PRIMARY school pupils are competing for a tidiness prize.

Classrooms at Crook Primary School are always spick and span as children compete each week for two Golden Broom awards.

Caretaker Keith Robinson marks the rooms daily and rivalry is keen.

As well as the brooms there is a Clean Sweep Shield awarded to the overall winning class.

The idea came from the school's headteacher Antonella Lupton, who heard about it at a Canadian school.

With other Crook and Willington headteachers, she visited Toronto to develop links for an information and communications technology Testbed project, seeking to open up learning opportunities through technology.

She said: "We saw a golden broom in a janitor's cupboard. It is such a good idea. It encourages the children to keep the school tidy and raises the esteem of everybody in the school.

"The children have taken to it very well. We have two brooms, for key stage one and key stage two. The caretaker says the classrooms have become 100 per cent cleaner now the children take a pride in their surroundings.