A SIX-year-old girl won a national playground design competition for her school and landed £2,000 worth equipment for her school.

ThermoPlastic Designs and Lines (TPDAL) - a Southend-based company which transforms school playgrounds and children centres with environmentally-friendly designs and floor games - ran a competition which saw hundreds of children from schools across the country enter.

Echo:

Winner - Athena's winning design

Echo:

Athena Vibert, a Year Two pupil from St Mary’s Prittlewell Church of England Primary School, in Boston Avenue, Southend, was over the moon when her design was chosen by racing driver-turned CBBC TV presenter, Rebecca Jackson.

Nina Osborne, managing director at TPDAL, said: “Children from all over the country entered and we narrowed it down to a final three.

“Rebecca chose Athena’s design and had no idea what school she was from.

“She then recorded a video announcing Athena as the winner and it was played to the whole school during their assembly - it was a total surprise for Athena and the rest of the children.”

Her The six-year-old’s piece was chosen for incorporating different cultures and education into her design.

The design will be installed at the school’s playground, with Athena’s help, on April 23, and will be used as an educational number jump - with the aim of helping the children with languages.

The design drawn by the creative little girl includes planet Earth in the middle, with children holding hands around the world with ‘hello’ greetings at top of the shapes in different languages.

Nina added: “Meeting Athena was an absolute joy.

“When we entered into Athena’s classroom, we were met by 30 excitable children and a grinning Athena who was over the moon we’d come to visit.

“The whole class were so supportive of Athena’s success, which was lovely to see.

“She excitedly introduced us to all of her friends, showed us around her classroom, and told us how much she loves to draw and colour.

“As soon as we saw Athena’s entry, we were blown away by her creativity.

“The way she had incorporated fun play with education was something we were very impressed by.

“Athena is a very worthy winner and we are delighted our playground design competition has encouraged such creativity.

“Our specialist designers have worked with Athena and using our software, created a working design ready for installation.”