Year 2 News

From Risa Hammel, Year 2E teacher

Who's been sleeping in my bed?

Happy last week of term 2 to all our Year 2s! This term has flown by, and we cannot believe it is almost time for the winter holidays.

English

We have continued and finished up our Goldilocks Project. Have you heard of the fairytale Goldilocks and the Three Bears? Yes? Well, have you heard of Goldilocks and Just One Bear? That’s right, we investigated a few different, interesting, and upside-down versions of the classic story. 

The first unique rendition we focused on was Me and You by Anthony Browne. This story book inspired lots of discussion around emotive pictures and colour palettes, facial expressions, and perspectives in stories. Using side-by-side comparisons, our Year 2s practiced comprehension skills of predicting, questioning, and connecting. They also used Goldilocks’ word-less images to create a narrative using first person. We practiced descriptive writing techniques or show-not-tell and emotive language to create engaging and personal stories, which were then edited and revised with a buddy. 

We also looked at Goldilocks and Just One Bear by Leigh Hodgkinson. In this version, a grownup Baby Bear gets lost in the city and ends up in Goldilocks’ apartment. We practiced predicting and inferring using the text clues and our prior knowledge of the story arc. We discussed how the characters had grown across their lives. We also worked on sentence expansion, adding in extra details about who, what, when, where, and how to basic sentences. You can have a go with this too! Expand this sentence: Bear sat on the chair. How can you make it more exciting and engaging? 

Maths

Our Year 2s have been really enjoying our fractions unit! We have investigated fractions of a shape, group of items, and numbers. We have worked with halves, quarters, and eighths, and in some cases, even looked at thirds and sixths. Our Grade 2s have also used word problems, bar models, and kinder squares to use their fraction knowledge across different contexts. We half all had a great time in these fractions lessons! (Get it?) 

As we head into the last week of term and the winter holidays, we want to thank all our Year 2 families for their support. We hope everyone has a restful holidays and we look forward to seeing all our students for a great start to term 3.