Children are turning away from schoolwork because they see education as unhelpful to their ambition to become rich and famous as reality TV stars, a teaching union claims today.

Their role models include David and Victoria Beckham and WAGs – wives and girlfriends of highly paid footballers – according to the Association of Teachers and Lecturers.

It has put forward a motion for its annual conference this weekend saying that members are “appalled at the extent of the decline in this country into the cult of celebrity, which is perverting children’s aspirations and expectations”. It adds: “This compounds the subsequent sense of failure, alienation and low self-esteem when celebrity status is not achieved.”

The union asked 300 teachers about whom their pupils modelled themselves on. More than half said David Beckham. Victoria Beckham, the former Spice Girl and self-professed fashion expert, was a role model for almost a third of girls.

Almost two thirds of teachers said children they taught aspired to be sports stars or pop singers. Many said their pupils sought to be famous with no discernible talent. A third of teachers said that Paris Hilton, the heiress and gossip-column fixture, was a favourite role model.

Julie Gilligan, a primary school teacher in Salford, said that she had seen and heard pupils emulating the behaviour and language of footballers and pop stars in the playground and in school, “including disturbingly age-inappropriate acts by young girls in school talent shows”.

Another member, Elizabeth Farrar, who teaches in a primary school near Scunthorpe, North Lincolnshire, said: “Too many of the pupils believe that academic success is unnecessary, because they will be able to access fame and fortune quite easily through a reality TV show.”

Robert Sanders, a junior school teacher in Bath, said: “One girl said that she wished to be a WAG.”

Mary Bousted, the general secretary of the association, said: “We are not surprised about infiltration of celebrity culture in schools – it reflects the current media obsession with celebrity and the effect of celebrity culture on society as a whole. Celebrities can have a positive effect on pupils. They can raise pupils’ aspirations and ambitions for the future.

“However, we are deeply concerned that many pupils believe celebrity status is available to everyone. They do not understand the hard work it takes to achieve such status and do not think it is important to be actively engaged in schoolwork as education is not needed for a celebrity status.”

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