Recommended Books for Year 2 Children (Ages 6 -7)
Posted by Sam Yo on
According to the Year 2 national curriculum set by the Government, the following three subjects are essential:
- English
- Maths
- Science
Since Year 2 is the final year of KS1 (Key Stage 1), your school will assess your child through KS1 tests known as SATs. Moreover, laying a solid foundation in your child's early education will come a long way. The foundation would build their confidence and help tremendously when they sit for the secondary school entrance exam (also known as 11+ exam or grammar school exam). This foundation will positively impact their GCSE and A level. So let's have a proper start and help your child to achieve their potential.
This article will lay out some important study, exercise, and activity books to help your child's learning activity.
Recommended English Books
English is one of the important subjects and laying a strong foundation will be beneficial in a long term. English is assessed for more marks than other subjects, especially for your child's secondary school entrance exams (also known as 11+ exam or grammar school entrance exams).
English subject can be split into five topics:
- Handwriting
- Reading
- Spelling and Vocabulary
- Grammar, Punctuation, and Spelling (also known as GPS)
- Comprehension
How to get started with English?
Each of the above topics is equally important. To get started, we recommend you first get the following three study books:
- Year 2 English Study Book
- Year 2 Reading Study Book
- Year 2 Grammar, Punctuation, and Spelling Study Books
These study books help your child to learn the fundamentals and techniques of English language. There are questions at the end of each section (answers are provided too). The English book covers all the topics mentioned above except handwriting. It explains the grammar (and other topics) clearly with colourful images along with exercise, as shown in the picture below.
The English Reading (orange) book explains reading techniques such as reading carefully to find facts and information, thinking about the text to make an assumption, and type of text such as stories, information texts and poems. The book also comes with four reading chapters with questions. As shown in the picture below, the reading book comes with example text with exercises with many guidance.
The 3rd purple book focuses purely on grammar, punctuation and spelling. In the grammar section, Nouns, Verbs, Adjectives, Adverbs, and Tenses have been explained. The use of capital letters, ending sentences, apostrophes and commas are described in the punctuation section. There are three more sections, including vocabularies and spelling. See the following picture for sample pages from this book.
Okay, I got the English fundamentals. What is next?
Great! The next step is to work on handwriting and comprehension.
Handwriting and Comprehension
Year 2 is an excellent time to put some effort to develop handwriting skills, especially in learning how to keep the letters at the right size, how to join each letter, and practice a wide range of words.
One parent said, "⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐The handwriting joins here mirror the expectations from the school. Some other handwriting books I initially used joined s and p, which was confusing for my child."
Practice is the key when it comes to comprehension. Comprehension is vital to develop skills like inference, fact retrieval, and prediction when your children read English texts. These skills enable them to answer the question very quickly and clearly.
We recommend the following two books:
Recommended Maths Books
Maths is the second most important subject. According to the national curriculum, the following maths topics are important:
- Number and place value
- Addition and subtraction
- Multiplication and division
- Fraction
- Measurement
- Geometry
- Statistics
While tons of books are available on the market, books that are short and sweet while getting the children's attention are essential. Books that explain concepts clearly via colourful images are important factors to encourage children's learning. With this in mind, we recommend this book:
One parent said, "⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Intelligently written and accessible to parents and children. These books are head and shoulders above other similar material. The unique humour used makes the subject matter lighter and easier to understand."
The green book is packed with colourful notes that summarises all the important skills needed for Year 2. Each topic page is followed by a page of practice questions with answers.
To make sure that they’re really got to grips with all the important topics, we recommend Maths Workout and Mental Maths Workout books. These books come with quick-fire practice questions presented in a fun and cartoony style.
Therefore, we recommend the following book bundle:
Okay, I got the Maths Fundamentals. How my child can excel in Mathematics?
When it comes to maths, practise makes outstanding mathematicians. Training can change the trajectory of your child rapidly compared to those born with a silver spoon! The best way to practice maths is to do short 10-minutes exercises regularly. Therefore we recommend the following book bundle:
Recommended Science Books
According to the new curriculum, the principal focus of science teaching in Year 2 is to enable pupils to experience and observe phenomena, looking more closely at the natural and humanly constructed world around them. To achieve this objective, the curriculum breaks down the key stage 1 science into four topics:
- Plants
- Animals, including humans
- Everyday Materials
- Living things and their habitats
We recommend the following book bundle covering every topic from the Year 2 Science curriculum, with easy-to-read notes, examples, diagrams, and photos on clear, full-colour pages.
This 5-book bundle also included plenty of engaging practice questions and activities for each topic – perfect for enjoyably testing children's understanding.
Conclusions
Year 2 curriculum focuses on English, Maths, and Science. In our opinion, building a solid foundation for these subjects right from the beginning come a long way. Practice making you perfect!
If you don't want to buy books subject-by-subjects, then the following book bundles combine necessary books from all three subjects: