Welcome to Hedgehog Class

Hedgehog Class is our Year Two class, where Mrs Vipond is our teacher. Our class page will be updated regularly to share our learning with you; we hope you enjoy it.

Our class topic web and maths medium term plan are located on the class learning page; please use the Hedgehog Class Learning page link below. Also on the learning page are reading and spelling lists and a yearly overview.

Indoor PE resumes on Wednesday afternoons (please remember to have a PE kit that remains in school) and outdoor PE is back to Thursday afternoons - PE kit to be worn to school on Thursday unless advised otherwise.

This we week we have been looking at rhyming verse, particularly in the Hairy Maclary books.  Children were introduced to Spike Milligan and have had one listen to the poem 'On the Ning Nang Nong'.  I would like children to have a read through so we are ready to start learning it in school.

Term 6

This week we have been doing some practical maths involving scales.  We started the week by checking the temperature in the science garden on our large thermometer (15^oC) and by setting up a rain gauge (which we completely forgot to check at the end of the week - will report back next week!).  We then moved on to capacity and were lucky enough to avoid the rain showers, although there were some wet children!

We've also been looking at lots of different rhyming words, ready to start learning our Spike Milligan poem next week and we ended the week by watching the KS2 dress rehearsal of their summer production - they were fantastic!

Week 3

This week has flown by and I barely saw you!  Thank you to those of you that read with our visitor outside on Tuesday morning.  She was very impressed with you and thought all of the books that she looked at in the classroom were amazing, so well done everyone. Next week is assessment week which does mean some more maths and reading comprehensions.  I know you all did very well in your SATs last term so to end off our busy week we'll be watching the KS2 production.

Week 2

We have spent a lot of time this week concentrating on our reading and really trying to understand what we are reading and making links with other books.  Please do get your children to tell you about the book or make predictions about what might happen next.  In maths we have had a mixture of activities trying to stretch our thinking and reasoning about problems.  This required a lot of resilience but once the pattern was spotted children were very successful.  We also consolidated our 3-D shape knowledge by playing a 'match the description to the shape' game.  We ended the week writing up our science seed growth in the morning and learning a bit about Andy Goldsworthy, the British artist, in the afternoon; closely followed by some natural materials art.

We've had a busy first week with a mixture of lots of different maths activities.  We investigated the 2-D and 3-D shapes to see what we knew and learnt some language to describe the properties of the shapes.  We also had some fun with the money but unfortunately it was all plastic! 

Before starting our map-makers topic we had a re-cap on all of our history learning; we certainly have a class full of historians and hopefully some green-fingered ones too!

Term 5

Children have packed an incredible amount into a very short term; a snapshot can be seen below.  They should be very proud of themselves and I do hope everyone is able to enjoy the break; I look forward to hearing about all of the exciting trips and activities. 

We all joined together to commemorate the jubilee with a tree-planting event.  Everyone was able to add their own bit of soil to the cherry tree, which will look beautiful when in blossom.  In addition, children did their best jubilee colouring with some writing, so a piece from each class can be chosen to be buried in our own time capsule - how exciting!

On Tuesday we had our 5th curriculum day, Skilful Day.  Hedgehog Class spent time learning what to do if someone gets burnt, some handy fire safety rhymes (Get out, Stay out, Call 999) and some compass skills.  I'm not sure we're quite ready to navigate our way but we do all know how to find North!  The afternoon was filled with the fundraising PE event - photos to follow under the Global Explorer web page.

Children have been actual superheroes this week. They have all tried their hardest and really shown perseverance when needed.  We ended our busy week with a superhero afternoon with a selection of masks, books, teddy bears and action figures and a superhero film.  No film is complete without some snacks; so strawberries, grapes and popcorn were served!  Well done everybody.

This week we all got to perform some 'magic' before learning our new story.  Children enjoyed watching their pictures come to life with water - endless fun to be had!

Term 4

I wish everybody a very restful and peaceful Easter holiday.  Children have worked tremendously hard despite a very disruptive term, so hopefully everyone can come back together in the new term after a good rest.

We had great fun receiving the baton from Squirrel Class so we could complete our laps around the field before we passed it on to Hare Class.  We also spent some time identifying other countries within the Commonwealth and tracking where the actual baton is - just leaving The Bahamas! Children also designed their own medal and learnt about some of the sports that will be taking place in Birmingham.

We explored our fourth Big Idea this term, Spirituality.  Children took part in lots of activities throughout the school including mindfulness, yoga, pebble painting and wonder walks.  All of the activities enabled children to explore what spirituality meant to them and to connect mind and body together, connect us with other people and to connect us with nature.  Look out for photos on the gallery but here are some from the wonder walks.

Wiltshire Year of Reading

We were delighted to join another author and illustrator on Tuesday to learn how they come up with ideas for their books, draw the pictures and then write the book!  This time we heard from Mini Grey, the author of books such as Traction Man is Here, The Bad Bunnies Magic Show and Hermelin, The Detective Mouse.  Children had great fun learning how to draw their own mouse character and later we were treated to an appearance from the bunny!  Many of these books are available in Wiltshire libraries, so do look out for them.

