Teachers will be able to search pupils for knives and other offensive weapons, such as ball bearing guns, without consent when the school term resumes next week.

They will even be encouraged to search randomly selected groups of pupils, such as an entire class, to send out a strong deterrent that weapons are not allowed.

The move has been welcomed by teaching union leaders, council chiefs and parent groups.

It comes just weeks after two boys were found carrying knives at Mason Moor Primary School in Southampton.

A nine-year-old had a kitchen knife and an 11-year-old was caught with a craft knife in separate incidents. Both pupils were punished with five-day suspensions.

Nationally, meanwhile, a Youth Justice Board survey has found that 33,000 of 11 to 16-year-olds admitted carrying a knife in school.

Convictions And, in 2004, there were 170 convictions of under-16s for carrying a knife, 37 for carrying them within a school.

Hampshire has had its share of incidents in the past.

A 12-year-old boy was stabbed in the face by another youngster during break-time at the Alderman Quilley School in Eastleigh.

A pupil was also found with ten shotgun cartridges in his pencil case at Hardley School in Holbury.

Most recently 16-year-old Craig Waters was hit in the right eye when a fellow pupil fired a ballbearing gun in the school canteen at Toynbee School, Chandler's Ford.

The incident followed a pupil at Bellemoor School in Southampton taking a fake gun into class and threatening to fire plastic pellets from it.

Guidelines issued to schools this week have said that professionally trained security staff, as well as teachers, could carry out the screening and searching of pupils. However, where there is felt to be a risk to safety the police should be called.

The government advice comes just three years after Southampton teacher and NASUWT union representative Ron Clooney called for airport-style security checks to be introduced - something that has since been adopted.

Schools already have the power to screen pupils for weapons with devices such as arches and "wand" metal detectors.

Such methods are being used in an effort to rid schools of the weaponry, including ballbearing guns, hunting knives, martial arts weapons, makeshift mallets and knives, that were all seized in local schools and photographed in the past.

Peter Sopowski, Southampton spokesman of the National Union of Teachers, said teachers' new search powers were to be welcomed.

"This will improve the situation because instead of having to ask senior staff to call the police to check whether a pupil is carrying a weapon, any teacher who has been approved and trained can carry out the search.

"However, knives in schools are not a huge problem. If someone has a knife, other pupils will often inform us before a member of staff sees it themselves.

"It is also worth remembering that there are plenty of knives, chisels and sharp instruments in craft, design and technology lessons and cooking knives in home economics."

Rare Mr Sopowski, who is also a Southampton teacher, said that in his experience bringing knives into school was a rare occurrence.

"Everyone is more cautious about it in schools now and if anything the number of knives and sharp instruments being brought into schools in on the decrease."

Hampshire's education boss Councillor David Kirk said he was glad of any extra powers that teachers could have to reduce the number of weapons in schools.

"I think it is important that teachers should be able to use these search powers at their own discretion," he said.

"They should not be under an obligation to carry out the checks if they don't feel it is appropriate.

"It is important to look at each case on its merits because in the end it is the teacher on the spot who can make the best judgement."

He said that so far this year there had been no incidents of knife crime in Hampshire's schools.

In Southampton representatives from the council's community safety team, youth and education services and the police will meet next Tuesday to look at the reasons behind knife crime in the city.

They hope their findings can be used to develop ways of raising awareness about the problem.

Youngsters at a city youth club have also given up their blades by taking part in a knife amnesty.

Across the city headteachers are encouraged to contact the police as a matter of urgency if an incident involving a knife takes place.

However a Southampton City Council spokesman added that such incidents were "very rare" with only one incident in the past ten years leading to a permanent exclusion.

Now education bosses are also looking at other similar-sized authorities to see if any lessons can be learned on preventing children taking knives into schools.

Angela Holland of the charity Parentline Plus said: "The charity believes that parents will welcome any initiative that reassures them of the safety and protection of their children."

The search powers for teachers come as the Daily Echo continues its campaign on knife crime after a spate of high-profile deaths from stab wounds earlier this year.

Our slogan "Carrying a blade - it's not sharp" was launched following the death of 18-year-old Lewis Singleton in March. He was fatally wounded as he walked home along Obelisk Road, Southampton.

To join the Daily Echo's campaign and get posters for your school, youth club or organisations, e-mail jenny.makin@dailyecho.co.uk.