An icy start to the day but an exhilarating workshop

A cold start - takes a while to scrape the frost off the car windows. And very icy in the valley.
But a great workshop at Helston School.

120 Year 11 students who are engaged, ask questions and really help take the project forward.
Again, am quite moved by the notion that this was where I went to school - and in one sense set off in life.

Waldek comes along to support Ewa in questiontime. He is still working at the medical supplies factory in Newquay, that she has now left.
And  - how heartening is this - more than one student in the Evaluation form said 'It changed the way I thought about migrant workers'.
Later a meeting at Pool with Ola Paluch, to think of ways of working with children there, whose parents are migrant workers.

First workshop of the week and daffodils during the day

Daffodils, left by my mother, to start the day.

Then to Helston School  for the first of two workshops on consecutive days this week. An engaging discussion with 120 students (Y11), and Ewa. The teacher here - point of contact, Joe Stuteley - has said that students could have knee-jerk tabloid-fuelled attitudes towards migrant workers. And that is what we need to combat. We give a presentation at the start: they go off to their classrooms. Then return for a plenary discussion. No sign of prejudice - in particular. But it's quite an hard audience to warm up. The hall is freezing - perhaps that is part of the problem. Also on a personal level find it very strange to be back in this school. It was my old school.

Then talking to possible assistants for future workshops - in Helston and Camborne.

Heading home, quite late in the afternoon, am surprised to see the pickers still picking. It is already growing dark. 

But this is the peak season. Mother's Day - the absolute pinnacle of the daffodil season - isn't far off. So the tractors are still at work until well into the evening.

The pickers arrive - a new pastoral

Driving home on the Helston road, pass the same field, where the daffodils don't seem to have come along much. But a bus has arrived, bringing workers. The pickers are at work nearby. A 21st century pastoral landscape.