Pupils enjoyed a wonderful day last week, learning all about the central African country of Malawi. Recently, Beckley, along with the other Genesis Federation schools has partnered with a local charity – Starfish Malawi. The charity links schools in East Sussex and Kent with schools in Malawi, creating fantastic opportunities for the pupils to learn about each other’s cultures, lives, schools, homes and so on.

Our Malawi Day helped to raise awareness about the country, the people and our partner school. Where is Malawi? How big is it? What’s the weather like? How similar is school? Beckley pupils enjoyed a range of activities that included creating some Malawian art, tasting Malawian food and performing some Malawian drumming music. At the end of the day, parents heard a talk from the founder of Starfish Malawi who told the story of how the charity came about, and the various projects the charity now runs.

Children came dressed in the colours of the Malawi flag – red, green and black and the money raised from this will be used to buy some footballs for our partner school in Malawi. We learned that the pupils at Kambriwi School currently have to ‘make’ their footballs by scrunching plastic bin liners together and binding them up with string!

We are all excited about the potential generated by linking up with Kambriwi School in Malawi. It will provide some great opportunities to learn about everyday life in a very different part of the world and celebrate the similarities and differences we share as schools that are 1000s of miles apart.