BARN owls are not normally renowned for their singing, but they held a tune wonderfully in Bridestowe on Monday morning.

The Barn Owls class of Year 5 and 6 pupils from Bridestowe Primary School performed a song to open the Learn to Live conference taking place in the village hall.

The children worked collaboratively on the song, 'Stop and Think', a protest song about cruelty to animals. The lyrics were written by pupil Jo Waddington, with the rest of the class working to set the lyrics to music, with help from musician Graham Crocker.

Headteacher Mike Brady said: 'We constantly look for opportunities to develop the children's literacy skills in other aspects of the curriculum. At the same time, we challenge the children to question issues of a social, moral or spiritual nature.

'In this case, we used music lessons to explore the notion of "protest" songs. The children listened to the work of artists such as Bob Dylan from the 1960s up to modern bands protesting about war or environmental issues. They developed an understanding of how music can be a powerful medium for conveying a message.

'What a fantastic example of children seeing the relevance of their school work to real life and realising that as pupils, they have a voice.'

The class performed in front of around 100 people who attended the conference, organised by Community Lynx South West CIC on behalf of the West Devon Children and Young People's Partnership.

Professionals attending the conference included headteachers, teachers, parents, parent support services, counsellors and representatives of other support services.

The aim of the conference was to raise awareness of assessing the needs of each young person individually, how best to support those individual needs, and ensuring that parents and carers have a voice as well.