It feels strange that this is my last blog post, as the six-month placement is coming to the end. It has gone very quickly, as anything fun does, and it’s hard to believe the start of the season when we were still getting snow days was so long ago!

I have gained so much from this placement, not least of all confidence. Leading groups of children and standing up in front of classes to deliver talks has been great fun, and not as scary as I originally thought. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time working with primary schools and have especially enjoyed the brilliant and bizarre questions school children ask – including ones such as on the shape of cuttlefish brains! Seeing children getting excited over rockpool finds and encouraging their interest has been extremely rewarding.

 

I am very grateful to everyone who works here and to all the volunteers whom I have learnt so much from. I have gained great experiences of creating my own event, as well as receiving lots of training including snorkel instructing. Snorkelling at Wembury has been one of my favourite activities, particularly because I have enjoyed the challenge of getting into fish identification – which was completely new to me. I will also miss exploring Wembury’s rockpools. My favourite rockpool animals have definitely been the sea slugs (the best of the best being the solar powered sea slug), which have a lot more going on than meets the eye.

 

Next up for me after Wembury is going back to my old University, Keele, to complete a masters on birds and tree diseases. I am very excited to get back into studying, though unfortunately this will lead me to one of the furthest points from the sea in the country! I won’t forget everything I’ve learnt about the marine environment however, and I hope to be able to volunteer at Wembury sometime next season to prove it.

Sea you soon (hopefully),

Matthew