Nearly There!

This week was one big roller coaster ride of fun! We finished making our cards and calendars, we had our school Christmas dinner and we had our special party packed lunch followed by our Christmas party. The highlight of our Christmas party was without a doubt the visit by Santa.
Ms Gower and I hope that everyone has a fantastic holiday and we would both like to say a massive thankyou for our lovely presents. We have both had lots of fun teaching Y2 (and Wellington and Antointe) this year and look forward to seeing everyone bright eyed and bushy tailed in January.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Christmas is coming....!

Our big event this year was our Christmas performance, Babushka. The children were fantastic and I was proud of every single one of them - WELL DONE Y2! There are lots of photographs of the performance on the noticeboard outside Y6 but just to put you in the mood I've included one here of our 3 camels (those fantastic suits were worth the hard work it took to actually get the children into them!!!!) Again, thank you parents for all your support with costumes and the learning of lines, it was very appreciated!
The children had a much earned toy afternoon on Friday - there are some pictures here of them enjoying their games. We also had another treat on Friday. Mrs Farr - Jack in Y5's mum - had kindly sent in some beautiful bears from her collection for YR to look at as part of their 'Teddies' topic. We were lucky enough to have 'first look' though! Pictured are some Y2 children with the bears.
Don't forget - next week we have Christmas dinner on Tuesday and KS1 Christmas party on Thursday, Ms Gower and I are very much looking forward to joining in with some party games! On Friday children can, again, bring in a toy of their choice.

Y2 have spent time really getting to grips - in a very 'hands on' way with our Sound topic!
After learning all about the ear on Monday - which bits of it do what - we then started using them in a very big way.
On Wednesday morning our KS2 recorder teacher, Mr Hill, came in with his saxophone, clarinet and recorders. He borrowed a guitar, a trumpet and a tambourine and everyone explored how these instruments make sound. We finished the lesson by all having a 'go' on the recorder.
On Wednesday afernoon Jessie Prewett's mum, Helen, came in with her flute. She played some tunes and showed the children how blowing into a flute is like blowing across the top of a milk bottle. The the children went off in groups with Helen to all try making the flute make music.
Then.... this morning Scott, Chloe's dad, came in with his collection of drums. He showed the children the different drums made different sounds. The children then got up in groups to make some drum sequences - WOW! Our school cooks couldn't believe their ears working behind the shutters in the kitchen!
Many thanks to all our volunteers for making this a very special, interactive two days for the children.
Thanks as well, parents, for the help given to the children to learn their lines. A last push over the weekend and we'll be there!
Talking of performances - our evening performance on Wednesday starts at 6.00pm. We would like the children back in school by 5.30 so we can get them changed. Help doing this would be gratefully received!

Making Music

Y2 have spent time really getting to grips - in a very 'hands on' way with our Sound topic!
After learning all about the ear on Monday - which bits of it do what - we then started using them in a very big way.
On Wednesday morning our KS2 recorder teacher, Mr Hill, came in with his saxophone, clarinet and recorders. He borrowed a guitar, a trumpet and a tambourine and everyone explored how these instruments make sound. We finished the lesson by all having a 'go' on the recorder.
On Wednesday afernoon Jessie Prewett's mum, Helen, came in with her flute. She played some tunes and showed the children how blowing into a flute is like blowing across the top of a milk bottle. The the children went off in groups with Helen to all try making the flute make music.
Then.... this morning Scott, Chloe's dad, came in with his collection of drums. He showed the children the different drums made different sounds. The children then got up in groups to make some drum sequences - WOW! Our school cooks couldn't believe their ears working behind the shutters in the kitchen!
Many thanks to all our volunteers for making this a very special, interactive two days for the children.
Thanks as well, parents, for the help given to the children to learn their lines. A last push over the weekend and we'll be there!
Talking of performances - our evening performance on Wednesday starts at 6.00pm. We would like the children back in school by 5.30 so we can get them changed. Help doing this would be gratefully received!

baubles and glitter

After a hard week of Ms Gower and I nagging the children to remember the standards ow work we expect from them everyone let their hair down on Friday and had a day of making Christmas decorations. The picture says it all! By 3.15 we all looked like glitterballs - including the teacher! (I got some very funny looks indeed at a service station on the M5 on the way to visit my family!) If you haven't already been to see it take a look at the whole school's work in the main hall. As Y2 would say - it's lush!

