Cheshire

What is happening in Cheshire?

Term 2 Week 7

This week saw sparkling performances of The Inn-Spectors, our Christmas Nativity production. We hope everyone enjoyed watching. The children have worked tirelessly for many weeks to put this together and everyone involved played their part in making this a fantastic show. 

Children from Year 2 also performed some of the songs from the nativity next door at Christ Church to entertain the members of the Tunbridge Wells COGS club. The singing was fabulous and they represented our school in a wonderful way.

In Geography this week the children wrote letters for Southborough Town Council to discuss the conditions of a local alleyway which is blighted by litter and unsightly graffiti. The children have suggested how improvements can be made and we look forward to receiving replies from the council in the New Year.

Our mathematics lessons have continued with opportunities for practical measurement of metres and centimetres and also developed skills of reading and interpreting word problems that require calculations of length.

We have completed our study of The Secret Sky Garden in English lessons by examining how the author and illustrator have used colour in the pictures and text. The children worked on developing their own metaphors and similes  based on colours. 

The children have also been designing and creating Christmas cards, experimenting with different techniques of painting, collage and mounting. They look forward to sharing them with you during the Christmas holidays.

Term 2 Week 6

This week the children have been working to polish their performances of our Christmas Nativity production, 'The Inn-Spectors.' which we will be performing on Tuesday of the coming week. Dancing, acting and singing will be combined to bring a shining performance to show to parents. Thanks to all the efforts that parents have gone to to provide costumes for this.

Our English lessons have provided an opportunity to create a story board of our key text, The Secret Sky Garden and the children have used these to write extended narratives using enriched vocabulary, phonic spelling strategies and their renewed efforts on handwriting and general presentation.

In Maths we have begun a new series of lessons on the measurement of length. The children have been comparing objects and learning to measure with rulers, metre sticks and tape measures. The standard units of centimetres (cm) and metres (m) have been introduced.

As part of our Art and Design Technology curriculum we have been designing Christmas themed decorations which were used to adorn the stalls at Friday's Christmas fair. 

Term 2 Week 5

This week we were given a mystery to solve. Muddy footprints, a beaten up old map and two videos led us to our woodland trail at the bottom of the school field. Armed with trowels, forks and rakes we set about digging at the site of a red cross on our map. To our surprise we found golden coins buried beneath the ground. Maybe pirates or aliens have been leaving their treasures at school for us to discover. The children have written detailed accounts of this experience using time connectives to sequence the events in the correct order.

We have continued our own growing experiments looking at how plants grow in varying amounts of light. The children have begun to record how plants are thriving or otherwise given varying amounts of light. 

This week we have continued rehearsing our Nativity play, entitled The Inn-Spectors, which will take place on Tuesday 10th December. We cannot wait to share your talented children's performance with you.

Our maths learning has continued to explore the relationships between multiplication and division and have been learning to find and record the family of equations that can represent a division problem. We have also looked at the difference between odd and even numbers and how to determine whether a number is odd or even.

Term 2 Week 4

Our English this week continued to focus on the two main characters in The Secret Sky Garden. Funni meets Zoo and we wrote in the role of Funni as she discovers this new friendship. This changes her outlook and the children have been choosing vocabulary to describe how her feelings changed and describe the amazing changes she has created in the former run down, derelict car park.

We have begun our own growing experiments looking at how plants grow in varying amounts of light. The children have made reasoned estimates of how much growth will happen and they are helping to provide the other factors needed for healthy growth such as water, warmth, soil and space.

This week we have begun earnestly rehearsing our Nativity performance, entitled The Inn-Spectors, which will take place on Tuesday 10th December. The children have been singing with great gusto and learning dance moves which they are eager to perfect before they perform to their families. 

Our maths learning has looked at division and how this can be represented by grouping and sharing. For example if 20 cakes are put on plates in groups of 4 how many plates will you need? If 16 marbles are shared between 4 children how many will they get each. We have explored the relationship between multiplication and division and used concrete apparatus and drawings to solve a range of division word problems.

