CHILDREN at a North-East school will loan their favourite writer to a television soap for three weeks.

Carina Rodney, writer-in-residence at Peases West Primary, Billy Row, Crook, County Durham, has won a competition to work with the story team of Emmerdale next month.

Ms Rodney is funded by Creative Partnerships, and works with children to develop their writing skills and give them the experience of working with a professional writer.

Playwright Ms Rodney, who lives on Tyneside, has had work broadcast on Radio 4, and won the competition thanks to Newcastle writers' development agency New Writing North.

She is one of six people to take part in the scheme.

Ms Rodney, who has recently worked with 80 children at the school on a play based on a Zulu legend, said: "We will be working with the story department to see how Emmerdale is put together and how the ideas are developed.

She will write a trial script, which could be used in the series.

"It is a completely new direction for me, and I am hoping it will be a way into TV work."

She will take a break from the school during the project, but the pupils will follow her progress with interest.

She said: "I went down to Emmerdale for the day to find out about everything we would be doing, and the children were fascinated.

"They come from a rural area, so they can relate to a lot of what goes on in the soap.

"The main thing they wanted to know was had I seen the Dingles' pigs?"