Summer Term 1

Welcome back! we hope that everyone had a brilliant Easter break. This half term we have our trip to Painshill Park with activities linked to our spring and summer science topics. The children have worked so hard this school year, and we are looking forward to the last term of fun and learning together. From making puppets to growing our own plants there is so much planned and we can't wait!

Summer 1 Term Dates:

15/4/2024 - INSET day

16/4 - Children return to school

22/4 - Trip to Painshill Park

27-31/5 - Half term 

    English:  

 As a school, we use Talk4Writing as a framework and all of the units are based on this. 

We will continue writing our fact files when we return to schoo the children will learn how to write and produce an interesting non-chronological report using a famous person of their choice or the superhero. they have created.

We will then use the Lion King as a basis to engage and inspire the children tp produce their own 'action story'. 'Talk for Writing' creates building blocks for the children to become confident writers and structure their writing in an organised, clear, and creative way.We will encourage children to use engaging openings and thoughtful endings in their action-packed warning tales.

We will be building on them using varied sentence starters, and time connectives, thinking about using correct tenses, using descriptive noun phrases including exciting adjectives, and similies, and using speech. Of course still including our non-negotiables such as capital letters, full stops, and finger spaces. We will also edit our work to give children the skills to edit and improve their writing.

• Non-negotiables: Every time the children write, we ask them to make sure that they have put a full stop at the end of every sentence, that they have used capital letters to begin sentences and for names, that they have finger spaces between their words, and that they have used a question mark at the end of a question.  

Cursive Handwriting 

This term we will continue to work hard with the children to practice their cursive handwriting. 

We have attached the 'a Guide to cursive handwriting' PPT document.

T-L-904-Letter-Formation-Powerpoint.ppt

      Reading, Phonics and Spelling :

Phonics/spelling lessons happen every day. We will do this as a class and provide extra support for children who need it.

Large Group Guided Reading sessions

Fluent Readers - Once the children become ‘fluent readers’ we will be reading whole class texts with the children. They will read more challenging texts, such as chapter books, using a range of skills to discuss and answer questions about the books. These sessions are not recorded in their Reading Records, but they have a Guided Reading book, where they record work relating to the text that is being studied.

 We will endeavor to hear individual readers as often as possible. Children are assessed with their phonics and reading regularly throughout the year.

Practice Reading sessions 

Phonic-based readers -In these small group lessons, the focus is largely on decoding, fluency, and comprehension. The children will read independently and to an adult, within their group. It will be marked in their reading records that they have had a practice reading session with adult support on that day. They will read with adult support  several times a week depending on the week

Once the children have read a book with their reading group at school, they will bring it home for further practice, along with an additional decodable book which will be changed weekly. Please help us to make sure that we can send home decodable books for all the children by returning both your child's reading books every Friday.

Once the children are fluent readers, they will be reading longer books in school and will be able to independently change their home readers whenever they need to. Please continue to send their reading record book to school every day.

English Homework:

Reading

We would like the children to read at home at least 4- 5 times a week with an adult. More able readers will then start to read more independently but it is still important for children to read out loud and have the opportunity to ask and answer questions about the vocabulary and text. Alongside reading school books we actively encourage children to read a wide range of books at home.

Spelling

   (link)   (logins in reading records)

This term there will be some changes to the way spelling homework will be set. 

Spelling challenges are set every Friday and we will now provide weekly paper homework with the spellings as a lot of children are not using the Spelling Shed app. The spellings will be set out as the 'Look, Say, Cover, and Write format. They will also be on the site but we are going to use paper homework this term to see if this improves children's learning.

The words will comprise spellings linked to the spelling taught that week alongside some Common Exception Words that Year 2 needs to be able to read and write by the end of Year 2.

We would like children to practice their spelling at least 3 x a week.

Extra English support:

Please take a look at these helpful questions to discuss with your child. They can be used when your child reads to you, when you read to your child or to prompt discussion about books your child is reading independently. 

Reading question stems 

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