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Birchwood Primary School

Juniper 2

 
Welcome to Juniper 2!
 
 
2025 - 2026
 
Mrs King/Mrs Brelsford - Class Teachers
Mrs Faultless, Miss Dow - Teaching Assistants

Autumn 2 

Significant People

This half term, we are learning about significant people from the past who have shaped the way we live today.

After receiving a postcard from Paddington Bear, we discovered that he’d ended up in hospital after slipping on some marmalade and hurting his paw! Paddington wanted to know how nurses knew what to do — so we set out to find out!

We learned all about Florence Nightingale, who transformed hospitals by making them cleaner, providing healthy food, and even opening a training school for nurses. 

As part of our learning, we also compared hospitals in Victorian times to hospitals today, noticing just how much things have improved thanks to Florence’s hard work and dedication.

 
Autumn 1
 
Bright Lights, Big City

We had a wonderful end to our first half term in Year 2 by attending our very own tea party!

Although it wasn’t at Buckingham Palace like Paddington’s, we all agreed that we had the best time together. There were smiles all around as we celebrated our fantastic learning and the brilliant start we’ve made to Year 2.

Well done, Juniper Class – what a lovely way to finish the half term!

To finish our learning about The Great Fire of London, Juniper Class became bakers — just like Thomas Farriner himself!

We learned that flour comes from wheat grains which are ground down before being used in baking. Using flour, salt, sugar, water, and yeast, we carefully measured, mixed, and stirred our ingredients. After letting our dough rise, we kneaded it into rolls — and what a fantastic job everyone did!

The classroom was filled with the delicious smell of freshly baked bread. What master bakers you are, Juniper Class!

In Juniper we have been learning a song called 'Tony Chestnut', with actions and then with our partner we had to listen carefully to the notes and then teach ourselves how to play the song on a glockenspiel. Everyone did a fantastic job at writing down the notes once they'd worked out which notes sounded correct. Good work Juniper!

This week in Juniper we thoroughly enjoyed making our moving vehicles. We all followed our designs and loved decorating them in our own unique way. Paddington has some fancy vehicles to travel in when going to his Tea Party!  

The children enjoyed having their photos taken alongside Paddington himself.

As part of our continued learning about materials, Year 2 have been diving into the fascinating world of what things are made from – and why!

We used Michael Rosen’s playful poem Woolly Saucepan as inspiration to think about how different materials are suited to different objects. Using our imaginations, we explored all sorts of unusual and funny mismatches – like glass trousers or chocolate teapots!

Then, we got creative and wrote our own versions of the poem, coming up with silly and surprising object-material combinations. Through this fun and imaginative activity, we deepened our understanding of the properties of materials, while also developing our poetry skills.

In Juniper Class, we’ve been using our growing knowledge of adjectives, nouns, and verbs to write our very own poems all about The Great Fire of London.

We thought carefully about the sights, sounds, and feelings of 1666, using powerful describing words and action verbs to bring the fire to life on the page. The children worked so hard to capture the drama and emotion of this historic event through their writing.

What a fantastic job, Juniper Class! Your poems were full of imagination, strong vocabulary, and creativity – we’re so proud of your brilliant work!

In history, we have started learning all about The Great Fire of London and what life was like in the year 1666. It has been really interesting to find out how people lived such a long time ago!

As part of our learning, we looked at lots of different pictures and had to sort them into two groups – pictures from 1666 and pictures from the present day. We saw old houses made of wood, old-fashioned clothes, and fire engines that looked very different from today! We also saw modern buildings, clothes, and fire engines that helped us understand how much things have changed.

This activity helped us spot the differences between the past and present, and it made us think about how people might have felt during the Great Fire.

We are excited to keep learning more about what happened during the fire and how London changed afterwards!

This week in Year 2, Juniper Class has been learning all about Information Technology and how it’s used in everyday life. In our most recent lesson, we focused on the role of technology in supermarkets.

We discovered how barcodes are used to store information about products. Each barcode is unique, like a fingerprint for the item! When the barcode is scanned at the till, it tells the computer exactly what the item is and how much it costs.

It was a fantastic opportunity to connect technology to the real world. We’re excited to continue exploring more ways technology helps us in everyday life!

To celebrate National Poetry Day, Year 2 Juniper Class learnt the classic poem The Owl and the Pussycat by Edward Lear. As part of our learning, we used Makaton signs to help bring the poem to life and support everyone in joining in.

