No peeping now! University students slip into hilarious 'anti-cheating' hats shaped as Angry Birds characters or crates of beer - to stop them looking at their classmates' exam answers

A university has found a quirky way to stop students cheating in exams - by getting them to wear ludicrously big hats to prevent them from peeping at classmates' answers.

An array of huge 'anti-cheating hats' were worn by the students in the Philippines, including ones inspired by animated characters and random objects like a crate of San Miguel beer.

The students, studying agriculture at the Batangas State University, were asked to wear the novelty hats by their lecturer, Angelo Ebora.

Almost all 70 of the students took part, designing their own head gear and wearing it during their exam on March 19.

Bizarre pictures show one student wearing a hat in the shape of a giant chainsaw, another sporting a Game Boy console hat, and another donning a Pikachu hat.

Others went for hats of cartoon characters like Angry Birds, the Corpse Bride, a Creeper from Minecraft, and Patrick from Spongebob.

There were also hats with Anonymous masks, pictures of Einstein, and one hat with the words 'future agriculturist' written on it.

Mr Ebora wanted to help 'alleviate his student's stress during their exams', while teaching them about academic integrity.

The hats prevented the students, aged 18 to 19, from looking at their fellow classmates' answers to copy answers.

'I was also very proud of them,' said Mr Ebora after he saw so many of his students had taken part. The tradition reportedly goes back several years.

But while the hats may stop students from peaking at others' papers, many online pointed out that they may have been able to put cheat sheet notes inside.