Guns, runs and training regimes

They come from a world of graffiti-covered estates, street gangs and thumping garage music.

Now they are living the spit-and-polish life of soldiers in the country's most prestigious armed division.

Three teenagers from Peckham are learning to swap their designer jeans and trainers for army fatigues and leather boots as they spend a week training with the Scots Guards. And the surprise is - they love it.

Kickabouts on the windswept grass of Burgess Park have been replaced by four-mile runs in Hyde Park and Nintendo computer games replaced by tank identification exercises.

The youths are guests of the Household Division as part of a scheme designed to help tearaways get a taste of Army life.

The boys were selected through the Peckham-based From Boyhood to Manhood Foundation, which provides education for socially excluded black youths, many of whom have been expelled from school. Another three are spending the week with the Household Cavalry in Knightsbridge.

Melvin Lodge, 15, said after three days with the Scots Guards: "My favourite part so far was the guns. We had real rifles attached to some kind of electrical appliance and we shot at people on a screen. When you shot it kind of pushed you back. It was very real. Much better than video games. We were also shown how to clean them and put them back together again."

For Elvis Osemwegie, 18, a keen footballer who works out three times a week, the regiment's punishing fitness test allowed him to prove he is in excellent shape. He passed with flying colours, saying: "I like hard training and this was really hard."

The other two were not so enthusiastic. Melvin said: "On the run my lungs started to burn up. But the soldiers helped and encouraged me. They told me how to catch my breath."

For Kola Gbadamasi, 18, a student at Christ the King Sixth Form College in Lewisham, army rations proved the biggest attraction. He said: "You get a lot of variety and you can eat as much as you like. It's much better than the food at college." Far from cramping their sense of style, the army uniforms proved a hit. Kola said: "I work in a clothes shop and a lot of people are buying camouflage stuff at the moment."

Melvin added: "You feel better than in your normal clothes. You feel you are part of the crew."

Not even the 6am starts have dulled their enthusiasm - although it took four attempts by guardsmen to rouse Elvis one morning. But fears that they would be screamed at by sergeant majors have not been realised. Elvis said: "My Mum shouts at me more than they do. It's not like what you see on TV. Everyone's been really nice."

Captain Andrew Wilson, of the Scots Guards who is overseeing the boys' week, said: "They are exceptionally well-behaved and very personable. We've had less trouble with them than with the normal recruits. It's changed my view about young men in Peckham and I think it's changed theirs about the Army."

The initiative is one of a string of events in the String of Pearls Festival, which was set up to increase access to historic buildings and institutions in the Golden Jubilee year.