Term 2 Week 3

Our story The Secret Sky Garden has introduced us to a new character called Zoo who has gained a different view of the garden whilst flying over it in a jumbo jet plane. The children considered what words he might use to describe the riot of colourful flowers that he sees growing beneath him on the roof of the car park. Once again the children have been up-leveling their ideas through careful proof reading and editing of their own writing. 

We were inspired by the book to think about how plants reproduce. We looked at a range of fruits, bulbs and seeds and learnt about the processes involved in seed germination. Detailed scientific diagrams have been drawn by the children and we are also setting up a range of growing experiments in different locations to consider the requirements of plants for healthy growth.

This week saw our worship focus around Remembrance and also anti bullying week. On Monday we respectfully held our silent reflection for 2 minutes at 11 o clock to mark Armistice Day and some children have shared stories about members of their families who have served in the armed forces. Tuesday was odd socks day and the children wore a fabulous collection of colourful socks.

Our maths learning has continued to focus on multiplication. We used the 2, 5 and 10 times tables and looked at picture arrangements of objects called arrays that help to represent multiplication equations. 

In our RE lesson the class studied the account of Mary's visit by Angel Gabriel from the Gospel of Luke. We wrote recounts of this event from the story of God's Incarnation.

Term 2 Week 2

We have discovered more about the character Funni from our story, The Secret Sky Garden. She is an environmental warrior who sets about transforming an old rooftop carpark into a flower garden. The children explored clues about her character from the book and wrote their own character studies using powerful adjectives and adverbs to describe her. 

We were inspired by the book to consider the local environment of Southborough and have used Ordnance Survey maps to identify areas where there is a need for transformation. The classes have developed important geographical skills by finding and describing familiar local landmarks on the maps. 

Our maths learning has focused on multiplication. We have looked at the language of multiplication and have been using our 2 and 5 times tables to solve a range of problems. The children have been journalling about their understanding and recording repeated addition and multiplication equations for a range of contexts. 

Our RE learning has focused on the incarnation of Jesus and how Mary was informed that she was to be the mother of God's son. Through role play the children explored the range of feelings and emotions that Mary and Joseph would have felt on hearing the news from the Angel Gabriel. 

Term 2 Week 1

This week we have begun our voyage into a new text. The Secret Sky Garden has introduced a strange setting to the children......a place covered in junk, broken cars, weeds and an old oil drum. Beyond is a city skyline and an aeroplane taking off. Amongst this chaos a child appears to be contemplating unknown thoughts. We have been writing a description of this setting and considering what might be about to happen in our story.

Our maths has continued our exploration of subtraction including column sums where re naming is required to work out the solutions. For example 43 - 28, where the ones column needs to be increased by renaming one of the tens into ten ones. The children have been working on this new method and writing about how this works in their maths journals. 

In Art we have created a floral design based on the close up view of a flower that a bee would have. Our next step is to experiment with watercolour paints to add texture and colour to this design based on the different colours that insects see.

We had a bonus singing session on Thursday with Mrs Bateup who is continually amazed at the high standard of sound and energy that the children in Year 2 produce when they are working with her. Well done to all our amazing voices. 

Term 1 Week 7

This week the children wrote the final adventures of Leaf the Polar Bear as he attempted to escape from the strange island and return to his Arctic home. We read the end of the story and all of us were delighted to see that the animal characters,who had been suspicious of Leaf, helped to escort him safely back to be reunited with his family in the frozen North. 

As half term arrived we looked back at all the amazing maths learning the children have been completing since September. We have been introduced to the column methods of solving addition and subtraction problems and have been developing important reasoning skills. This week we continued our exploration of subtraction and discovered lots of ways to record our thinking in our maths journal books. 

Our Science learning focused on the different ways animals use their habitats to hunt and feed, hide from predators and build places for safety and reproduction. The children matched a huge range of animals to their habitats and wrote about particular animals in relation to their surroundings.

