Today BBC Newsround unveils exciting new changes to its format to offer more kids more news in more places.

New longer daily TV bulletin on CBBC and BBC iPlayer

More news stories at Newsround online with greater depth and analysis

Series of specials announced looking at issues important to children

New YouTube channel launches showcasing best of Newsround

The popular children’s news programme will today introduce one longer eight-minute daily bulletin to air every morning on CBBC and BBC iPlayer while its popular Newsround website will now offer more in-depth stories and features than ever before.

CBBC is also announcing new commissions of the award-winning Newsround Specials, co-produced by the Newsround team and Children’s In House Productions. This autumn Growing Up Black In The UK (2x20') will follow the story of three children who reflect the diversity of the Black British experience. The trio will pool their passions and opinions as they begin to craft a manifesto for change. Early next year Newsround will be asking Why Don’t We Talk About Periods?, looking at the issues around period poverty and the campaigners looking to bust period myths and normalize the conversations around menstruation.

A brand new Newsround YouTube channel also launches today which will bring young viewers the best of Newsround’s content from around the world. Videos will be curated from the website and news bulletins throughout the week and will highlight the issues most impacting on children as well as providing a platform for their points of view. Also this month, a full-time environmental correspondent will join the Newsround team to inform and educate our young audience with the most up to date environmental news from across the world.

Newsround has gone from strength to strength in 2020 with the website regularly attracting more than 1m visitors a week and around an estimated 750,000 children watching the bulletin every day many from their classrooms. All these new features will ensure that even more kids are able to access the much-loved brand in the places where they spend their time.

Editor of BBC Newsround, Paul Plunkett, said: “We are so excited to be relaunching Newsround today with more online content, a longer bulletin and a YouTube channel that we know our audience will love. Our Newsround team are passionate about reporting age-appropriate news stories across all our platforms that speak to the lives of today’s children. These changes reflect the changing media habits of our audience and ensures Newsround will remain relevant for generations to come.”

Newsround is available on BBC iPlayer, the CBBC Channel and at www.bbc.co.uk/newsround

Meet the Newsround family

The Newsround presenting team is made up of seven journalists who are all passionate about delivering the latest news to young audiences in an accessible and age-appropriate way.

Ricky Boleto

Ricky is Newsround’s longest-serving reporter and joined the show in 2008. Ricky has travelled across the world with Newsround to meet children and report on issues including Nelson Mandela’s political career, the USA election and life at a refugee camp for kids in Kenya.

He also met his wife Leah at Newsround and they have two young children together.

Leah Boleto

Leah joined Newsround in 2009 and has reported on some of the biggest stories including the 2012 Olympics, the Belfast riots and the USA presidential elections. She has also worked for BBC Breakfast and BBC Radio 1 Newsbeat.

Martin Dougan

Former captain of Glasgow’s wheelchair basketball team, Martin began his career as a presenter in 2012 after been chosen to be a commentator for Channel 4’s Paralympics coverage and he joined BBC Newsround the following year. Martin loves sport and travelling. He recently travelled to Fiji to report on climate change there for a Newsround special and this will be airing later this month.

Hayley Hassall

For over 11 years, Hayley has delivered news to children as a senior journalist at Newsround. She is known for her reporting on home affairs issues including child anorexia, homelessness, child poverty and politics.

Throughout her time at Newsround she has managed to break a world record, jumped out of a plane at 21,000 feet, challenged the prime minister on child education policies and slept on the streets of London for 32 hours to highlight homelessness.

Jenny Lawrence

Hailing from Aberdeen, Scotland, Jenny started her career at Newsround in 2011 as a runner before taking on other roles within the team and eventually becoming a presenter. Since then she has travelled the world to report on stories including a young refugee’s journey from Syria to Sweden and the Home Nations’ journey around France for the European Championships, she has built LEGO houses with Ed Sheeran and was one of the first journalists to interview Major Tim Peake on his return from the International Space Station.

De’Graft Mensah

De’Graft is one of Newsround’s newest presenters having joined the family in 2019. He was born in London and studied journalism at university. Since joining Newsround, De’Graft has presented episodes about the Black Lives Matter movement and has spoken with kids about their experiences of racism in the UK and USA.

Shanequa Paris

Having joined Newsround during lockdown, Shanequa was thrown right into the deep end to report on Covid-19. Before joining the programme, she worked as a reporter at BBC Coventry and Warwickshire and was offered her presenting job at Newsround after she impressed a tough audience of children at her screen test. They warmed to her straight away.
Meet our newest presenters - De’Graft and Shanequa

De’Graft and Shanequa are the newest presenters to Newsround and are passionate about telling stories that matter. We sat down with them both to hear what it’s like creating a news show for children, how Covid-19 has affected things and their favourite moments so far.