A wonderful workshop yesterday in Truro, Cornwall, with international nurses from the Royal Cornwall Hospital, Treliske. Many have not been here for many months, so this was a great introduction to the city - led by our photography tutor Mike Newman. Thank you Hall for Cornwall for providing such a splendid cream tea (what an introduction to Cornish cuisine!) and allowing us to visit the theatre.
A full report on www.bridging-arts.org
There are several native Arabic speakers at the school and they helped today. Here is student from Syrian now in Year 6 having a conversation with a classmate - a few easy phrases that the native English speaker learned in minutes.
We had our Arabic language postcards to hand out - and we realised that some children had been practising overnight with siblings we had worked with yesterday.
It was wonderful to see the children's enthusiasm - and eagerness to learn.
A valuable morning at Falmouth Primary School in west Cornwall this morning with the wonderful Rawda Alater, who spoke about her life in Syria and her subsequent experience in the UK. She answered children's questions - and even taught a bit of Arabic.
In at least two classes there were Arabic speakers. In one, a child from Saudi Arabia, spoke no English at all and was delighted to be able to chat with Rawda. As the rest of us listened, we realised what it must feel like to be 'the one' who doesn't understand. It's a strange and disconcerting experience - and one that non-English speaking children must often come up against when they first arrive here.
Rawda spoke about the difference between schools in this country and in Syria. In Syria, children don't have hot dinners at school. The opposite - they take a packed lunch of flat bread and maybe cheese. Houses don't have curtains and carpets. It's hot. Life is different.
Rawda explained how she felt when she arrived as a refugee in Truro from Lebanon, where she'd been living for five years since she left the war in Syria in 2010.
She was afraid to open the door, she said, because she didn't understand a word of English.
Together this morning we learned how to say hello, how are you! And with the help of Arabic speaking pupils, wrote a few words in Arabic on the flip chart.
Mirabela from Bucharest, who has been working with us since before the pandemic, led the assembly. And she had two willing young helpers who had arrived at the school from Romania just a couple of years earlier, themselves without any English....
We left language postcards at the school so that children could take them home to practise the phrases that they had learned.
