Category: Kafuro Primary School

Goodbye to Mr Burford

On Friday, Liss Junior School held an event to celebrate the life of Mr Andy Burford, our former headteacher who passed away over Christmas 2020 when the country wasin the midst of a lockdown due to Covid. It is only now that the school has been able to hold an appropriate celebration of his life. Many people involved in the Queen Elizabeth Parks project – both in the UK and Uganda – will remember that Mr Burford was instrumental in Liss Junior School becoming twinned with Kafuro Primary School in the first place. He also assisted Mr Stanley with many of the bids for British council funding and was a source of many brilliant ideas for joint projects between the schools.

Mr Burford’s family attended the celebration of his life where an art installation was revealed on the side of the school (as seen below). The roots and trunk of the tree represent the core skills we give the children at school with the leaves representing the growth they make while at Liss Junior. The butterflies were made by Yr 6 as they leave us and fly away to the next stage of their education and adulthood

We also planted a cherry field in the school orchard up on the field in memory of Mr Burford. As well as giving the pupils another source of fruit, it will also produce a beautiful blossom each year.

Mr Burford continued his love of learning after he had retired, and his wife, June, gave the school a beautiful litograph that he had created.

All the pupils, staff and parents at Liss Junior School will miss Mr Burford as will many of the people involved with the twinning project.

UK teachers hold cluster meeting

On Thursday, UK teachers met at Liss Junior School for the first time this year. The main throust of the meeting was to get a full report on Miss Duncan and Mr Davies’ trip to Uganda during the summer as well as hearing the latest news on the process to get Stephen and Shakilah, the headteachers of Kafuro Primary School and Rihamu Junior School, over to the UK by the beginning of March. There was also an opportunity for schools to share what they have been doing as well as outlining expectations for the year.

UK teachers meeting at Liss Junior School

Beginning Wants & Needs work at Liss

Year 6 have begun their work on the wants and needs learning that Miss Duncan and Mr Davies began when they visited Kafuro and Rihamu during the summer.

Our first task was to draw around the outline of a pupil and give the outlined child a name. Next, we discussed what this child would need to grow up into a happy and healthy adult. The children were set the task of identifying twenty things that would help the child achieve this. At this point there was no input and the children could completely decide for themselves.

Once the pupils had completed their twenty things that a child would need, they wrote them on post its and placed them in the middle of the child. Next, they were asked to remove five of the things that the child could do without – this reduced the items to fifiteen. This exercise was repeated twice more and generated fierce debate on each table as the children argued over what should stay. Eventually, each group had five items left which they shared with the rest of the class and compared.

Our next step was to introduce UNICEF wants and needs cards and perform a similar exercise. However, firstly the children were asked to divide the cards into three groups: those they thought were Most Important, Important and Least Important. Then, once again, Mr Stanley asked the pupils to reduce the cards down to just five, and the classroom became very animated as the children had to make some very difficult decisions over what should stay and what should go.

Once the pupils had completed this exercise, they compared the five wants and needs they had left with the post its they had created in the previious lesson. As a class, we then discussed the difference between wants and needs.

Needs: the things that are absolutely necessary for all children to have a happy and healthy life

Wants:the things that are nice to have but not necessary for a full life.

We finished this first session by discussing some key questions: Are wants and needs different for people in the UK and Uganda? Why don’t all children in the world have what they need?

To the first question, the pupils were quite clear that needs would be the same in both countries. However, there was an acknowledgement that wants would be different. For example, a pupil in the UK might want a Playstation or an Xbox, but for a pupil in Uganda, where electricity is scarce in places, a new bike would be something that they might really want.

The pupils were surprisingly not shocked that children in the world didn’t have everything they need. They were quite clear about some of the reasons why this might be the case:

  • War
  • Some countries don’t have enough money to feed people
  • Some governments are corrupt
  • The environment was not conducive to growing food – a result of climate change
  • Lack of water supply – again due to climate change.

There was widespread disbelief in the class that millions of people go hungry in the world when there is more than enough food to feed everyone comfortably.

In our next session the pupils looked at the needs of children are protected. We studied the United Nations Charter for the rights of the Child. In groups, the children looked at the post its they had created during the first session and divided them into wants and needs. For each need they tried to marry it up with one of the articles from the convention

The class then shared their ideas together and were easily able to show how the articles supported the needs they had identified.

Finally, we looked at scenarios in which children’s rights have been abused. The pupils were each given a scenario and tasked with identifying which rights had been violated and suggesting actions to restore these rights.

