When children arrived at Street Lane Primary School, in Denby, on Monday morning they discovered the three colourful characters missing from the garden they had worked hard to create.

Two of the gnomes were later found smashed up in an adjoining school field but one is still missing.

Headteacher Jan Robinson said: "There have been no sightings of one of the gnomes that had a wheelbarrow.

"We found the one that was sitting on a swing and the one leaning on a fork."

This is the first time the school has been hit by vandalism and Mrs Robinson, who bought the gnomes for the children to enjoy, said she was very disappointed that vandals could have done such a thing.

She said: "What upsets me most is that we put a lot of effort into the garden so that we could plant onions and other vegetables. It was our pride and joy and then I came in on Monday and the gnomes were all gone.

"The vast majority of the children are shocked. It has upset a lot of young ones because they love having a look at the garden."

She said some children had even offered to buy new gnomes.

Following the incident the police went to the school to speak to the children about criminal damage.

Mrs Robinson has appealed for people to be vigilant over the summer holidays and look out for anyone on the school premises.

In a separate incident in Riddings, two logs were thrown through the window of the village junior school. The incident happened between 4pm on Friday and 4.55pm on Sunday.