PUPILS at Holmer Green Infant School in High Wycombe are so wild about walking to school that they were chosen to help launch Stepping Out Safely (SOS) a county-wide walking campaign.

Only a quarter of the children come to school by car whereas two years ago the figure was two-thirds.

On Friday the school hall was a sea of blue and green as the children gathered for special praise from Buckinghamshire County Council's cabinet member for schools, Marion Clayton, and road safety officer Marcus Rogers.

Cllr Clayton presented two five-year-olds, Eleanor Brown and Tyler Abear, with blue bags and a framed certificate for winning an armband design competition.

All the children had designed armbands which were on display in the hall, but the winning designs, chosen by local WPC Ali Gaffney and school governor Anne Linnell, will be made up into proper armbands and every child in the school will have one.

The school's efforts to promote walking include crocodile trails, where children walk to school together, with parents looking after them, and Go for Gold, where kids get stickers for walking to school.

There are several park and walk sites, including a pub car park, where parents can leave their cars and walk with the children to school, marked footpaths, and a car share scheme. The school also recruited its own school crossing patrol person.

The school is one of nine in the county with one or more crocodile trails. Marcus Rogers told the children they had done really, really well and he hoped to persuade children elsewhere to follow their footsteps.

Headteacher Sue Huntley said one noticeable effect was that the children arrived at school wide awake and alert.

The SOS campaign will run throughout the year.