Grade 2 Community News

Welcome back, Grade 2 parents and families!

We’re so excited to dive into Term 4 — it’s sure to be a busy and memorable one! With all the excitement building about moving up to Grade 3, there’s still plenty of learning (and fun) left to enjoy in Grade 2. Looking back to the start of the year, it’s amazing to see just how much our students have grown and achieved. We’ve got lots of exciting events ahead, and we can’t wait to make the most of this final term together!

Literacy

This term, we kicked off our InitiaLit comprehension and fluency lessons with a brand-new reading strategy — monitoring! Monitoring means checking to make sure we understand what we’re reading. Our Grade 2 students have been practising this by reading in pairs and checking in with each other to see if they can retell what they’ve just read and if it makes sense. We’ve also been learning the steps we can take when we realise something doesn’t quite make sense and exploring strategies to help us fix it. Over the past two weeks, we’ve been reading all about elephants and enjoyed a text called “Baby Elephant’s Journey.” I’m sure many of our grade 2 students will be able to tell you all about it! 

In our InitiaLit spelling lessons, we’ve been revising some of the rules we learnt in Term 3 to get ready for our upcoming assessment. To start the term, we explored prefixes (like re- and un-) and suffixes (like -ing and -es), practising how to build new words by adding them to base words. We also learnt about the ‘dge’ and ‘ge’ spelling patterns that make the /j/ sound in words. If the vowel before the /j/ sound is short, we use ‘dge’ (as in bridge). If the vowel is not short, we use ‘ge’ (as in large).

In our writing lessons, we revisited the text The Stone Lion. We used story maps to help us discuss the main character — the Stone Lion himself! Students created a story map to show what the lion was like at the beginning of the story and another to show how he changed by the end. Using this text, we also learnt about pronouns and possessive adjectives. Students practised identifying and using possessive adjectives in their own sentences and worked on choosing the most appropriate pronouns to use in different contexts.

Numeracy

This term, we began our EMP program by exploring fractions! Students practised reading fractions, identifying equal parts, and shading the correct number of parts to match each fraction. We then moved on to writing fractions based on shapes divided into equal parts. The students have shown great success and are growing more confident with fractions every day!

We have also been working on subtraction using regrouping, focusing on three-digit subtraction and identifying when regrouping is or isn’t needed. When the number at the top is bigger, we can subtract straight away (Yes, do it!). When the number at the top is smaller, we need to regroup first (No, regroup!)

Students have continued to build their fluency with addition, subtraction, and multiplication facts. This term, our focus has been on developing automaticity with multiplication problems. Students have been learning to use cognitive strategies to help them recall multiplication facts. They have learnt the following strategies:

In Measurement, students have been learning how to interpret data from picture graphs. We focused on reading the key carefully to understand how many responses each symbol represents. Students also compared categories to see which had more or fewer responses by looking at how high each section went — and even worked out how many more or less!

Knowledge Building and Health

This term, we’ve started our new topic — Cycles in Nature! We began by exploring the reasons why we have day and night and the changing seasons. Students learnt that the Earth rotates on its axis and orbits around the Sun. When the part of the Earth is facing the Sun, it’s daytime, and when it faces away, it’s nighttime. We also discovered that because the Earth is slightly tilted, the side tilted closer to the Sun experiences summer, while the side tilted further away experiences winter.

We also began our Health unit, where we’re learning all about keeping ourselves healthy and safe. Our first topic was sun safety — a perfect focus as we head into summer! Students explored why it’s important to protect ourselves from the sun and discussed different ways to stay safe. They also learnt how advertisements promote sun safety messages and worked in pairs to design their own creative sun safety posters.

Grade 2 Reminders

• Swimming Weeks 3 and 4 – Students will be attending swimming lessons in Weeks 3 and 4. We encourage all students to practise getting themselves dressed independently in preparation for swimming. Please ensure you have both paid and provided consent for your child to attend via Compass.

• Melbourne Aquarium Excursion Week 6 – We’re excited to be heading to the Melbourne Aquarium later this term for our final excursion together! Please check Compass to confirm that payment and consent have been completed.

• Hats in Term 4 – All students are required to wear a hat during recess and lunch this term. Please ensure your child has a TRPS hat clearly labelled with their name.

• Take-Home Reading – We encourage all students to continue reading every night and filling in their take-home diaries. Our goal for the end of the year is 200 nights of reading — is your child close to reaching this milestone? Keep up the fantastic effort and let’s finish the year strong!

Thank you for your continued support and partnership in your child’s learning. We appreciate your involvement and encouragement as we work together to finish the year on a high note.

PLC 2