Good afternoon everyone,

This week’s worship has focused on how we are all connected, with Jesus at the centre. We discussed what Jesus means when he talks about us being branches that ‘bear fruit’. We learned that the fruit Jesus spoke of is the good things we do: kindness, love, care, respect, forgiveness, etc and that all these things come to us through Jesus and through the Holy Spirit. If we break our connection with Jesus, we cannot use this spirit to do good deeds..

English - This week we have been identifying the features of a finding text, based upon The Bog Baby. We have also been practising our skills in describing emotions by ‘showing, not telling’ and using language to give clues. Finally, we have designed and labelled our own found creature, inspired by the Bog Baby and have written character descriptions about these creatures.

Maths - In Maths we have continued our work on fractions. This is a very tricky unit and we have been working hard to identify halves and quarters, as well as calculating halves and quarters of amounts.

Science - This week we checked on the growth progression of our seeds and bulbs. Many are now starting to grow. We also established a new investigation with beans to see if plants really needed soil to grow. We will monitor the progress.

RE - In RE, we drew links between the stories of the miraculous catch, the garden of gethsemane and Jesus appearing at Lake Tiberias and thinking about what this tells us about Jesus. We have also been thinking about Thomas’ feelings when Jesus appeared to him.

History - We wrote newspaper reports about Grace Darling’s rescue of the Forfarshire shipwreck.

PE - Our Wednesday PE focused upon playground games, including skipping and donkey. Our Friday PE explored gymnastics, where we focused upon balances and rolls.

Computing - We explored Scratch jr to create an algorithm to make an insect fly.

Please continue to practise counting in 2s, 3s, 5s and 10s and the Year 1 and 2 common exception words.

Spelling

Both groups - /igh/ sound words spelt with ‘y’

Reading

minibeasts reading comprehension.

Maths

finding quarters worksheet.

3D shape hunt.

Golden Award -

Writing Award -

Maths Award -

Year 2 PE lessons will take place on Wednesday and Friday. Please come to school in PE kit on these days.

Water bottles - all the children were given a new school bottle. This will come home each night to be cleaned and re-filled. Please only use the school bottles and ensure your child brings theirs each day. Lost water bottles can be replaced at the school office, but I am afraid you will have to pay for those. Year 2 have green tops.

I will not be in class on a Thursday afternoon, as it is my release time. This will be covered by Mrs Bowdell and Miss Andrew and is also when the children will have Music with Mrs Watson.

Party Invitations - I am afraid that Mrs Bowdell and I will not be able to give out party invitations in class. Please do not send your child into class with them for them to give out - it creates upset and fuss about something that takes place outside of school.Thank-you for your understanding with this matter.

Key Rings - please do not put key rings onto your child’s school bag, it creates fuss in class and then upset if they are lost.

School bags - please continue to use the red book bag that your child was given in Reception, we don’t not have the room to store large bags. Many thanks for your help with this matter.

Although Key Stage 1 SATS are no longer mandatory, the Department for Education has sent us our usual SATS paper and has deemed SATS to be optional. Mrs Mannix has decided to continue this form of assessment in Year 2 and, therefore, during this month of May we will be completing our SATS work. There are two reading papers; two maths papers; a punctuation and grammar paper; and a spelling test paper. We will spread these out throughout the half term and I intend to keep them as informal and low-stakes as is possible. The only warning the children have been given is that they must remain silent (something they find very tricky!).

On Thursday, we completed our first reading paper and the children did wonderfully well. Next week, we will complete our second reading paper and potentially our spelling paper before finally doing our two maths papers the following week.

In terms of support, please continue to read and complete the comprehension homeworks. Also, please continue to practise counting in 2s, 3s, 5s and 10s and recalling multiplication and division facts for these.

PHONICS SCREENING - Year 1 Phonics Screening will take place the week of 10th June. (First week back after our half term holiday). If your child did not pass their phonics screening check in Year 1, they will be required to take this again during this week. Please ensure your child is is school this week as each child must complete an individual phonic assessment at some point during this week. I will carry out the assessments and decide which day your child will complete the assessment based on a range of factors, such as mood that day, readiness for learning etc.

Mrs Hollinghurst will run a short meeting on TUESDAY 7th MAY at 2.40pm in the school hall where she will go through the details of what will happen and how you can help during our two week holiday to ensure that your child is ready for this on their return to school. If you are unsure as to whether your child will be retaking their phonics screening check, please let me know and I can inform you of this information.