Youngsters would usually get a ticking off for bringing rubbish into the classroom but pupils at one school near Fakenham on Friday spent a lesson delving through garbage.

Youngsters would usually get a ticking off for bringing rubbish into the classroom but pupils at one school near Fakenham on Friday spent a lesson delving through garbage.

The aim of the youngsters' rather smelly task was to see how effective their efforts had been to make All Saints Primary School at Stibbard a greener place - and they were delighted with the results which showed that the school was now creating far less waste than six months ago.

An analysis of the school's penguin bin in the playground showed that whereas 22kg of waste was put into the bin over three days in October, only 1.7kg of waste was put into the same bin during three days this month.

Other rubbish bins across the school also showed a decrease in waste, while paper and compost bins were being well used.

The impressive results were largely due to students in the year four and five class championing the environmental cause at the school.

The class has been encouraging teachers and fellow pupils to recycle wherever possible by, among other things, hosting a special assembly and creating posters with slogans such as “Bill and Ben the compost men,” and, “recycle today reuse tomorrow.”

Teacher Dawn Burden said: “The children have been learning about global warming and the greenhouse effect in class and yesterday's results have helped to show them what we can do to help the environment as a school. The class have been fantastic. They have been delighted with the results and I am really proud of them.”

The full results of the rubbish analysis by the year four and five class, which compared bins with three days of waste in October and then with three days of waste in March, were:

Year one - 20g put in the rubbish bin, 810g put in the paper bin and 2.22kg put in the compost bin in the March analysis (compared to 900g put in the rubbish bin in October's analysis)

Reception class - 10g put in the rubbish bin, 430g put in the paper bin and 180g put in the compost bin (2.3kg put in the rubbish bin)

Staff room - 180g put in the rubbish bin, 245g put in the paper bin and 800g put in the compost bin (2.3kg put in the rubbish bin)

Penguin bin in playground - 1.7kg put in the rubbish bin (22kg put in the rubbish bin)

Toadstool bin in the playground - 1.9kg put in the rubbish bin (3.1kg put in the rubbish bin)

The school is also trying to win a �5,000 prize by collecting the most online pledges from people vowing to do something to help the environment.

For more information visit www.climatechangechampions.org