Talking of Christmas a big plea and reminder - we need the children to learn their lines fir the play. Many thanks for all the effort so far. From tomorrow onwards we'll be rehearsing 'scriptless'!

Making - then showing - masks

As promised here are the pictures of Y2 making their masks then showing them in our class assembly today. We couldn't decide whether the class looked better with the masks on or off! We hope you enjoy looking at them.

Making and Painting!

Firstly - apologies for the upside down picture last week - I am getting to grips with our new camera! Talking of pictures, this week's photos are on the camera in school and I am on my PPA day at home right now! I'll put the pics on tomorrow.

We have had lots of fun this week painting and making. We finished our unit of literacy all about instructions by making a mask on Friday. The children are evaluating their work today with Ms Gower as the concluding piece of this Big Write.
We also had lots of fun on Thursday afternoon mixing up primary colours to make colour wheels. We also started thinking about our Christmas production, Babushka. Parents - if your child has a speaking part PLEASE spend time with them helping them to learn lines, this would help us tremendously. I hope the costume requirements are clear. If not please catch me any day except today and Wednesday this week.

Books, Domes and Dishes!

Y2 have been very busy this week doing lots of 'doing'!
In P.E. the whole of the school took part in a Virtual Festival. KS1 played Domes and Dishes in their classrooms, divided into 4 teams - strawberries, blueberries, bananas and apples - we had two whole P.E. lessons of turning over and back again! We play our next part of the festival after Christmas - watch this space for the winners!

In Literacy we have been reading writing and following instructions. This week we have focussed on making books - each day we have read instructions about a different sort of book and on Friday everyone made their own book - take a look here at our hard workers!

We also had a postcard this week from Wellington's friend, Charley who lives in Germany - Charley had been on holiday to Holland and send Wellington and Y2 some information about windmills.

Oh - and we mustn't forget that Wellington has a very special visitor from France over here, too, Antoine. Y2 have been helping Antoine and Wellington to write some French words. Tres bien!
T

Celso Paco and good sitting!

This week Y2 have been working hard at listening and managing distractions - pictures show a selection of Y2s demonstrating good sitting and, as promised Y2, someone else doing very bad sitting indeed....!
We have worked with Amandine and have also watched Mozambiquan performer Celso Paco sing and dance to us.
Don't forget to bring your leaves and quality words to school tomorrow, children!

Y2 goes European!

This week we have been very lucky to have Ulrike Grave spending the week with us in Y2.
Ulrike is in her final years at school in Bremen, Germany and she shared some of her experiences with us, taught us how to count in German and told us about life in Germany which helped us with our topic work.
The picture shows Ulrike 'being teacher' as she showed Y2 (and Mrs Shore!) how to count to 5.
On Thursday Ms Gower worked with Ulrike and the children to make a book about German life. Next week we will be having Amandine - our French assistant - in the class and Ms Gower will be doing the same with her.
Watch this space!

Writing postcards to Germany!

I'm sure all mums and dads will know by now about Y2's special friend Wellington. Last week we helped him write about his holiday in Wales, this week we helped him write postcards to his friend, Charly. Charly lives in Germany and we were all excited when Wellington received a postcard from him last week. We all put our heads together and wrote a class postcard to Charly then lots of individual ones. We're hoping that Wellington has friends in other countries who can write to us to tell us about their home!

Y2 working hard

Y2 have really 'got into' their tasks and have been busy working their socks off - as these pictures show!
They know all about vowels - Mickey spotted 12 when he was reading with his group and Ms Gower on Friday! Lots of visitors for Wellington came in, his drawer was quite full by the end of the day! The children were very excited when Wellington had a postcard from Germany and they will soon be writing back, on Wellington's behalf, to Charly - the German bear. Watch this space!
The beautiful weather meant we were able to do P.E. outside - everyone's quoit throwing and catching has improved considerably!
Let's hope the sun will stay out for the rest of the month.

Welcome to Y2!!!

Well we have had a busy start to our new school year! Everyone has done lots of painting and writing in order to make the new classroom's walls look lovely and bright. Despite the horrid weather everyone had a lovely summer - many thanks for the pictures and artefacts brought back from holidays, they are all going on display in the classroom.

