We will then explore electricity and its impact on the world. Children will have the opportunity to explore simple electrical circuits and work collaboratively to solve problems. The topic will culminate with children designing and building their own inventions, which they will present to the class. During this time, children will be encouraged to use the principles of Voice 21 to develop their oracy skills.

PE is on a Thursday for both classes. The children should wear the agreed PE kit to school, including sensible footwear, and we politely request that they do not wear jewellery. 

Each child will have a designated reading day. Please ensure reading books are bought in on these days. 

Please ensure all school uniform and water bottles are clearly labelled with your child's name. 

As the weather improves, it is helpful if the children come to school with suncream already applied and are provided with a sunhat.

Don't forget to download our School App via the Play or App stores - The School App will provide you with up to date information about activities and events at Oldcastle Primary School.  

Please look out for our weekly newsletter issued via The School App and available on our website on a Friday afternoon.  The newsletter contains all forthcoming diary dates for the school.