Our RE learning concluded a section of learning about the Christian story of Creation. We thought about how we can apply God's care for the world to our own environmental concerns. The children are very aware of the damage our world's environment is suffering from and what actions they could take to protect the future of the planet.  

Term 1 Week 6

This week the children considered how Leaf, our polar bear story character, would describe his story to the friendly crows. We wrote first person accounts of his journey using expanded noun phrases to describe what he saw and felt on his journey from the Arctic. We have used the theme of polar bears to create Christmas card designs which will be available to order following the half term break.

We all experienced an exciting and enjoyable drama workshop set in ancient times with King Arthur and the knights of the round table. The children had to protect the sword Excalibur from an evil witch and mix up a magic cake with many strange ingredients.

Our maths lessons have extended our knowledge of addition using the column method and other methods. We have also focused on learning counting patterns with chants and songs to help remember our 2, 5 and 10 times tables.

On Thursday we celebrated our Harvest Festival in church and our children were involved in leading Bible readings and sharing a harvest poem.

Term 1 Week 5

We have continued our learning journey through the story of Leaf, the displaced polar bear. This week the children have written advice to Leaf to help him continue his mission to return to the Arctic. We have focused on using different kinds of punctuation in our writing and on checking our own writing for meaning and sense. In the story Leaf collects leaves from the woods to help him fly and we were inspired in our art lessons to collect leaves and use them to create colourful natural patterns. These patterns have been created after looking at the work of the artist Andy Goldsworthy who creates images using natural objects.

You can find some of his work on this web site.

https://www.boredpanda.com/land-art-andy-goldsworthy/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic

Our geographical studies have looked at the impact of climate change on the numbers of polar bears within the Arctic and we have discussed what might happen to polar bear populations in the future if the rate of sea ice melting continues to grow.

In our maths lessons we continued with our work on addition looking at different methods of recording our thinking and ways of solving addition problems. The children have been introduced to the column method of addition and are beginning to use their number bonds knowledge to solve these effectively. The following web based game is a good place to help practice these number bonds , especially those up to 10 and then up to 20, which are so important for mathematical fluency.

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/maths-games/hit-the-button

Term 1 Week 4

We have been considering the character of Leaf, a polar bear in a strange environment. The children wrote a note in the role of the polar bear considering his feelings and thoughts. Our science involved looking at simple food chains and work out what the difference is between producers, consumers and predators. In maths we began to explore addition and look at varying methods of solving addition problems including simple column addition. Rapid recall of number bonds with numbers up to 10 will help children to become confident in using a range of addition methods. 

Term 1 Week 3

In English our Key Question was are Polar Bears black? We carried out research to find out the answer to this question. One of the facts we found out was "Polar bears have hollow, transparent fur that traps the air to keep them warm". We then discovered the skin underneath is black to absorb the sunlight. "I also learnt that Polar Bears have 42 teeth!" Charlie G.

In science we investigated the affect that blubber has on a polar bear. We used lard to represent the fat coating and plunged our hands into ice cold water. We were then introduced to recording our finding on a table and writing a conclusion "The four fingers of fat trap the warmth so it doesn't get out" Isabella W. 

Term 1 Week 2

This week in Cheshire 2 we have been exploring Maths No Problem, building on our knowledge of tens and ones. We have been counting numbers up to 100, counting up in 1's and 10's, comparing numbers and partitioning them in 2 different ways. 

Will there be ice in 50 year's time?

In geography we explored the Arctic. Did you know the temperature of the Earth is rising. "Gases, from things such as cars burning fuel, form around the Earth and trap heat from the sun". William "This causes the Earth to slowly heat up". Samuel B 

Who made the world? 

In RE we discussed our key question. We looked at images of the natural world, we then explored our school grounds and collected things that we believed the creator made. In Cheshire 2 we drew what we think the creator looks like and why we believe the world was made. 

Term 1 Week 1