Getting the British Bulldog spirit

Every so often, they check the diagrams laid out before them and fill the air with loud, jovial outbursts before they turn back to their work, gluing on wheels and tail wings.

This time last year, these eight or so teenagers at a school near Newcastle, may not have finished their year without being suspended or even expelled.

With their GCSE options looming, they had little prospect of gaining good qualifications, if any, and it seemed as if their lives were heading for status zero - nowhere.

But a pioneering pilot scheme run by the Ministry of Defence and Department for Education and Employment has, for the first time in a long time, started instilling them with confidence.

Ex-army instructors have been drafted into four schools in Newcastle to help tackle disaffection, discipline problems and truancy among the Year 10 and 11 pupils through the Skill Force project.

The teenagers, boys and girls, have been split into two groups in the school and are being guided through a two-year curriculum-based programme. The youngsters also work towards the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme and the St John Ambulance Young Life Savers Award.

While they still take core GCSEs - maths, English and science - they focus more on skill-based tasks and outdoor pursuits.

Making a plastic model aeroplane may not seem like hard work, but the concentration and precision it requires are skills which they can use when they get jobs.

One boy is successfully gluing his Bristol Bulldog plane together without instructions, no mean feat. He is quick to speak up when the teenagers are asked if they want to speak to the Press. "You can interview me if you like," he says. "Are you a reporter? Where do you work?"

I sit next to him and he tells me he thinks the course is "excellent".

"The instructors give you a chance to speak," he says. "They don't shout at you when you've done something wrong. They sit and explain things to you, whereas the teachers explain things once and, if you haven't heard, you don't get it explained to you again. I like the things you get a chance to do and the way you can say things. I think they listen a lot more."

In the next room, another 14-year-old agrees the instructors seem to understand them more. "I think this will get me somewhere in life," he says. "The lessons used to be hard and there was lots of written work. This is quite easy but it's because they give you lots of help and explain it." The course has even led Darren to consider joining the Army when he leaves school.

The Skill Force team grew from an idea of Lt Col Peter Cross, of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, who contacted Mike Booth, headteacher at Benfield School.

Steve Handford, a teacher and former Infantry captain, and teacher Mick O'Brien, were brought in to help plan the course. It finally got underway in September, with the scheme also being piloted in Norfolk.

It is believed part of the reason the course is so successful is because the instructors are not seen as teachers and so probably have more "street cred". The instructors are also keen to draw a line between the traditional teacher role models the children have already rejected, and themselves.

"I'm anxious that we're not teachers," says Steve, Skill Force team leader. "We need to maintain a discreet identity which means first name terms and a certain distance from the school disciplinary procedure.

"We handle things up to a point, but after that it becomes a school disciplinary matter. If we start handing out detentions we become teachers and it's not about that. Our very strength is that we can use our privileged position. They look at us differently. The respect we have is of a different type because we don't occupy the role models that they've rejected in the past."

He is keen to stress that, although the teenagers can be disruptive, the aim of the course is to catch them before they "drop out of the system".

"On the whole they've coped extremely well," he says. "There are difficult kids but we're finding we're turning the corner with a lot of them and their attitudes are changing. They will front up with bravado that they don't care but, actually, they don't want to be kicked off the course."

Another reason Skill Force works is because there are plenty of outdoor activities, including privileged access to military equipment which belongs to the reserve units. "We have access to radios, field equipment, rations and vehicles to assist with exercises," says Steve. "Every so often we'll conduct an exercise, say on communication skills, using the military radios to get them to build, transmit and record messages. We also have first aid exercises.

"At least twice every half term we're out doing practical stuff. There are a lot of team building exercises with a particular emphasis on problem solving."

Back in the classroom, the teenagers are also learning how to book different types of holiday, from package holidays to Egypt to trips to Cornwall. The objective is to teach them how to plan ahead - they even have an imaginary family to consider.

The Skill Force team spends a day each week at Benfield School, Firfield School, Walker School and West Denton School and the pilots have proved so successful the Government is pledging £600,000 to extend the scheme to Manchester, Merseyside, Leicester, Bristol, the West Midlands and London.

"The under-achievement and the behaviour is intertwined, as is the problem of low self-esteem," says Steve. "At the end, we hope the kids will go on to either full-time employment, full-time training, or full-time further education. We try to avoid the situation where they become so called status zero - ie none of the above."

One of the pupils has almost finished putting together his model aeroplane. It's his first day back after steering off course for a while. A determined look crosses his face. "There have been a lot of good things so far," he says. "I'm not letting anything get in my way this time."