Pupils rise to writing challenge

There are prizes in four categories

More than 33,000 schoolchildren have entered a government writing competition for schools in England.

The competition, Write Here, Write Now, was designed to encourage eight, nine and 10 year olds in their writing - the weak link in the national literacy strategy.

The School Standards Minister, Estelle Morris, said she was delighted at the "fantastic response".

"The large number of entries has exceeded all expectations and tapped into a huge enthusiasm for writing in primary schools across the country," she said.

Various genres

The competition was open to all children in Years 4 and 5 in England.

They had to complete a story started by Jacqueline Wilson, a poem begun by Roger McGough, a play started by Sir Alan Ayckbourn, or a TV/film script started by Phil Redmond.

Poet Roger McGough said: "It's great that so many children are taking part in the competition.

"Writing is not only important to getting on in life, it can be enormous fun too. I hope everyone enjoyed trying to finish my poem."

His poem began:

A stranger called this morning
Dressed all in black and grey
Put every colour in a bag
And carried them away

The tongue-tingling red of the
strawberry ice lolly ...

Regional winners will be announced in each category at the beginning of October, while the overall national winners will receive their prizes at a special awards ceremony at the end of November.

Prizes

There will also be awards in the story and poem categories for pupils working below the expected standard for their age, whose teachers feel they have produced what is for them an exceptional piece of work.

All the winning entries will appear in a book to be published by the Cambridge University Press.

Among the prizes are book vouchers from Cambridge University Press, educational CD-ROMs, PCs, web cameras and PC-Microscopes from Mattel Interactive, and a day out at The Disney Channel's studios in London.

Everyone who took part will get a certificate.

The government's target is for 80% of 11 year olds to have reached level 4 or above in English by 2002.

In last year's national curriculum test results in English, 71% did so - but that figure masks a gulf between the reading standard and that in writing, which was much lower.