A Royal Mail competition to design a Christmas stamp caught the imagination of children at a Newham primary school.

The youngsters at Essex Primary in Manor Park are among 20,000 children across the country who have created entries for this year’s Design A Christmas Stamp competition.

The theme of the competition is “What does the Christmas season mean to you?” and the designs can be religious or secular.

Two winning designs from children will be selected by a panel of judges, and these will appear on one of the 1st and one of the 2nd Class Christmas Stamps from this year’s range. Both winning designs will have to be approved by The Queen.

Stephen Agar, Managing Director of Consumer and Network Access at Royal Mail, said: “We’re delighted that our competition has captured the imagination of so many children across the UK. It’s great that we have already received over 20,000 entries, and the demand for the competition is so high.”

The winners of the competition will be announced in the autumn and the stamps will be available from November 5 2013.

Royal Mail will select 120 area runners up from 12 regions across the UK. Two finalists will be chosen from each, with 24 winners going into the grand final. Two overall winners will then see their design feature on this year’s First or Second Class Christmas stamp