We were thrilled to share our performance with the children and staff from The Birchwood Nest — it was a lovely opportunity to come together and celebrate poetry in an inclusive and creative way.

Super learning, Juniper Class – we’re so proud of you!

This week, Year 2 Juniper began their Infant Agility journey by focusing on aiming and throwing – and what a fantastic start they've made! Their concentration, coordination, and enthusiasm were brilliant to see.

Infant Agility is all about developing fundamental movement skills, and over the coming weeks, the children will explore:

Running
Jumping
Dodging
Balancing
Aiming
Throwing
Catching
Reaction and response

These fun, skill-building activities help build confidence, coordination, and a love for being active – and Juniper Class are off to a flying start!

Well done, everyone – we can’t wait to see how your skills grow! 

This week, Juniper Class have been diving into the world of materials! We began by recapping our knowledge from Year 1, reminding ourselves of the names and properties of everyday materials.

Next, we explored a wide variety of materials and worked hard to classify them based on their properties – is it bendy, rough, transparent, or soft? The children really enjoyed hands-on investigations and thoughtful discussions about the different objects they examined.  Well done Juniper Class. 

This week, Year 2 Juniper have been building their confidence with adding and subtracting two-digit numbers. We used a variety of manipulatives, including bead strings, part-whole models, and base ten blocks, to explore the different strategies we’ve learned over the past few weeks.

The children worked brilliantly to solve problems, explain their thinking, and choose the most efficient methods. We then moved on to practising written strategies, showing our working clearly and carefully.

It’s been fantastic to see how much progress everyone has made – well done, Juniper class!

A big well done to our wonderful Year 2 representatives!

Cooper – our new School Councillor
Eva – our thoughtful Eco Councillor
Mylo – our brilliant Digital Leader

We are so proud of you all and know you will do a fantastic job representing Juniper Class.

Juniper Class have been busy exploring fixed wheels and free-moving wheels this week, all in preparation for a very important task – designing and building vehicles to help Paddington get to his royal tea party!

The children have loved investigating how different types of wheels work and thinking about which would be best for their own vehicle designs. Lots of great teamwork, problem-solving, and creative ideas are already rolling in!

We can’t wait to see the finished vehicles – Paddington is in for quite the ride!

This half term, Juniper Class have been learning all about two-digit numbers – exploring their value and how they can be partitioned into tens and ones.

This understanding has really helped as they've now moved on to adding and subtracting two-digit numbers. It's been great to see their confidence growing as they use different strategies to solve problems.

Great work, Juniper Class – keep it up!

Juniper Class have been really enjoying their weekly trips to the library! It’s been great to see everyone so excited to pick out books, share favourites with friends, and spend some quiet time reading.

These visits are helping the children build confidence as readers and get more familiar with how libraries work.

Well done, Juniper Class – keep up the great reading in school and at home!

Juniper Class had a wonderful time this week making the most of the beautiful autumn sunshine! We headed out to the trim trail for some fresh air, fun, and a chance to stretch our legs.

The children loved balancing, climbing, and jumping their way along the trail – and there were lots of smiles and laughter all round. It was the perfect way to enjoy the crisp autumn weather and stay active together!

Well done, Juniper Class – you showed brilliant teamwork and energy!

What an exciting first day back we've had in Year 2!

This morning started with a surprise – we stumbled over a mysterious suitcase and a red hat! We quickly guessed that they must belong to Paddington Bear! Of course, our curious minds just had to take a look inside...

To our amazement, we discovered a very sticky invitation to a tea party – covered in marmalade, of course! Poor Paddington – he couldn’t read where the party was supposed to be. Luckily, there were some clues hidden in the suitcase to help us figure it out.

We found:

  • A toy taxi cab
  • A tube ticket
  • A picture of King Charles
  • A postcard of Big Ben
  • A Union Jack flag

Using our fantastic inference skills, we discussed each clue carefully and soon worked out that the tea party must be in London!

As well as solving Paddington’s mystery, we also got stuck into learning about the features of non-fiction books. We explored:

  • Title pages
  • Contents pages
  • Glossaries
  • Indexes
  • Pictures and captions

We’re already showing brilliant teamwork and thinking skills – what a great start to the year! We can’t wait to see what the rest of the week brings.

Our Year 2s came back today full of smiles, stories, and energy – and we couldn't be happier to see them! From catching up with friends to diving into new learning adventures, it's already shaping up to be a fantastic year.

