A NEWPORT primary school was celebrating its sporting success as it topped the Wales average in one of the biggest surveys of sport played in school to be carried out.

Maesglas Primary School in Newport emerged as the best school in Wales for measures like the amount of time spent doing sport inside and outside of school time and how much pupils say they enjoy sport.

Sport Wales' School Sport Survey is the largest survey of any kind of young people in the UK, as it collected the opinions of 110,000 Welsh schoolchildren from almost 1000 schools.

Phil Harrhy, headteacher at the school, said: “It’s great to celebrate nationally, the progress we make in health and well-being for our children and for our community.”

The school have embraced two new initiatives called the Play to Learn project and the multi-skills project. As part of this, the school offers a wide range of sports clubs including, dance, rugby, athletics, cricket and football.

Carolyn Charles, PE co-ordinator at the school, said: “It‘s nice to be recognised because we have put in a lot of effort.

“The main thing that I’m especially proud of is the young leaders.”

Year six pupils are trained as young leaders and lead sporting activities for younger members of the school.

Ms Charles said: “It gives the children in the foundation phase an extra hour of sport every week.”

And the school have noticed the results. Last year, there was a seven per cent rise in the number of year three pupils participating in sport. All members of staff have been involved with the projects.

Ms Charles said: “All the teachers have been trained up.”

The survey revealed the percentage of school children ‘hooked on sport’ in Newport as a whole, was three per cent higher than the national average for local authorities.