We also made our Full Value Contract. This is what everyone has agreed to do.
1. We all do quality sitting
2. We all do quality listening
3. We all do quality speaking
4. We look after the people and things in our classroom
5. We make people feel welcome
6. We treat other people how we would like to be treated ourselves
7. We always try our best

Here are some photos of everyone hard at work and 'trying their best'.

Teddy on Snowdon!

Hello to the old Y2s (I hope you are all ready to be Y3 now!) and the soon to be Y2s!
In the blog at the end of term I promised you a picture of Teddy in her camping gear - if we got there...
Unfortunately it was far too wet so we went to a lovely cottage in North Wales instead and did lots of walking on the mountains. Here is a picture of Teddy (looking rather wet in her waterproof coat!) walking on Snowdon - the highest mountain in Wales.

See you on Thursday
Mrs S

Teddy on snowdon

Minibeasts and Goodbyes!

What a hectic last week in Y2. Our trip to Charterhouse in the Mendips was much enjoyed by the children. Here are a selection of photographs showing them pond dipping, minibeast hunting and generally getting in touch with the nature in our relatively local area. A big thank you too, to the parent helpers who were marvellous sports trudging through the long, bumpy grass (and yes, at one point, a small stream....) facing bugs, beasties and (sorry Deb Taylor!) a shiny, wriggly snake like slow-worm.

I would like to say a massive thank you to you all for the generous presents and touching cards and messages I felt inundated with yesterday. I have greatly enjoyed teaching Y2; their funny stories and tremendous hard work have consistently inspired and motivated me this year - and their relentless interest in my dog has amused me greatly!!!!!! If the weather is kind enough for us to go camping I'll post a picture of Teddy in her camping gear on the blog later in the holiday.
Have a wonderful summer and enjoy the time you spend with your lovely children.
Again, thank you.
Laura

Swap Day

Today was very exciting for everyone as Y2 spent the morning with Mrs Christmas in the Y3 classroom getting ready for next year.
The first topic will be Victorians and Mrs Christmas will be sending a letter out about this next week. The children had lots of fun practising being in KS2 (even if, they say, they'll miss their afternoon play!)
Katherine said 'It was exciting!'Ryley said 'I enjoyed making postcards' and Alec said 'It was really, really good - we made big postcards on cardboard - it was really fun!'
Here are photographs of the children working in their new classroom.

We're still keeping our fingers crossed for a sunny day for our trip on Monday - the last time I looked the outlook was good....! Don't forget sensible shoes, school fleece and waterproof / sunhats and cream. Look out for the photos on the blog next week.

At last - our Fountain is launched!

Many thanks to everyone who joined us for the Fountain Launch on Wednesday. Despite the relentless rain we had a fantastic turn out – nearly all of our Y2 parents were there to support the children and encourage everyone with their clapping! This was particularly important because it was not until Wednesday morning when we knew that there was no chance whatsoever (we were optimistic for as long as possible!) of an outdoor performance that we had to completely replan KS1’s input. The children were fantastic and incredibly GROWN UP and adaptable – Well done Y2!
Of all the fantastic moments on Wednesday that sheer Luckwell determination is perhaps shown in the photograph – unable to have a lovely picnic in the sunshine here are the parents and children crammed into Y2’s classroom – thank you for your resilience and commitment to making Y2 have a truly wonderful afternoon. I imagine there were a lot of very sleepy children in Bedminster on Wednesday night!

Another thank you to everyone who came to Profile Evening, it was lovely to see so many faces. If you were unable to attend but would like to pop in to see your child’s work please let us know and we can arrange this.

Finally, our trip on Monday. If you still haven’t received a letter please check your child’s bookbag or ask for a replacement. Hopefully our visit to the Mendip Hills will be a lovely end to Y2 – I’m hoping for sunshine……..!

Top Link Festival

This week Y2 impressed Bedminster with their P.E. skills at Ashton Park's Top Link Festival. Young Sports Leaders at Ashton Park organised a morning of fun P.E. activities for the Y2 children at local schools. One of the activities was Parachute Games - you can see Max and Elena listening carefully to parachute instructions in the picture.
We had a beautiful sunny day for the event and 'warmed up' with a walk to Ashton Park to get us into the mood. Many thanks again to all the parents who joined us on the walk through Bedminster - as always your support is very much appreciated!
We are also in the process of making up a fountain dance for the fountain launch (which hopefully you've received your invitation to - let Mrs Shore know if you haven't) next week. Watch this space!

