Pupils at an Earlswood school helped spread the message of a litter-free environment - with a little help from a special furry guest.

Cosmo, Reigate and Banstead Council’s environmental mascot, made his first appearance of the spring to launch this year’s litter free schools initiative.

The furry green toad joined pupils from last year’s gold award-winning school, St John’s Primary School in Earlswood, who helped him launch the scheme for 2010.

Litter Free Schools, now in its 16th year, is aimed at encouraging pupils to keep a tidy school environment and reminding them of the importance of keeping a clean environment in general.

An incredible 48 schools borough-wide are participating in this initiative, which is being sponsored by Kimberly-Clark for the fifth year running.

Councillor Julian Ellacott, executive member for environment, said: “The litter free schools programme is a fun and educational way of reinforcing the important message that we can all help towards a keeping our environment clean and tidy.

"It is great that so many schools are taking part again this year and I wish all them all the best of luck.”

Pupils at the participating schools work hard to keep their school’s playgrounds, playing fields, driveways and area outside the school clean and tidy in anticipation of visits from the council’s eagle-eyed inspectors.

Inspectors visit each school twice, once on an arranged day and once to carry out an unannounced spot check.

During the visits the school is given marks for the cleanliness of different areas. Each school then gets a gold, silver or bronze award according to their total score.