Christian Aid urges kids to 'gang up on poverty' by making movies

The kids branch of Christian Aid, Global Gang, has launched its new 'Gang Up On Poverty!' campaign, a nationwide search for young, aspiring movie-makers to make a short film about what should be done to address global poverty.

The competition is open to young people aged between seven and 14 and the winning entry will be shown on the revamped www.globalgang.org website and displayed at the London International Gallery of Children's Art later this year.

Entries, which should be no longer than three minutes, will be based on children getting their peers to take action on poverty.

Global Gang is packed with stories, pictures and clips from children around the world. The redesigned site encourages 7- to 13-year-olds to see themselves as active members of the global community, and enables them to chat, share ideas and play fun games that relate to development issues.

Sophie Shirt, editor of Global Gang, says: "Global Gang houses an incredibly rich bank of content, from games about landmines and global warming, to stories about ex-child soldiers and child labour.

"Through fun, interactive activities and compelling stories, the site engages children with the issues of poverty and injustice.

"Our intention is that by illustrating what children have in common and giving them opportunities to interact, the site will encourage children here to feel connected with children worldwide. We hope to awaken a sense of injustice and ultimately a desire to take action and make the world a better place."

Global Gang is also a great resource for homework with a new section called 'Find it!' in which kids can browse the entire site according to key words and topics. To add to the fun, children will be able to choose an avatar (or online character) to represent themselves on new message boards.

Find out more:

Global Gang is linked to Christian Aid's Learn website - an invaluable resource for teachers, teaching assistants and youth leaders. Visit www.christianaid.org.uk/learn for notes on how 'Gang Up On Poverty' links to the ICT and citizenship curricula.

'Learn' also contains a wide selection of free-to-download resources, including assemblies, stories and case studies in times of emergency and disaster. Its news and calendar sections are must-have resources for teachers who need to keep up with world news, disaster updates, events and competitions.

The new, improved website, www.globalgang.org is now live and full details of how to enter the 'Gang Up On Poverty' competition can be found there.