Curriculum

Information for Parents

Useful Documents

Year 2

2023-2024

We carefully collected woodlice to conduct an investigation to test what conditions they prefer for their habitat. We divided a tray into 4 sections (dark and damp, dark and dry, damp and light, dry and light)  to create a ‘choice chamber.’ Nearly all of the woodlice preferred the dark and damp area! Many of us had predicted that this would be the case based on where the woodlice were found. Using our findings, we worked in groups to make habitats for woodlice. Anyone woodlice were harmed in this investigation! They were all freed and had lots of new habitats to choose from if they wished!

Year 2

2021-2022

Year 2 Residential to Bassenfell Manor

Year 2 had a wonderful time exploring the grounds and locals woods, completing team challenges, trying archery and being brave on the stackers activity. This was the first night away from home for many of the children and they were all amazing!

Clip ‘n’ Climb

What an amazing group of climbers! The children were confident, determined and encouraging with each other during both sessions. 

Oh I do like to be beside the seaside!

The children had a super trip to a very windy Allonby on Friday. They thoroughly enjoyed their hands on learning experience of our geography topic, ‘The Seaside’. Mrs Watkins had some great outdoor learning activities to keep the children busy identifying shells, creating art work and collecting treasured pebbles to take away as a memory of their time at the beach. 

DT - Textiles

The children learnt about using a running stitch to join fabric. They had to plan/design, use a template, cut the fabric and then sew the pieces together. They then added decoration. The finished pouches look great!

Computing

The children have been programming with the Scratch Jr app. They loved making their own story animations and musical instruments.

Art -Geometric prints by Esther Mahlangu

Experience Easter 

Volunteers from our local church visited the school on Friday to teach the children about the Easter story. The children were really engaged with the hands on activities.

Celebrating British Science Week

The children really enjoyed thinking about the conditions on Mars and created these super creatures with features that would help them to survive on the planet.

Signs of Spring 

The children enjoyed hunting for signs of spring in the sunshine. They were particularly pleased to see the daffodils sprouting that they planted in the peace garden back in the autumn.

Outdoor Explorers

We were fortunate to have Miss Lawler lead the Year 2 children in an outdoor explorers session on Friday. The children enjoyed finding space to dig holes, planting daffodil bulbs and covering them in a soil 'blanket'. We will be keeping a close eye on sprouting daffodils in the spring.

Nick Sharratt Virtual Visit

The children enjoyed a virtual visit from author and illustrator, Nick Sharratt. He read some of his stories, showed the children how to draw characters and made them giggle with his funny voices and expressions!

Uses of Everyday Materials 

The children enjoyed hunting for the different uses of everyday materials. They successfully recorded their observations in a table.

PCSO Visit - Stranger Danger

PCSO Claire Parker came to speak to the children about ‘Stranger Danger’. They were taught to use the ‘no go code’.

Computing

The children are learning all about word processing in computing. They have learnt about the different keyboard shortcuts and are working hard to improve their typing skills. 

Outdoor Explorers!

The children enjoyed exploring our wonderful school grounds. They completed a scavenger hunt and created some fantastic autumnal art. 

Indoor PE

The children really enjoyed this active game of snakes and ladders.

Year 2 Reading Visitor

Every week Year 2 have a reading visitor. This week Mr Strong came and read to us. The children also asked him lots of questions about his reading. We would like to say a big thank you to all our reading visitors so far: Mrs Elliot, Mrs Tiffen, Mrs Worthington, Mrs Watson and Mr Strong. We have loved listening to your stories and poems.

Teamwork in PE

The children have been working really hard to develop their teamwork skills. Here are some very successful passing games towards an end zone!

Year 2 Reading Challenge

These are some of the books the children are reading or sharing as part of our reading challenge. 

Art -Joan Miro

The children have been learning about the Spanish artist Miro and comparing his work to the work of Mondrian.

Dragon Poems

The children have enjoyed reading and sharing the book Tell me a dragon by Jackie Morris. They can recite a number of the dragons from the book and have written their own dragon poems. We hope you enjoy reading them.

Art -colour mixing

The children have been using the three primary colours to mix new colours and then sorting them into warm and cold colours.

