Welcome to Hedgehog class! Our teacher is Mrs Jackson, who lots of us know really well, as she taught us in Nursery. She has been teaching for 14 years, and has worked at Bedwell for the last 4. Her favourite things are Lindt chocolate and reading her Kindle. She doesn’t like running very much, and is scared of spiders!

• All about Year 2 - our class presentation
• Our curriculum map - find out about our current topics
• Our latest class newsletter
• Meet our school councilors, Poppy and Max 

Home learning ideas:

• We have started using Google Classroom in class, so we will be familiar with it as a platform for learning beyond school. Login details will be coming home soon.      
• We are regularly set maths tasks and challenges via Mathletics, and should all know how to log in - let your teacher know if you can't get on. We've also started using Times Table Rock Stars to support us in learning our tables facts.
• Our history topic this term is the Great Fire of London, which provides lots of opportunities for learning beyond the classroom - try investigating the history, building models, drawing or painting pictures or reading about the lives of people who lived through it. There are loads of resources available through the Oak National Academy, here.  

Our latest news:

• In science this term, we have been learning about materials. We have investigated what floats and what sinks (playdoh doesn't float - we were surprised), tested the strength of different materials by building bridges (uncooked spaghetti is surprisingly strong) and this week we explored different ways to change the shape of materials. We tried stretching, squeezing, twisting and bending - and, as you can see here, we tried very hard to find out what you can (and cannot) cut through!  
 

 
• School Council elections - One of our first tasks this term was to elect our new School Councillors. We thought carefully about the skills we thought a good class representative should have, what we liked about our school and how it could be improved further. Building on this, we then drew on all our understanding to write speeches (with a bit of help from our mums and dads), ’selling’ ourselves to the rest of our class and showing why we’d be the perfect Councillor. It was a tough choice, with loads of us making fantastic speeches, but once voting was complete and all the ballots had been counted, we elected Poppy and Max. You can read their speeches here.     
 
• In the Spring, were lucky to be invited to an Athletics competition at Stevenage Leisure Centre with Rising Stars where we had fun with 3 other schools. We were able to compete in different activities such as obstacle courses, long jump, javelin and relay. We had lots of fun the whole morning where our behaviour was impeccable, and we all received a certificate for our hard work.
 

We have been learning about... 

Computing - We have been developing our art skills in computing this term as well as successfully learning how to login independently, save our work and print it. We have enjoyed exploring different artists and using some of their artistic techniques on the computer.

English - Over the past half term we have thoroughly enjoyed learning the story of the Magic Porridge Pot. We couldn’t believe it back in January when we came into class and found a miniature town had been flooded on the carpet in wet, sticky porridge... It was quite a sight! 

History - Following on from our English unit we have been learning all about the Great Fire of London. We think you’ll agree that we have picked up a huge amount of information and really enjoyed retelling what happened and how it started. The houses we made for homework were fantastic and have taken pride of place in our library area and classrooms.

This term's topics

English - Our next English unit will see us focussing on settings and character descriptions. Our model text is called Shipwrecked, and will help us to focus on how we can use our senses and imagination to describe people and places in interesting and engaging ways. We will be developing the way we structure our sentences, using conjunctions like because and so to tie ideas together.

Maths - Over the course of the term, we will be looking at a variety of methods for additon and subtraction, including partitioning, jumping on a number line and formal column addition. We will also be using and applying our maths skills, using addition, subtraction, multiplication and division to solve problems in real life contexts involving money and measures.  

Science - We will be continuing to explore living things and their habitats. We will identify differences between things that are living, dead or have never been alive, and learn about the key features that all living things share. We will explore the places where particular animals live, and think about the ways in which these are linked to their characteristics.

Humanities - We will be learning about the exotic South American country, Ecuador. We will locate Ecuador on a variety of maps, recognising continents and oceans, and will also identify the Ecuadorian flag. We will then compare the climate and physical features of Ecuador with those found n the UK. This will lead us to explore what it would be like to live in Ecuador, looking at traditional and modern clothing, food and houses.

Take a look at our curriculum map for more information on our topics.