Children's comedy-drama series about children who live in a care home

The Story of Tracy Beaker (also billed as simply: "Tracy Beaker"), is a CBBC programme that has been broadcast on CBBC since 2002. Each episode is 15 minutes long and features a short story about the everyday life of the residents of the care home. The main character is Tracy Beaker (played by Dani Harmer), who is well known in the home because of the fact that she repeatedly gets rejected by potential foster parents because of her behavioural problems.

The first series was broadcast on CBBC in early 2002. In this series we are introduced to all the main characters of the programme. The series starts with Tracy coming back to the care home after being rejected by yet another set of possible foster parents. There are three members of staff at the care home (which is called Stowey House, although everyone calls it the "Dumping Ground")

A woman called Jenny is the head careworker and is in charge of the home. The two other careworkers are Mike and Duke. Tracy's social worker, Elaine, is also around sometimes. When she is not, she is often referred to as "Elaine the Pain".

Justine Littlewood is another resident of the home, who becomes Tracy's arch enemy when Tracy decides that Justine has stolen her old best friend Louise. However, Tracy finds a new best friend called Ben, a boy who lives nearby and regularly comes to the Dumping Ground. Ben is an only child and has parents with well-paid jobs. His parents often shower him with gifts to make up for not being at home much of the time. This is in stark contrast with the kids at the dumping ground, who have a fixed budget that can be spent on each of them. Other residents of the home include: Adele (who is the oldest of the children), Zac, Ryan and Peter.

Part way through the first series, a writer called Cam Lawson starts visiting the dumping ground. She is doing research for an article about kids who live in care homes. Tracy has the idea that Cam would be the ideal foster parent for her, even though Cam lives on her own, and does not have a steady income. Although Cam thinks the idea is ridiculous at first, Tracy eventually wins her over and the first series ends with Tracy Beaker finally leaving the dumping ground.

The second series, first broadcast late 2002, begins with Tracy Beaker back at the dumping ground. In a series of flashbacks we find out that she accidentally set fire to Cam's house and Cam had no choice but to take her back there temporarily. The dumping ground has changed since we last saw it. Some characters have left, including Mike, Zac and Ryan. Mike's replacement is Nathan, a trainee careworker. Other new characters include Lol and Bouncer (two brothers), and Amber.

The third series was broadcast late 2003. In this series, Jenny has been replaced by Shelly. New characters include Michael, Jackie and Crash. In this series, some of the characters' backgrounds are explained more clearly than before. Jackie, for example, is taken into care because her grandfather, who looks after her, develops Alzheimer's Disease and is unable to care for her.

In spring 2004, as part of the BBC's Taking Care season, a feature-length special of the Story of Tracy Beaker was broadcast on BBC One. It was entitled "Tracy Beaker: The Movie of Me". Right from series one, Tracy always told tall tales about how her mum was a famous film star who couldn't look after her because she was busy.

These animated imaginary sequences were usually accompanied by filmed flashbacks which told the truth of Tracy's unhappy past with a mother who neglected her. In the Movie of Me, Tracy Beaker's mum finally appears, and causes all sorts of problems, not least between Tracy and her one-time foster mother, Cam.

In late 2004 the fourth series of Tracy Beaker was broadcast. Once again, Tracy is living with Cam, but this time they are both determined to make it work. Meanwhile, most of the residents of Stowey House have moved into a new home called Cliffside. Duke and Elaine the Pain are still around, but now a man called Sid is in charge. Cliffside happens to be just round the corner from Cam's house, which means that Tracy often hangs around the place even though she no longer lives there, much like Ben in the early series.

The new children in this are series are the Wellards: Roxy, Rio and Chantal. They mean trouble for both the staff and the rest of the children. Jackie's grandfather dies in this series, and Bouncer is told that he will be moved into a halfway house. The series ended with both Jackie and Bouncer leaving the dumping ground.

In November 2004, five specials were broadcast over the BBC's Children in Need week. They were called "Tracy Beaker Parties with Pudsey". They were set in the time before the fourth series started, so Tracy is still living at the Dumping Ground. The premise of these five special episodes is that Tracy Beaker needs to organise a fundraising party for Children in Need. In each episode, she has a dilemma about some key decision about the party and needs the viewers help. People could phone in their choices and the money raised would go to Children in Need. The following episode would show the results of the viewer's choice.

Tracy Beaker Parties with Pudsey was notable for the number of guest stars who appeared in the show, including Jon Snow, Bill Oddie and Anna Ford. Many CBBC presenters, and characters from other CBBC shows were also present. The series also featured short appearances from characters who had left the programme, such as Mike from series one, and Adele and Amber, who had left after series two.

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The Story of Tracy Beaker (Book)