Primary school boy really 'appy' with win

Luke Atkinson beat hundreds of challengers from across the country to be crowned the creator of the best app for the Key Stage 2 age group.

All year five and six students at Flookburgh Primary School, near Grange-over-Sands, entered the Espresso Coding competition to design the nation's best winter themed app for smart phones, tablets and computers.

According to the judges, Luke, 11, won because his app was incredibly complicated to design.

His app consisted of a game where the user controls Santa Claus and has to collect as many presents as possible while constantly being pelted with snowballs.

The user gets 15 lives during which time they have to try and amass a high score.

It is an achievement made all the more impressive by the fact it was completed within just a few weeks during regular classroom hours.

Flookburgh Primary entered the competition when it began preparing to teach the government's new curriculum, which includes computer coding, in an attempt to get ahead of the game before it comes into force next year.

Gillon Ross, 29, a year five and six teacher at the school, said: "We have been trying to push the ICT and computing side of things because that's the way the world is going at the moment.

"Everything's becoming more technology focussed and kids are adept at it already and we want to enable their understanding of how the things they use actually come to be - like an X-box.

"It's about getting them to understand the work that's gone into it. Luke was thinking technologically about it and if he ever got stuck I would demonstrate it to him briefly and then he would apply it really quickly. He's actually more of a sportsman though, so he's got it all!"

Sarah Heath, marketing executive at Espresso Coding, said: "We went through and shortlisted three or four entries from each age group and for Luke's app the judges were unanimous.

"He won because we could tell a lot of time and effort had been put into it. We were really impressed."