CHILDREN at Ladybridge High School cannot wait to get home to do their homework.

For assistant headteacher and head of technology at the school in Deane, Stephen Astley, has turned homework into a game the youngsters cannot get enough of.

He has developed an arcade-quality computer game, Arcadu, which harnesses the lure of computer games to encourage, support and motivate pupils to carry out homework and revision tasks.

For each piece of work they do, the children get access to games on which they can compete against classmates.

And it is proving very popular.

Mr Astley, aged 37, said: “I came up with the idea last July after the Building Schools for the Future scheme was dropped.

“Ladybridge would have been in the first phase to benefit from the scheme.

After that I was looking for a way to motivate pupils.”

As a computer teacher he said he knew young people liked playing computer games.

He said: “We listened to students and developed a series of attractive games.

Many students stopped playing with their commercial consoles and chose to complete Arcadu’s challenge instead — in their own time.

“Rather than chasing students for homework teachers have found students opting to complete over 800 questions a week without any intervention from teachers.”

League tables for class, school and national levels are included to reward performance and monitor students.

Other schools wanting to use Arcadu pay £2 per child, with a minimum subscription of £250.

Money made will be ploughed back into developing other innovative educational tools.

Other schools have signed up including Rivington and Blackrod High School and Rumworth Special School.

Pupil Clayton Henry, aged 15, said: “It gets quite competitive because you are playing against students in your school and other schools.

“It is very popular with students here.”