Also, below are some suggestions of questions that you could ask your child before, during and after they have read a book - some ideas to really get them thinking about what they are reading.

We had a fantastic day at Marwell and after the torrential rain yesterday, all the animals were out, basking in the sun.  We saw all the animals that we are researching for our topic, Africa, so look out for some great fact files and recounts of our trip.

We had a wonderful Zoom call with Eli as part of our Africa topic.  It was so lovely to see him and get a special tour around his Ugandan home.  We shared some of our learning with Eli and just as we were discussing our new book 'Lila and the secret of rain' it started to pour and he had to rush inside! Thank you Eli and mum for your time and sharing some African life with us.

We celebrated 25 years of World Book Day by sharing each other's books and recognising other books through the catchy song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4LO_Nnod-M

We also made our own reading crowns, took part in a quiz and contributed to our whole school book - I wonder if the alien will make it home; will he find the missing parts to his spaceship?  We had a great day and it was lovely to see so many fantastic costumes and books.

Term 3

We ended our learning about the Great Fire of London with a Zoom session with the National Archives.  We learnt that they store thousands of documents dating back all the way to the 970's and it all started with a dead rat!  Hedgehog Class were detectives for the session and had to look at different pieces of evidence to really see if what we know about the GFoL is based on actual facts.  The extract above is from the Hearth Tax of the time.  Can you see the link to what we know about where the fire started?

After a very rainy morning, the sun came out and we enjoyed the afternoon listening and looking for birds in the school grounds.  This was part of the RSPB's birdwatch and we will submit our results along with lots of other schools.  We will also have a look at how we might present our data to share our findings.  There are lots of resources on the website from recipes to arts and crafts:

https://www.rspb.org.uk/fun-and-learning/for-teachers/schools-birdwatch/resources/

PSHE lessons this term are about setting goals and reaching our dreams.  Children were set a challenge to either, learn how to count to 10 in French or Spanish, learn a nursery rhyme or learn the Macarena dance!  Children wrote the steps to achieve their challenge and then had a week to learn it.  There was lots of persevering, practise and working together to achieve their challenge.  Unfortunately the video is too large to upload but here's some of our Macarena dancers!  Well done everyone 😊

This term we have been learning some multiplication which is really just a quick way to perform repeated addition.  We explored the fives using our hands and fingers, looked at clocks and made links with the ten times table. We even shared a 5m swimming achievement. There has been lots of new language this term, including factor and product, so see if your child can tell you what they mean or ask them to use examples!

We had a fantastic Worldly Day where we explored the past, different countries and cultures and discussed how we could make the world a better place.  Children designed their own royal cake for the Queen's Jubilee, tasted some Spanish food, practised Origami, learned some Swahili and explored our very own St Nicholas time capsule from 1971.  A great day was had by all.

To help our learning we have been singing along to a song all about 1666.  Please have a listen; it's very catchy! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5eVlKWSHAA

There are also lots of fun games to play but this site is one we have used before and comes via BBC Bitesize:

https://www.fireoflondon.org.uk/

We immersed ourselves into Jack and the Beanstalk and this week we have been learning the story through actions and role-play with the help of some puppet figures!  There are some very scary giants in this class!

As well as not being very good at drawing, children found out I am not great at growing indoor plants! For Christmas I received some seeds that were guaranteed to grow and would you believe it - they are certainly growing!  Each day the plant is getting even bigger and children came back from lunch to find it had reached the ceiling!  It's very similar to our new story - Jack and the Beanstalk.  Look out for new actions next week to help re-tell the story.

Term 3

Welcome back and a very Happy New Year to everyone; I hope you're all rested and ready for Term 3!  We'll be staying with London as we learn about one of the most significant events from the past; The Great Fire of London. Can you remember from Term 1 when the Battle of Hastings was?  If so, try to add 600 years and you'll get to the Great Fire.  We are learning about historical events in a chronological order, meaning we started with the earliest and are working towards the current date. We'll have some help from a virtual workshop with the National Archives so we can understand how we know what we do about the fire.  In science we'll be looking at living things and their habitats as well as exploring some simple food chains.  We'll get out into our science garden and see what has started to make it their home so a definite reason for wellies!

Suggested topic books:

Vlad and the Great Fire of London by Kate Cunningham (reading in school)

The Great Fire of London by Liz Gogerly

The Great Fire; A City in Flames by Ann Turnbull

The Baker's Boy and the Great Fire of London by Tom Bradman

The Great Fire Dogs by Megan Rix (Fiction and for slightly older readers)

Term 2

Homework is for the rest of term/holidays and is due the first Thursday of Term 3.  Remember to practise your best handwriting and spellings; especially if you are writing Christmas cards or thank you letters!

What a performance!  Thank you for supporting our Nativity with help preparing costumes, learning lines and of course, audience participation!  Hedgehog Class parents and family members were the clear winners!!

Our DT lessons have been about wheels and axles so children have designed, painted, constructed and tested out their very own vehicles.  Well done everyone 😊

We're having lots of fun exploring London and this week we learnt a little bit more about Trafalgar Square which we previously encountered in our story 'Katie in London'.  We learnt that Norway gives us a Christmas tree every year to put up in Trafalgar Square and that Julia Donaldson, who everyone knew through her many famous books, has written a poem and now a book about the journey of 'The Christmas Pine'.  Definitely one to look out for in shops and libraries this Christmas!

We had great fun meeting Mark, a representative of the RSPB, when he came to help us decide where to position some lovely new bird boxes.  The boxes were kindly donated to us by the local charity 'Focus in on Life' and we look forward to getting them mounted and ready to receive birds in the coming years.  We even used our directional knowledge that we have been learning in our geography lessons to make sure we could position them facing North.  Thank you to Mark and the charity for their time and resources.

We had lots of spots and yellow for Children in Need Day.  Thank you for all the doations; children have learnt what the charity is about and how the school council chose it for us to support.

We were fortunate to join an author and illustrator, Robert Starling, during our English lesson.  He read one of his books to us, Fergal is fuming, and then taught us how to do simple drawings to help with expression and show how our character is feeling.  It was great fun and we all had a go!  We also got to meet Super Sloth!

Everyone likes to receive a letter so we thought it would be great to write to a Year 2 class in a London school.  We have all written a letter to the children in Lowry Class and hope to get a letter back before the end of term.

Armed with our story maps, children took to the outdoor area to start learning and practising 'The Papaya that Spoke'.  Everybody is having great fun and hopefully they will be able to share the story with you shortly!

Mr Heath teaches computing on a Tuesday afternoon and this term it is all about computer art.  Children have been learning to use Paint and this week they experimented in the style of Mondrian; don't they look great?

Week 1

What a busy first week back we have had!  We enjoyed Aspirational Day on Wednesday where children were fortunate to have two parent visitors from Dstl to help discuss different jobs.  Children also role-played being scientists, worked together to try to build a bridge from paper and wrote their own aspirations on a leaf.  All of our leaves will soon fill up a tree along with those from Badger and Squirrel Class.  In the afternoon we had a whole-school science show which was great fun and full of exciting facts.  All of the photos from the day will be uploaded to the gallery page but here's a selection.

Term 2

Welcome back; I hope you're all rested and ready for Term 2!  We'll be learning all about London as we explore some of the landmarks and re-visit some of the castles we saw in Term 1.  We'll put our navigational skills to the test and try to navigate around London using directional language.  We'll also  be constructing our own mode of transport and evaluating our final design!

Suggested topic books:

Katie in London by James Mayhew

Magical Mabel's adventure in the Tower of London by Wendy Clark

Paddington at the Palace (and the many other books) by Michael Bond

Usborne's See inside London

London Children's Map by Guy Fox

Term 1

What a fantastic day.  From naming our teams, choosing team captains, solving riddles (the farmer, fox, chicken and grain) to team games, bracelet making and creating our new topic board.  It has been a non-stop day of team working, showing kindness, perseverence and teaching ourselves to be resilient.  Everyone should be very proud of their efforts and can certainly say they have been resourceful.  Well done 😊

We've finished our learning on materials and their uses, so what better way to test out properties than to make some slime.  Apologies for the mess!

We have also been enjoying a Friday 'show and tell' where the items must be to do with our topic or science.  We've had lots of castle facts, home-made castles, dragons, visits to see the Bayeux Tapestry and today we even had a modern day piece of armour with lots of properties.  Well done everyone.

We are nearing the end of our topic on castles, so children used all of their knowledge to write their own fact files.  Some people even managed to include our 'words of the day' - fantastic!

It has been really lovely hearing from children about castles they have visited, some recently and some a long time ago.  Thank you for all the lovely pictures and information that has come in from home.

We continued our theme of materials and their uses whilst learning a new word - absorbent.  We agreed that a sponge is an absorbent material and that a raincoat would be terrible if it was absorbent as we'd all get wet!  

We then predicted which material would be the most absorbent, carried out a fair test, wrote down our results and discussed our findings.  Excellent scientific skills 😊

Children were introduced to the 6 Big Ideas earlier in the week and this term we are looking at what it means to be 'Resourceful'.  Hedgehog Class showed resourcefulness in action when they worked together and persevered to build our castle! Well done everyone 😊

We had a look at a piece of artwork by Paul Klee called 'Castle and Sun' and re-created our own abstract version using 2-D shapes and watercolours.  The results were fabulous.

We have started to look at our new book The Egg and learn the actions to the story.  By telling the story we will be able to write it.  Coincidentally we had some visitors to the classroom and they seem to be helping with our inspiration!

We were fortunate to have a visit from The Bridge and they helped us look at and understand God's Creation before we made our own unique creations!

Blue Peter Badges

Back in May we all undertook different pledges to work towards our Climate Hero badge and children helped by turning off lights, recycling paper and planting bee-friendly flowers. Children have all got their badges but adults must apply for their badge card. Please use the link below and enter the code for the old Squirrel Class:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/shows/blue-peter/badge-card-application

Please enter the code HS SP4OLB CH when prompted.

The weather was far too lovely for indoor PE so we went outside for a bit of yoga surrounded by our beautiful countryside.  Thank you for bringing in PE kits - we will continue with our 'indoor' PE on a Wednesday afternoon.