Learning in Year 2

In Year 2, children continue to grow as confident, independent learners. Through a carefully sequenced, knowledge-rich curriculum, pupils revisit important prior learning, make meaningful connections and develop increasingly secure knowledge and skills.

Daily phonics, reading and writing lessons support children in becoming fluent, enthusiastic readers and effective communicators. Pupils explore engaging texts such as Grandad’s Island, Paddington, Coming to England, Fantastically Great Women Who Changed the World and Fantastic Mr Fox. They develop their writing through character descriptions, narrative retellings, formal invitations, recounts, non-chronological reports, stories from other cultures and poetry.

In mathematics, children deepen their understanding of number and place value and build fluency in addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. They also develop their knowledge of fractions, money, time, measurement, shape, statistics and mathematical problem-solving.

Across the wider curriculum, pupils:

• investigate living things and their habitats, animals including humans, plants and the uses of everyday materials in science;

• explore human and physical features, compare London with Nairobi, develop mapping and fieldwork skills and learn about the Amazon rainforest in geography;

• study events beyond living memory and significant historical events, people and places within the local area in history;

• develop creativity through drawing, painting, printmaking, collage, textiles, sculpture and design projects;

• design and make products involving textiles, mechanisms, structures, materials, and food and nutrition;

• explore singing, rhythm, pulse, pitch, tempo, dynamics and musical composition; and

• learn about friendships, families, respectful relationships, personal safety, healthy choices and being ready to learn through PSHE.

Regular opportunities for phonics, handwriting, spelling, physical education and creative learning ensure that children experience a broad, balanced and engaging curriculum throughout Year 2.

Further details can be found in our Year 2 curriculum overview.