Mrs Thwaites says goodbye!

This week we have been learning about the life cycles of tadpoles. Tadpoles breathe through special holes called spiracles.

In numeracy we have been learning to tell the time which is very useful indeed. we have also been sharing our times table knowledge with each other.

In science we sorted foods into 'healthy' and 'unhealthy' and designed some delicious healthy meals. Maybe we can cook them for our families over the weekend. "Joe really liked the fish" said Katherine and Isobel. We questioned each other on Thursday about our eating habits - it made some very interesting reading! Marmite and jam anyone?!

We are really sad that Mrs Thwaites is leaving and we will miss her very much! Mrs Thwaites is very sad to be going too : (

Sports and Performance

Another busy week in Y2 passes.

After all their hard work writing and recording radio plays Y2 presented their work to the whole school this week. Mrs Thwaites led our celebration assembly where the children shared their ideas and some of their recordings with the rest of the children - everyone was very impressed!

Following all the fantastic homework the children did over half term the children have been 'brainstorming' what they have found about the past. We were very impressed by their knowledge! The picture shows one of the 'brainstorm' pages. Many thanks for all your support in helping the children with this, parents, and all your precious photos and artefacts will be returned intact very soon!

Sports Day was a great success. We had a fantastic afternoon on Wednesday and Y2 showed what excellent 'sports' they are! Well done everyone, whatever position they were in the races, and well done to Yellow House for their first overall win in 13 years!

Finally next Thursday - as I wrote on my note that the children took home we are have won all our marbles and the children have voted for a 'Spy Day' where they will, well, 'be spies'!!!!! For the children who are not inspired by spying it will be a general dressing up in own clothes and bringing in a game/toy day. We don't require any party food on this occasion. This is also Mrs Thwaites' last day and an opportunity for her to relax with the children. I'm sure you will all join me in wishing her well in her teaching career and thanking her for all her hard work in Y2 over the last 8 weeks.

TALK week in Year 2

This week was TALK week, so instead of our usual timetable, the teachers planned lots of fun activities. With Mrs Thwaites we did lots of drama, and made our own plays for the radio. It was lots of fun choosing the sound effects. We used the musical instruments and our voices in all sorts of unusual ways!

Although Sports Day was postponed, we still spent lots of time outside and really enjoyed our mini-Olympics and afternoon of Playground Games!

We are looking forward to Sports Day next Wednesday and crossing our fingers that the sun will be shining!

A busy week in Year 2

What a busy week we have had. We have been reading and writing information sheets in Literacy, and thinking up ideas for the fountain launch. We are all keen to do a dance!

In ICT we made bar charts of the work we did in Science rolling toy cars on different surfaces. We were all computer wizzes!

Some of us were a bit tired on Wednesday as we had been up late watching City win at Ashton Gate. Jude says he wants to go with them to Wembley!

On Thursday we had a great art lesson in which we painted our own postcards of Fairyland. We all had very different ideas. 'The painting was fun!' says Katherine. We all enjoyed experimenting with mixing the colours.

Have a fun weekend. We hope the sun comes out again.

Y2 Go Bowling

Well we've been so busy looking forward to our trip this week that time has whizzed by!
We've done lots of work on multiplication and division using grouping in maths and continued our postcard theme in English - there is some fantastic 'quality language' being used in Y2! We were able to start our focus on tennis skills outside in this wonderful sunshine - let's hope it stays this way!

Talking of sunshine we were fortunate enough to be able to walk to the Bowling Centre today in beautiful weather. We got there in record time (and Mrs Shore would like to apologise again to the wonderful parent volunteers for the rapid pace maintained....!) which meant we were able to have extra bowling time. The class loved it and listened very carefully to the instructions given by the organisers. Everyone behaved excellently and walked very sensibly.
Well done Y2 - Luckwell is very proud of you!

Next week we hope to start using our fountain - watch this space for photographs.
Have a lovely weekend, everyone!

