Monday 24 February 2014

Sierra Leone 2014





After a very long but exciting journey we arrived late last night at our destination, Mama Beach, which is only a 15 min drive from our friends in Waterloo! Today we have visited a beautiful local beach and visited the vibrant capital city of Freetown and its museum. We finished our road trip visiting the village of Waterloo where we were were greeted so warmly by all our friends! We are getting up early tomorrow to go mass and spend more time meeting the people of Waterloo!

SUNDAY- Today we went to St.Raphael's church at 10.30 to their brilliantly colourful and musical mass!! We then went to the official 'Welcoming Ceremony' where we introduced ourselves to the other members of the Waterloo partnership. We had a lovely few hours meeting more people of Waterloo. Miss Freckleton enjoyed giving out her football kits to some of the local children and we are all getting really excited about starting school tomorrow!! We were then driven by our brilliant driver Saidu (who remembers Miss Cassidy & co from previous years and send his love!) to see another local beach with Aunty Iris and Horatio. Another great day!!








MONDAY- We've really enjoyed our first day with the children today at Fano!! Their singing and dancing at the welcome assembly was gorgeous and they were all so happy to see us. Miss Dowler spent the morning in Year 1 where the children were v to get their necklaces from the children at All Saints! Miss Freckleton spent the morning with the nursery children and Mr.Barnes did some printing with the Yr 5 and 6 children. Mr.Ralston was coaching football all morning in the heat and Mrs.Maguire worked hard all morning in the local library! Tomorrow we're looking forward to sharing more new experiences with the children and teachers at Fano!!!




TUESDAY

Today we spent our second day at school.  Miss Dowler worked with year 1 and 4 doing some literacy work and was taught how to make African peppermint by Aunty Isatu; she can't wait to show her class when she is back! Miss Freckleton worked with Nursery and Reception classes trying to transform their learning environment as well as reading stories and doing letters and sounds activities.  Mr Barnes enjoyed sharing letters from our children in All Saints with year 5 and 6 children in FANO and is looking forward to bringing the replies back to school.

Mr Ralston spent his second day at the Craig Bellamy football academy, coaching 2 more local schools. A very enjoyable day ended with a World Cup competition and smiles all round. 

We also visited the the vegetation near the swamps in Waterloo where it was very interesting to see how families earn a living.





WEDNESDAY

Mr Ralston welcomed Magic Musa and 20 boys from FANO school to the Craig Bellamy Football Academy for a coaching session.

The boys were really excited to play at the Academy and really enjoyed the session. The boys showed they had lots of footballing skills and there were lots of future generation Messis and Ronaldos on show.

Miss Freckleton introduced the Massage in schools programme in FANO today with Reception and Year 2.  She also delivered Early Years maths training to the teachers from local schools. Miss Dowler spent another lovely day with years 1 and 4 doing local geography and painting. 

It was also wonderful to see the Anfield Children's Centre leading sessions for dozens and dozens of women and children at the library building.  Well done Margie and Chantelle! Another challenging but wonderful day!  Tomorrow wait for news about the schools' tournament and the teacher football challenge - Waterloo, Sierra Leone vs Liverpool, England...and Mr Barnes and others giving a concert in Waterloo...




3 comments:

  1. Sounds like you had a busy day. Say hello to aunty Iris and all our friends in Waterloo. Look forward to reading your blogs. Claire H

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  2. Great photos! You all seem to be working very hard in the heat!

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  3. Looking forward to tasting African peppermint when Miss Dowler gets back to school!Hope the community work is going as well as the lessons in school. Loving the photographs too!

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