St George's C.E. Primary School

Up early and then a quick dash to Stalybridge station in order for us to catch the train to Liverpool. Then a bus up to Hope Park made us feel like students all going into university. It was very exciting! We went to the main meeting area got our name badges and had Fairtrade drinks and tried out the smoothie maker which meant we sat on a bicycle and pedalled hard to squash the Fairtrade bananas into a smoothie!!  It was great fun! We then split into groups and heard from two young people from Ghana called Esther and Samuel whose parents grow cocoa. They told us about their lives and how cocoa gets made into the chocolate we sell in school- divine bars. A lady with a microphone moved around so we got a chance to ask them lots of questions and even found out which football teams they supported. Before lunch we did another workshop where we learned about how tea is grown in Malawi and how the villagers work together and use the Fairtrade Premium (this extra they get )to improve their lives. By sharing ideas in groups, we tried to decide how to spend £1000 between 5 villages. It was really hard as every suggestion seemed important. After lunch we had one more workshop where we thought about how may people are involved in making a piece of clothing made from cotton. As each person came up with a job they went out to the front and we ended up with a huge line of people.The group leader talked about how Fairtrade gives the cotton farmers a fair wage for all their hard work.   As we left to catch the bus back to the station we were all given a bar of chocolate and a huge poster of cocoa plants for school. Despite the long journey, it was a really great day and we learned lots!!