1st May 2008

This week we have been writing postcards in Literacy and reading Little Red Riding Hood. We set the story to music with Mrs Thwaites. It was fantastic!

We have also been learning how to make series circuits in Science.

"I liked building the bigger circuits with more bulbs" said Kitty. "They got dimmer!"

Max discovered how to make a special kind of circuit called a series circuit.

We enjoyed singing the "Jump down, turnaround" song in singing assembly.

In Numeracy we used our skills in addition and subtraction to solve word problems.

In PE we have been bouncing large balls and have made up our own games.

Happy Bank Holiday everyone!

new term

Everyone had a lovely holiday and came back to school refreshed and ready to learn!
Mrs Thwaites has joined for 8 weeks and has started taking part in our lessons and teaching us. Robyn said "Mrs Thwaites is a fun teacher who helps us learn new things". Please come in and say hello over the coming weeks.
Our fountain started working this week and talks to us and plays music. Mark came to show us some of things it can do and how we can play with the fountain. We pressed pressure pads to make the water squirt high. We also ran around the fountain to make the water height increase. Some people had ideas for the fountain for example George - it was St George's Day after all!

The Time Capsule

Today Y2, along with Y1 and watched by the whole school planted a 'Time Capsule' beneath our newly arrived fountain. Y2 were involved because of the significant input they had last year with Miss Linton. Spread over the two time capsules were things like current newspapers, pictures of the school, children's work and a school sweatshirt. Jessica and Samuel were chosen to put Y2's box beneath the fountain.

As hoped we were able to practice our catching skills outside in the sunshine. We're hoping for another sunny day on Friday when Max Tryfonos' dad is coming in to share some of his sports expertise with Y2. Our new focus on time went well, too, with lots of evidence of work outside school. Please keep this up with your children - time really is something that can be worked on effortlessly at home.

We've introduced two new characters - Wilf and Tib - to our class. Wilf the dog represents 'What I'm looking for' - the objectives of a given task, and Tib the cat 'This is because' - ie, the whole point of why we are learning something. On the subject of dogs and cats we're waiting for more pictures of pets (or other family members' pets) for our Pets Parade notice board - Bubbles, Kaiser and Teddy are looking a little lonely at the moment.

Have a lovely break - hopefully the good weather will happen for us! See you back in school on Monday 21st April.

Creating a Long Story

Apologies for the lack of blogs - there has been a serious technical hitch on the Y2 blog page but hopefully we've got it sorted now!

We've been doing lots of things in Y2 and at the moment we're really hoping the days will start to get warmer so we can start doing P.E. outside again! We're focusing on catching skills - and that your eyes are as important as your hands if you're going to learn how to catch properly!

In English we're gathering lots of 'stolen words', thinking up amazing story openers and deciding how we can use punctuation effectively to create an interesting 'long story'. Yesterday we worked in groups and devised some short plays to show the central point in a story - the disaster! Today we've been building up detail around the drama; the picture shows some children brainstorming some descriptive words to use.

Next week we're off timetable and will be thinking about our newly arrived fountain. We will also have a few extra sessions on time as work we did last week showed that there was quite a lot of misunderstanding. Any extra work you can do at home with the children about time would be very appreciated!

As always - any questions etc do pop in.

Junk modelling

Y2 have been junk modelling - thanks for everything you've sent in this week. Our finished results are in the classroom if you want to pop in and look!
We're saving the rest of the boxes etc to make dragons with on our DRAGON DAY next week. We're having this on Thursday rather than Tuesday (as previously stated). The idea behind this is it is going to be a child led activity day, the children have been asked to think about what they'd like to do.

Those of you attending Parents' Evening on Thursday - hopefully the 'Dragons' Den' won't be too scary!!!!!

Have a lovely weekend.

Junk Modelling ... and more

Y2 have been junk modelling - we've made playground equipment out of cereal boxes and lots of other recycled materials. Many thanks to everyone who sent things in for us!

We are saving our remaining 'junk' for DRAGON DAY which will take place during TALK week next week. The children have asked to make dragons, write poems and stories about dragons and decorate the classroom as a dragons' den.

We're going to do this on Tuesday - watch this space for pictures!

If you haven't signed up for parents' evening please do so a.s.a.p. as slots are rapidly disappearing - the list is on the classroom door.