Young scribes at Greenhead have won a literary prize for the third year on the trot.

The group of talented wordsmiths have retained the Bangla Poetry Competition for Bradford Schools.

Jahena Ullah, Asma Ali, Rahida Parvin, Sayhana Ali, Rukun Ali and Khalid Mahmood all took part in the competition.

To regain the trophy the young writers from years nine, 10 and 11 composed a selection of poems and short stories.

And their achievement was all the more amazing considering the short length of time they had to work.

Community development liaison officer Fiza Ghafoor explains: "The pupils were only notified about the deadline on the night before so they had to work very hard to get their entries finished.

"The poetry and short stories they wrote were excellent and they did very well at such short notice."

Their literary success means that the school retains the shield it has held for the last two years.

Two Year Nine students have also entered into the literary spirit by recording extracts from well known novels.

David Proctor and Huzma Basharat have recorded two short passages onto tape which they are entering into a national competition for 11 to 14-year-olds.

David chose to read a passage from 'Goodnight Mr Tom' by Michelle Magorian with Huzma reciting from 'A Christmas Carol' by Charles Dickens.

The competition has been organised as part of the National Year of Reading, which aims to encourage youngsters to read. Performing arts students also had an acting masterclass with a professional theatre company.

Year 10 students took part in a three hour workshop with the 'Mind the Gap' theatre company.

Under the direction of Matt Hargreaves, the budding thespians did a variety of exercises to extend their improvisation techniques.

Sociology students had the chance to hear from a group of renowned writers during a recent day long conference.

A group of 29 Year 12 students attended a sociology conference at Manchester University, where speakers included the renowned feminist writer Germaine Greer.

Sharpshooter Michelle Smith has received a massive boost in her bid to represent Great Britain.

The talented youngster has received a grant from the Drake and Tonson Swire Smith travel fund. The cash will go a long way to cover her travel costs to South Africa, where she will represent her country and compete against the best young shots from across the globe.

The competition will take place over the Easter holidays.

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