Prep-2 Sector 

PREP

Phonics

Did you know that we consolidate our letter sound knowledge every day through the learning strategy of dictation?

The teacher dictates words and sentences to the students. Students say the word aloud and listen for the sounds in the word. They record the sounds they hear. Students learn about high frequency words as well as boundary punctuation and spacing.

Prep students are becoming confident and independent with this daily routine. 

Reading and Writing

We have continued reading and writing informational texts. We had so much fun learning facts about penguins and stars. After reading information texts together, we have a rich discussion. This is a great opportunity for students to learn lots of new vocabulary and use these words when speaking and writing. Students pose questions and recall interesting and important facts from our reading.

We also made a penguin and star craft!

The Prep Team

Year 1

What a busy and exciting few weeks we have had in Year 1! With so many wonderful learning experiences and celebrations, it has been lovely to see students growing in confidence, curiosity and independence.

In Humanities, students have been exploring our local community and developing their understanding of places and the people who are connected to them. Our recent excursion provided a wonderful opportunity for students to observe and identify natural and constructed features in our local area, consider how places can change, and think about how we can care for the places that are important to us. Students asked questions, made observations and shared what they discovered about our local community.

We have also had lots of fun celebrating Book Week! Students enjoyed dressing up as their favourite book characters for our Book Week Parade and proudly sharing their costumes and the stories that inspired them. It was wonderful to see the excitement and enthusiasm students showed for books and reading. To wrap up our Book Week celebrations, we enjoyed a special Buddy Reading session, where students shared books with their buddies, listened to stories and talked about some of their favourite characters and books. These opportunities encourage students to develop a love of reading while also building confidence in sharing their ideas and connecting with others through stories.

In Maths, students have been exploring measurement, with a focus on comparing and measuring the length, height and capacity of different objects. We have been learning how to use informal units of measurement, such as blocks, counters, paper clips and pop sticks, to measure and compare objects. Through hands-on activities, students have been developing an understanding that we need to use the same-sized units and place them carefully, without gaps or overlaps, to measure accurately.

 Students have also continued exploring a range of addition and subtraction strategies, learning to choose strategies that help them solve problems efficiently and explain their mathematical thinking.

In Writing, students have been exploring both poetry and narrative writing. Through our study of Julia Donaldson’s books, students have been discovering how poets and authors use rhyme, repetition, descriptive language and other poetic devices to make their writing engaging and enjoyable. We are finishing the term with a much-loved favourite, The Gruffalo, which will inspire some fun and imaginative learning experiences.

It has certainly been a busy few weeks, and we are looking forward to finishing the term with lots more learning, creativity and fun!

'You can if you think you can'

The Year 1 Teachers

Year 2

Students have been enjoying our Poetry unit that we have been doing in the second half of this term. Students have been really enjoying reading and listening to different poems written by Michael Rosen. We have listened to “Chocolate Cake” and read the book “We’re going on a bear hunt”. Students have explored how rhyming and repetition have been used in his poems and stories before trying to use these features themselves. 

Grade 2 students have tackled trickier spelling patterns, including silent letters in words like write, wrist, thumb and climb. They then revised everything learned this term — silent 'kn' and 'gn' words (knee, gnome), tricky vowel sounds, and silent letters — through daily reading, spelling and dictation practice. Most recently, students explored words ending in 'le', such as handle, puddle and castle. Alongside this, they've built vocabulary using prefixes and suffixes (like -al, -en and -ic), practised handwriting, and strengthened reading fluency through partner and echo reading each week.

 Great effort all round!

In Maths, Students have continued to develop their strategies in solving problems involving addition ad subtraction. They have been developing their jump strategy, split strategy and compensation strategy. Students have also started their data unit. Students have been looking at different types of graphs and learning how to identify the key features of each graph. By learning the different features of each graph, students have been able to interpret each graph and understand what information is being presented. 

Our Lego competition has wrapped up with some amazing pieces being created by the students. Students were very proud of their creations!

Yr 2 Team