We LOVE how quickly they've settled back in, ready to learn, laugh, and grow together. Here's to a wonderful Year 2! 

 
Welcome to Hazel !
 
 
2024 - 2025
 
Mrs Hodgetts/Mrs Lewin - Class Teachers
Mrs Whitlock/Mrs Winyard/Mrs Amvrosiadis/Mrs Spencer/Miss Gregory - Teaching Assistants
 
Summer 2
 
Enchanted Woodland
This half term, we have been exploring the work of Andy Goldsworthy. We found out that he uses natural resources and objects to create pictures, then observes the changes over time. In groups, we gathered our own natural resources and worked together to make large art pieces in Goldsworthy's style by using different textures, circles and arches. We then left them over the weekend to see how they changed. Afterwards, we put the natural objects back into our outdoor environment, just like Goldsworthy does. Don't they look fantastic!
What a way put a smile on the children's faces! (And the adults!) As you can tell, we were all very happy!

Well done Hazel 1 for your fantastic class assembly. We enjoyed hearing about all the exciting learning that you have done so far this year. What a busy year it has been!

Today, we explored the school grounds to spot and name different types of common trees. We examined the leaves carefully and used our 'Leaf ID' sheet to help us identify which tree each leaf came from.
Imagine our surprise when we came across a strange note in the middle of our phoneme cards. 'If you go down to the woods today you’ll be sure of a big surprise!' After finishing our phonics lesson, we put on our coats and went to investigate.
 
Summer 1
 
Rio de Vida
Well done Hazel 1! Super effort completing this morning’s sponsored walk/run.
In the last week before half term, our class got busy in the kitchen making a delicious roasted pasta salad. We practised safe cutting skills using the bridge and claw techniques to chop our vegetables, then added garlic and oil before roasting them in the oven. While they cooked, we boiled the pasta and let it cool. Once everything was ready, we mixed the roasted vegetables with the pasta, added a little mayonnaise and pesto, and gave it a good stir. Everyone tried the final dish — and there wasn’t a plate left with food on it! A tasty end to the half term and a great chance to build our cooking confidence.
We have been ordering numbers to 100. We then ordered them from biggest to smallest and gradually increased the numbers we represented and ordered. We were even able to compare and order them without the dienes, too.
The children started drawing their art using a variety of shapes. We then used primary colours to start with and mixed these to create secondary colours. We are all so proud of the artwork created!
Year 1 thoroughly enjoyed their school trip this week to The National Adventure Farm.
We met lots of animals, had a tractor ride and lots of play. The children were such a credit to our school and were very tired by the end!
The children have been having a fun with Winning With Numbers and showing off how great they are at it! They've been so excited about it that we thought, “Why not invite the face of Winning With Numbers to come and see what our students have been up to?” And that’s exactly what we did – and it was a lot of fun!
Today Year 1 have been looking at the primary colours and then mixing them to create secondary colours. The children will use these colours to paint their own versions of ‘Castle and Sun’ by Paul Klee’s this week.
 
Spring 2
 
Monarchs
Today we enjoyed a visit from Charlie, a local firefighter. We learned about his job and saw what he had to wear to protect himself in a fire. We then learned about keeping safe in our home. Finally we practised ‘Stop, drop and roll’ to help us stay safe if there ever was a fire.
We have been measuring using standard units of measure. We began by finding items in our classroom that were taller, longer and shorter than a metre. As a challenge we then found things that were taller, longer and shorter than half a metre. Finally we found objects that were taller, longer and shorter than a quarter of a metre.
In Geography we have been looking at the four countries that make up the United Kingdom (UK). We were introduced to an atlas and looked through it so see what it was about! We then labelled and coloured the countries of the United Kingdom referring to the atlas.
We have been learning about doubling and halving in Maths and today we have used the Cuisenaire rods to investigate this.
Today we created a route for turtle to follow to get to Anansi’s house for dinner. After going outside to practice our routes, we then directed our partners to program the route using a Bee-Bot.
An algorithm is a set of steps or actions needed to solve a problem or complete a task. The steps in an algorithm need to be in the right order. With our partners, we created a course on the floor. We had to follow the algorithm that our partners gave us to get from the start of the course to the finish. The instructions had to be clear and we had to use our star words. If the algorithm was correct, our partners successfully completed the course. If we were not clear or precise, we had to debug to correct errors!
We started our Computing lesson by singing the Hokey Cokey. We discussed how this was an algorithm as we had to follow clear and precise instructions. After practising the song, we used some pictures to represent the different actions. Together we put these in the correct order to create a ‘Hokey Cokey algorithm’.
We have been learning about halves and to investigate making halves, we have used a piece of bread to see how many ways we can get two equal sized pieces.
In English, we have been reading the ‘Smartest Giant in Town’ by Julia Donaldson. To remember the important parts of the story, we have been using our ‘talk for writing’ skills. This will help us rewrite our own versions next week.
We have been using the make 10 strategy to find the difference between two numbers.
Year 3 came to read with us this afternoon for World Book Day. We loved having the older children hear our new reading skills! We were also very lucky to have one of our governors, Mrs Michel, read us a story.  What a brilliant day!!

