THE Sonning Common Young Authors competition is back for another year.

Sponsored by the Standard, the competition is open to 11- to 16-year-olds who live and study in Sonning Common, Peppard and Kidmore End. Children under 11 can be entered at the discretion of their sponsor.

To take part, children must attend either Sonning Common, Kidmore End or Peppard primary schools, Chiltern Edge Secondary School, or be part of youth organisations such as the scouts and guides.

Organiser Dirk Jones, a Sonning Common parish councillor, wants to get more children picking up a pen rather than a computer games console.

He said: “When I was chairman of the youth club in Sonning Common, some of the children were writing their own posters and the spelling wasn’t very good.

“They were 15 or 16 years old — my kids never had that problem at that age.”

Mr Jones, 57, of Kennylands Road, Sonning Common, added: “Words are the building blocks of life, the most practised form of communication other than speech. Their use is needed in jobs and running lives.

“The best writers can change people’s lives, can shape opinion, can persuade others and build pictures in the minds of people about what they themselves are seeing. I am half-British and half-European so I neded writing in order to communicate.”

Entrants must submit a handwritten story-line of at least 300 words. The story or play itself must be between 1,500 and 3,000 words for 11- to 13-year-olds and 3,000 and 5,000 words for 14- to 16-year-olds, on a given subject, such as “My school day” or “Imagine if…”.

The top prizes include laptop computers, each with Microsoft Office Student software.

For more information, visit www.sonningcommonparish.co.uk/writing. If you would like to be a sponsor, call Mr Jones on (0118) 972 2165.