DT Mechanisms: Making a moving monster-part two

Science: hunting for living things

The children really enjoyed looking within our amazing school grounds for living things in their habitats. We lifted stones, hunted in the grass and enjoyed finding all the busy bees on the flowers in the peace garden.

DT Mechanisms: Making a moving monster

The children are learning about pivots, levers and linkages. They started by looking at everyday objects to understand that a lever is something that turns on a pivot and that a linkage is a system of levers that are connected by pivots. The children then experimented by making linkages.  Their next job is to design their moving monsters before constructing them and finally evaluating their design.

Art - Drawing

The children have created pieces of work in the style of Nancy McCroskey, using lines, shapes, patterns and tone/shading to fill in squares or shapes. 

Maths -Place Value

 The children are learning about tens and ones using manipulatives in the classroom. We have used a range of concrete resources: tens and ones, bead strings and place value counters

Sports Day

The children had a lovely afternoon competing in a range of activities organised by Mrs Rudman. The Yellow Team were the overall winners, well done Melbreak!

Climbing

As part of our PE curriculum, the children in Year 2 had the opportunity to try out climbing at Clip 'n' Climb. Over the three sessions, the children developed their physical skills, demonstrated  resilience and challenged themselves to get better or try something harder. Some of the children had never been climbing before but by the end of our visits they were all experts!

Forest School

Mrs Watkins came into school to lead Forest School sessions in our outdoors. We learnt about what a fire needs to burn, about fire safety, how to use a flint and steel and we also developed our map reading skills. 

Computing - Stop Motion

Art -Print Making

Daffodil Art

The Year 2 children painted daffodils to be displayed around Cockermouth as part of the Daffodil Day celebrations to mark Cockermouth born Poet Laureate, William Wordsworth.  

British Science Week in Year 2

The Year 2 pupils have been involved  in a wide range of activities for British Science Week, learning and having lots of fun.

The children took part in a presentation made by past Paddle pupils where they shared: why they like Science, which scientists inspired them and their favourite experiments. Also the children learned about three scientists: Marie Curie, Alexander Fleming and Ernest Everett Just. Finding out that Science is for everyone!

The focus for our science week was working scientifically:  asking and answering questions, observing closely and carefully, investigating, exploring, conducting fair and comparative tests, predicting, using simple equipment, recording, discussing and using evidence to draw conclusions.

On Friday morning, the children took their learning outside to explore the habitats and microhabitats in our school grounds. They  recorded their findings, used simple equipment e.g. magnifiying glasses and identified trees and invertebrates using keys and branching databases. We loved being outside and exploring , although it did get a bit cold!  We were very resilient scientists and kept going!

Next for some fair testing - we made flitter jars and tested whether the glitter sank more quickly with water or water and soap.

Finally we finished off our science week by making bubble juice, finding out how bubbles work and having lots of fun blowing bubbles.

We think Science is exciting and fun!

We hope you like the photographs.

Tell Me A Dragon - Writing

The children have loved reading and writing about dragons. Using the book Tell me a dragon by Jackie Morris, we have explored vocabulary and different sentence structures then worked on creating interesting descriptions for new dragons. The children have also been learning how to edit their work and have enjoyed using their personal dictionaries for the first time to correct spellings. Everyone is very proud of their writing and we hope you enjoy reading them.

 Miro and Mondrian – Painting

The children have looked at the work of Miro and Mondrian and compared the similarities and differences, exploring how they use line, shape and colour. We revised primary and secondary colours and mixed black and white paint with other colours to make different tones.

They then produced their own piece of work in the style of Mondrian.

Drawing habitats and micro habitats in our school grounds.

Year 2 Outdoor Explorers

Exploring habitats and micro-habitats in the school grounds.

We had an exciting afternoon exploring the school grounds looking in the hedgerow and meadow habitats for plants and animals. We also found lots of seeds and acted out how they disperse. 

Outdoor Explorers

National Trust Link Day

Science - Basic needs of humans

Year 2 have been learning all about the basic needs of human and animals. We have been looking at how babies grow into fit and healthy 6 year olds. We had a visit from one of our classes’ baby brothers and had chance to ask questions about how to meet the needs of a baby. We asked questions about how babies grow and develop.