Hollywood here we come

A classroom of Tauranga students have challenged film-makers twice their age to claim top honours at a national competition.

Students from Room 14 at Otumoetai Intermediate School have won one of 20 top awards in the Outlook for Someday film challenge.

The students entered a four-minute film about the effect palm kernel use in chocolate is having on the environment and society.

The theme of the competition, now in its sixth year, was sustainability.

The class of 9 to 11-year-olds came up with the idea for the film after taking part in a drama production earlier in the school term, said teacher Nicola Van Hout.

"We are a digi-class so that means every child has a laptop and I'm always trying to find ways to challenge their learning and when I learned about the film competition, it linked in perfectly with what we were doing - we were working on a topic of sustainability."

Mrs Van Hout said students learned a variety of new skills during the project, including filming, editing and acting.

The winners were formally announced this week but the class does not know which special award it has won. This will be announced at an awards' ceremony in Auckland next Wednesday.

Mrs Van Hout said the students were busy fundraising to help cover the cost of travel to Auckland for the awards.

As well as Room 14, three other classes entered in the competition.

Principal Henk Popping said he was extremely proud of the entrants as they were competing against budding film-makers up to twice their age.

Mr Popping said the school was proud of Room 14's success.

"Technology is a big part of the school's learning and it's really great to see Room 14 students doing so well in their digital learning."

The competition generated 191 entries, involving about 700 young people aged from 7 to 24 years. Entrants had to make a sustainability-related film up to five minutes in length, filmed with any camera.

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