The project to help Year Five children get a taste of secondary school life has started up again at Beths Grammar School in Bexley.

The Curriculum Project invites 30 pupils from selected schools in the area to Beths, where they will gain an insight into secondary school life and the kinds of things they will be learning about in Year Seven.

After the success of last year's design-technology classes, when the pupils designed and made puppets and performed a show at their primary school with the puppets they made, Beths is hosting classes in maths with ICT and science.

The children will learn how to use a Bunson burner safely, how to use a microscope, how to collect, handle and make sense of data and how to use software to construct shapes and investigate angle properties.

Della Horniblow-King, PA to the headteacher at Beths Grammar School, said: "The project isn't a way of Beths scouting for business we invite girls along to these classes and we're a boy's school.

"These lessons are just a way of giving something extra to the community."

Pupils from each primary school are invited to Beths for one afternoon per week for three weeks.

They will be given an hour lesson of maths/ICT and an hour-long science session.

Della continues: "The kids are overwhelmed when they first walk into the classrooms as they are so different to the ones they are used to.

"Because the school is so much bigger than the primary schools, we have many more facilities.

"The children may only have one computer per classroom at their school but we can provide them with one per person, which obviously gives them more time to use it."

The Curriculum Project is the brain-child of Beths' assistant headteacher Vikram Gukhool.

He came up with the idea after hearing about the concept when talking to teachers from other schools across the country, while attending professional development courses.

He said: "These lessons are a great way of allowing the kids to discover maths and computing using new technologies.

"We also make our science lessons fun and captivating, which may help shape some young scientists of the future."