PUPILS at a Newport junior school learned about the work of a charity that improves availability and quality of water in Africa - from a former teacher.

Mary Watkins, a peripatetic teacher with Dwr Cymru Welsh Water, returned to Gaer junior school, where she taught for 20 years, to tell youngsters about conditions she witnessed first-hand in Uganda, on a fact-finding mission with the charity WaterAid.

During her trip she visited the slums of the capital Kampala, and spent a day with a family in a remote village, whose drinking water comes from either a borehole a two-hour walk away, or a swamp, which regularly makes them ill.

"The children were quite shocked by the pictures of the slums of Kampala and the living conditions of the people," said Mrs Watkins.

"I described a trip to the muddy swamp to collect water for the family I was spending a day with. They found it difficult to believe people would actually drink the water and were very shocked when they heard about how one in five children in Uganda die before the age of five years of water related diseases."

Claire McCarthy, Year Six teacher and science co-ordinator, said the children followed Mary's trip through her blog on Welsh Water's website "It is always valuable for pupils to have their eyes opened to the hardships that others endure," she said.

A short film of Mrs Watkin's trip can be viewed through www.dwrcymru.com/English/library/movies