School Report

BBC School Report gives 11-14 year-old students in the UK the chance to make their own news reports for a real audience.

On 26 March 2009 schools take part in a News Day, simultaneously creating video, audio and text-based news reports and publishing them on a school website, to which the BBC aims to link.

Here in Dorset there are three schools involved in the project: Cranborne Middle School near Wimborne Minster, Lytchett Minster School in Poole, and The Gryphon School in Sherborne.

Cranborne Middle School

Sarah Eadie is the Literacy Co-ordinator for Cranborne Middle School.

Together with her pupils, she's looking forward to the News Day.

Sarah says: "We're involving the whole of Year 8, nearly 100 pupils. So far, the plan is that each English group with cover a slightly different area, covering things like School news, Comic Relief activities, and local/national news - but we're remaining flexible!

"The children are really excited and motivated by the idea of writing for a real purpose and a real audience.

"We're really looking forward to giving the children the opportunity to make full use of their fantastic ICT skills and we hope that the concept of working to tight deadlines will be a valuable learning experience for them."

Lytchett Minster School

Meanwhile at Lytchett Minster School Year 9 pupils have been preparing themselves for School News Day for the last few months.

Alan Willans, Head of ICT at the school, says: "It has been a fantastic opportunity for our students to get involved with the BBC in making the news.

"They have enjoyed creating news items, using autocue and filming their reports. 

"Although it is our first year of joining the BBC in this project we already see how it will grow from strength to strength in our future curriculum."

On School News Day itself, at 2pm, the students will be broadcasting their news covering the stories of the day as well as their own special reports on local issues.