This half-term, Year 2 have been enjoying exploring the British Isles across various subjects in the curriculum.

In English, we have been exploring the stories of Katie Morag set on the fictional Isle of Struay off the west coast of Scotland.  Looking at the story of ‘Katie Morag and the Two Grandmothers’ in particular, we have been analysing how authors develop characters in their stories and how we can extend our writing by telling the reader who carried out an activity or action, where and when it took place, why the event happened and how.

In Geography, we have been extending our understanding of maps. Identifying both physical and human features, and thinking about how these can be shown on a map, creating our own maps of our local area.

In Art we have been learning how to ‘paint with paper’, aka, to collage, selecting a variety of paper materials to build up our own islands, and then animals. We have also been learning about the history of tartan patterns, creating our own using the technique of weaving.

In Music, we have been exploring the sounds we might hear throughout the British Isles, thinking about how we can mimic these using our voices and body percussion. Building on this, we composed soundscapes with symbols to reflect the sounds we might hear in the coast, countryside or a city.

In Science, we have been exploring materials. The children had great fun exploring how objects change shape using playdough as well as testing stretchiness to find out which material might be the most suitable to create a new bridge for the dog to be able to cross the bog in Julia Donaldson’s ‘The Smartest Giant in Town’.