To celebrate World Book Day, we dressed up as favourite book characters. We even got to experience some DEAR time (Drop Everything and Read) which gave us lots of opportunities to read for pleasure.

In computing we discussed where we use algorithms in everyday life. Although we don’t call them algorithms, we use them all of the time when cooking, for example when following a recipe. Our adults may regularly following ‘route algorithms’ on phones and sat-navs too. We then used a path puzzler app to investigate route algorithms We had to work together to get the ‘most precise’ route. We drew arrows on a whiteboard to show the different ways of getting, for example, the brown dog to the brown bone. We also had to ‘debug’ some of our routes, as the paths could not cross!
 
Spring 1
 
No Place Like Home
To support our work in Geography this half term focusing on geographical skills and fieldwork, while walking to Polesworth Library to watch 'The Snowflake' a show put on by the Birmingham Rep, we followed our route on a map, identifying key features within the local area. While there, we created a dance to reflect the seasons and made snowflakes to join in with the show!
Having listened to the story of Anansi and the Turtle, we used parts of the story to count how many 'more', how many 'fewer' and the 'difference'.
Music
Tuned Percussion
After creating our own pattern of E-D-C notes, we practised playing them on the instrument alongside singing a line from the chant.
Today we worked in small groups to identify and name a variety of animals. We sorted them based on their characteristics, we then discussed this together and grouped the animals.  We were then introduced to the scientific vocabulary for the different animal groups and classified the animals into the correct category using our knowledge of each animal.
Today, we have used role play to retell the story of The Enormous Turnip.  We thought about how the characters would be feeling throughout the story and we all agreed that the characters would be feeling exhausted trying to pull up an enormous turnip!  However, in the end they were pleased that they could all share a turnip supper! 
This week we have used a drum to tap out the syllables in our names. We have also been learning a football echo song and we have been using instruments to tap along to the beat!
We have been refreshing our knowledge of telling the time at o clock and half past the hour!
 
Autumn 2
 
School Days
Christmas dinner was very tasty! We even had a festive singsong at the same time!
Hazel class would like to say a huge thank you to Team Birchwood for our wonderful winter books.  We have enjoyed spending time looking at them and sharing them with our friends.  
It’s panto time! 'Oh, no it isn’t!'
 
'Oh, yes it is!' We had a great time watching the pantomime this afternoon.
We used a range of colours and mixed paint and cornflower to have a go at the impasto technique in the style of Vincent Van Gogh.
Here are Hazel 1 making some paperchains to order the months of the year.
In DT we explored the journey of wheat from seed to harvest, learning how it is made into flour and then into bread. Using the skills of measuring, mixing and kneading we then made a dough. After leaving it to rise we shaped the pitta breads and put them into the oven to cook. Finally we chose a filling and enjoyed eating the final product.
 
Autumn 1
 
Everyday Materials
The children enjoyed their last forest school session which saw them learning some new sawing skills as well as lighting a fire safely.
We have been learning to repeat shapes and patterns, we learned the 'Hokey Cokey' and have also had a go at the 'Cha Cha Slide' dance which has helped us to follow the leader’s movements, and to know how to change direction!
We have been exploring the difference between fiction and non fiction texts.
We have been comparing and grouping together a variety of everyday materials on the basis of their simple physical properties.
We have been looking at materials in Science and sorting them using a Venn diagram into metals and plastics. 
We have been exploring the story of “The Three Little Pigs” by retelling it through freeze frames.
This was our very first Year 1 Forest School session. We played a game of trust with our partners using blindfolds and then we learned the first skill of carving using a peeler and a stick.