Moving up from primary school is a daunting experience at any age.

But one Preston school has set up a special scheme aimed at making the transition from primary to secondary a lot easier.

At Christ The King Catholic Maths and Computing College in Frenchwood the older pupils are giving up their own time to help ensure the new year sevens feel at home in their new surroundings.

That means no-one getting lost in the corridors or failing to understand the school timetable, as well as getting to grips with the different way the school operates to their primary one.

Over the last few weeks year 10 and 11 scholars have been taking time out to make sure the new peer group mentoring scheme is a success.

They include the head girl and boy, Kate Aubrey-Williams and Joseph Cobb, as well as their deputies Ben Fagan and Norain Matthew, who also chair the school student council.

The mentors are on hand to provide confidential advice for the year sevens and can discuss a variety of issues including bullying. If they need more expert advice, they will take the issue on board and pass it on to the relevant teacher.

Peer support leader Tina Forshaw said: "The idea is for the older ones to be listening ears for the younger children so they can feel safe and secure and talk things through with them."

Norain said: "Our school is really special because we really do care about how well our young children in year seven settle in.

"We remember what it was like when we first started out at high school so it makes lots of sense to use that experience to help make things smoother and happier for our younger students."

Head boy Joseph added: "The school really listens to the views and opinions of the students. Lots of schools have a council but ours really does work well. Students from every year are represented at the meetings and the staff honestly take everything they say seriously."

The Lawrence Avenue school has a vertical pastoral system, meaning that morning registration in house tutor time allows pupils from all five year groups to be available to help the younger ones.

The school also has a team of senior prefects who meet with the head, deputy and assistant heads each week to work through events for the following week.

Assistant headteacher Bruce Jackson said: "In this way we are constantly ensuring that our students feel valued and important."

Peer mentoring doesn't stop at school.

Over at Runshaw College in Leyland the A level scholars operate a volunteer system which sees them acting as a "friendly face" for new starters.

The idea is to act as someone they can talk to and socialism within college, chatting to them if they meet them around college and help reduce the feeling of being alone in a crowd of new people.

The aim is to help the new students settle in and make a network of their own friends in their year or interest group - introducing them to the idea of taking part in extra curricular activities such as enrichment, clubs, the student union or Academy where they will meet people with similar interests.