Pupils at an Ammanford school have been highly commended for swapping their mobile phones for board games to help improve family time at home.

As part of a digital competence framework, Ysgol Bro Banw pupils have been taught the importance of balancing screen time with other parts of their lives.

Teacher Lucy Lock said: “We love technology in Ysgol Bro Banw.

“When it is used purposefully it can be wonderful, but we also appreciate that sometimes we need a little reminder that there are other things in our lives too.

“When we did a survey, and lots of the children felt that technology got in the way of family time and they would like to do more activities at home with their family and we know more family time will promote the well-being of our children.

“The children came up with the lovely idea of creating further opportunities for family time by opening a board games library that pupils could borrow from called the Lending Lodge.”

The Lending Lodge aims to promote positive screen time through movie sacks which create opportunities for family nights.

Pupils from across all year groups have designed and created the library and built a digital database which tells them which games are available and who is borrowing them.

The children had a budget and worked out how many games they could buy by using formula in a spreadsheet and they went to buy the games on a shopping trip to Ammanford.

The school were recognised for their work surrounding Better Screen Balance for children at the National Digital Learning Event 2018 at the Celtic Manor last month.

Some of the Better Balance initiatives included creating a mobile device 'amnesty box' and creating a place where children can borrow non-screen activities for the night.

Mrs Lock added: “All initiatives have been created to help our pupils get a better screen balance and to encourage them to spend more time doing activities with their family.

“We were presented with a High Commendation award by Kirsty Williams AM, Cabinet Secretary for Education.

“The NDLC’s Pupil Award recognises the achievements of a pupil or a group of pupils from a maintained school or college in Wales who have either used technology in an innovative way or have created excellent original digital material.”