Some of the scenarios are posted below:

[gview file=”http://kafuroliss.primaryblogger.co.uk/files/2019/09/Scenario-B.docx”%5D

[gview file=”http://kafuroliss.primaryblogger.co.uk/files/2019/09/Scenario-C.docx”%5D

[gview file=”http://kafuroliss.primaryblogger.co.uk/files/2019/09/Scenario-D.docx”%5D

[gview file=”http://kafuroliss.primaryblogger.co.uk/files/2019/09/Scenario-E.docx”%5D

[gview file=”http://kafuroliss.primaryblogger.co.uk/files/2019/09/Scenario-F.docx”%5D

[gview file=”http://kafuroliss.primaryblogger.co.uk/files/2019/09/Scenario-G.docx”%5D

In our next post we will talk about Rights and Responsibilities and how we have used them to create our class charter.

Uganda Day 11: 2019

Unlike the CM sports gang, Paul and I had a later than normal start. We headed to the Conservation Cup tournament which kicked off just as we got there – perfect timing! Whilst supporting Kafuro during their football and rugby games from the sidelines, I had time to chat to Ashley who leaves tomorrow! I can’t wait to catch up with her when we are both back in the UK. I also chatted to some children on the side of the pitches who had lots of intriguing questions about England. 


A few games completed, it was time for lunch. Children were served first and then the adults ate in a classroom which felt like being back at school during wet play! 


I was also able to meet lots of people whilst I was there. I met Stephen’s wife who was very kind, and Stephen Biru who is Director of Education and Conservation. 


The finals took place in the afternoon and it went very quickly. Kafuro didn’t win either of the tournaments but they showed fantastic sportsmanship and team work. I’m sure they will come back stronger next year! The winning teams were awarded the prizes and all teams were given a football from the kit used for training. Once all teams had been celebrated, it was time to say some sad farewells. It was hard to get away from the school as no one wanted to leave. As we were driving away, we passed Stephen who had very kindly been to buy me a present – a lovely wall hanging in the shape of Uganda! A wonderful reminder of my fantastic time in Africa. 


Driving home we passed some small shops selling souvenirs. I purchased an elephant carving, a keyring with the uganda flag and a small drum to show the children at school for music lessons. 


At Tembo in the evening, we had our usual meals, followed by more farewells. This time we had to say bye to Steve, Karen, Jan and Ashley. I’m sure I will be making visits to QECP when I am home for a catch up!  


When we went to the Lodge in the evening, a huge storm came over, which we’ve had a few of whilst being here. The lightning here is brighter than England, it completely lights up the sky for longer than usual. Strangely there is no thunder to accompany it and it is still unusually warm during the storms. Joffrey explained that this storm was a farewell to Steve and his group, just as the rain on our first day had been a greeting. If this is the case, England must be saying hello and goodbye to lots of people all the time!  

Current update from Kafuro

Greetings to all our friends in the World,

We thank everyone who spares his precious time to read our blogs and witness from what we are learning together.

Liss community, our special friends, we are proud of all the activities you do.

On an assembly, Mr. Yowasi Byaruhanga has been updating about progress Liss Junior School has making both in studying about Uganda and sport. In sports, a hand of applause to Toby and all other Liss participants who have continued to uplift Liss Junior School’s name.

All of us at Kafuro Primary School, we are very lucky to study about England and our friends.  In addition, we have learnt a lot from you about even our own country and even Africa from our interaction with you.

We are training very hard for friendly matches with schools in the conservation cup,
We are the Tag Rugby champions for the last two years. We are training very hard to be the best champions in this year.

In weather, we have been experiencing a dry spell for almost two and a half months. February is usually a rainy month but this time the conditions has changed.
In this, Mr. Yowasi Byaruhanga has alerted us again about the facts about global warming and weather changes due human activities. Most of our school children have been mobilized to plant at least one tree every month.
Buying seedlings is far better and quicker than making a nursery bed.
We have selected a representative for every class to coordinate the process of all our pupils in school planting a tree every month and clearing and promoting the environmental conservation.

Thanks for reading our blog.
If you have been reading our blog in silence, well done, but we kindly recognize you and thank you. Could you please write a small comment for us to hear from you?? 🙂

Written by Primary Six and seven – guided.

Good luck to P7 pupils

From all the pupils and staff at Liss Junior School, we would like to wish the P7 pupils  at Kafuro and all the other QEPP schools in Uganda every success in their Primary Leaving Examinations this coming week. We are well aware of the magnitude of these examinations and also know how hard all of you will have worked over the current academic year. You will all be in our thoughts this week!

PRIMARY LEAVING EXAMINATION

To all our Linked Schools

With all the hard work and good preparations your teachers have done,

The power of the Almighty God is ready to bless you with SUCCESS in your Primary Leaving Examinations to be done tomorrow Monday and Tuesday.

Best of our lovely wishes to you you all and we know you are very ready and bright to make it.

Bless you all with Success.