The launch of Twofeet at the Bollin School brings professional shoe fitting into schools for the first time. Twofeet is all about protecting the health of children's feet and raising the awareness of the damage that ill-fitting shoes can do to long term health. Schools can also download free Twofeet worksheets on feet and foot health from the Teachingzone website to use as part of their curriculum.

Early Years Vouchers Ltd, one of the UK's leading childcare allowance organisations, has noticed a significant shortfall in the number of teachers signing up to Tax- and N.I-free vouchers. Although teachers were originally the only profession to be exempt from sacrificing part of their salary for childcare vouchers this legislation was reversed in June 2006.

Children who are exposed to music or who play an instrument from a young age are more successful in school than those that don't and British parents are well ahead of the game according to a survey by Karacha.com, the online destination for quality musical instruments and accessories.

Secretary of State, Ed Balls and Head of the National Healthy Schools Programme, Richard Sangster, unveil plans for the next phase of Healthy Schools, as they share a vision for improving the health and wellbeing of children and young people to a conference of Headteachers today.

This summer, GapGuru, the India gap year specialist, is looking for 30 more inspirational teachers to work with underprivileged children in India for three weeks over the long summer break as part of ‘Travelling to Teach - Summer Holiday Programmes for Teachers' an exciting initiative aimed specifically at teachers across the UK.

How many highly paid professionals spend their time doing basic ‘administration' work because they don't know how to use technology effectively?  Young people leaving school may need training in workplace etiquette but one skill they do have is computer literacy.

Each year thousands of sixth formers from schools and colleges up and down the country benefit from residential Summer Schools run by the Sutton Trust, an educational charity dedicated to raising aspirations among less privileged groups. As the deadline for this year's applications approaches, we caught up with two Cambridge students whose lives were changed by taking part in the Summer School and who formed a lasting friendship as a result.

With the economic climate in turmoil, theTrainingpod has picked the perfect date to launch.

Engineers at the University of Liverpool have tested a new form of bomb-proof concrete that could lead to the return of litter bins in public areas.

A diet rich in the unique ingredient found in all Quorn products - mycoprotein - could help people to reduce their cholesterol levels and may help people to manage obesity and type-2 diabetes risk.

Prince William has today become Royal Patron of the charity Skill Force. The charity primarily utilises the skills of former members of the Armed Forces to run life skill courses for disadvantaged young people.

As families across the country feel the effects of the recession, parent support charity Parentline Plus has issued some tips to help them cope.

For Britain's working parents, childcare costs have become a huge burden on family finances, yet for many, nurseries and childminders are also an expensive necessity. The good news is that in April 2005, every working parent became eligible to claim Tax- and N.I -free vouchers - which meant significant savings on childcare costs - everyone, that is, except Teachers.

Gopak, the UK leader in lightweight, foldable and stackable products, has released a brand new product catalogue with a fresh look that makes it easier than ever for customers to find the exact products they need.

As an investment in its future and to provide a resource for the local community, the Governors of Andoversford Primary School, near Cheltenham, decided to invest in a new building to house a playgroup for pre-school children and a mother and toddler group. Head Teacher Joseph Kinane explained: "We realised that for the budget available, a factory fabricated building was our best option. We carried out research on the internet to see what was possible and narrowed it down to a small number of suppliers who were then invited to submit tenders. We decided on Pinelog's proposal because their buildings were very attractive, competitively priced and they were able to demonstrate wide experience in supplying what we needed."

School summer holidays may seem a long way off, but Amwell, the UK's leading manufacturer and installer of washroom cubicle and paneling systems are already gearing up for this key time for education washroom refurbishments. Amwell has been supplying the education sector for over 25 years with a range of bright, innovative washroom products designed to meet the specific needs of colleges, schools and pre-schools.

The latest product development from off-site specialists Yorkon, has won the inaugural Building Products Innovative Products Award, which showcases the best in British building innovation, research and development.

Contract interiors specialist Gradus has supplied flooring from its Jaku and Kata design tile ranges, as part of a refurbishment programme for Levenshulme High School for Girls, funded by the government's Building Schools for the Future (BSF) initiative.

Safety at the new Queen Margaret University campus at Craighall in Scotland was given a major boost following the selection of Draka cable to provide essential reliable power to all of the vital life safety and property protection systems throughout the £45 million project that is now home to 4,500 students and staff.

You use anti-bacterial gel to wipe down surfaces, scrub the bath with bathroom cleaner, and pour extra-strength bleach down the loo. Your home should be a germ-free haven; but what about PCs, laptops and printers? AF International, leading manufacturer of specialist computer cleaning products, warns that neglecting electrical equipment can introduce harmful bacteria into the classroom - a warning backed by independent research.

Thanks to its total system approach to flooring, Mapei's products were chosen for the construction of the science block at Clevedon Community School in North Somerset which is due to open in September.  Working closely with the main contractors Kier Western, Mapei supplied a fast-drying screed and levelling system, as well as a solvent-free acrylic adhesive for the fixing of the vinyl flooring.

Bexwyke Lodge, a 600m² building, is the biggest of its kind to be built for educational purposes in the UK and offers five classrooms fully equipped with the latest multimedia and IT equipment, a staff room, music rooms and a reception area for junior section pupils.

CP Electronics has supplied lighting controls for use throughout the new Wood View Learning Community in Plymouth, Devon. The campus has joined forces with two local schools - Woodlands Special School and Sir John Hunt Community Sports College to provide a new complex for 1,500 children. Designed to combine light and airy learning with communal spaces, it contains the latest "intelligent" building technology. Features of the new technology include under floor heating which responds to the movement of people around the building, along with CP's lighting control systems, containing lighting presence detection.

Around 2000m2 of Polysafe Mosaic decorative low maintenance sheet vinyl safety flooring from commercial flooring specialist Polyflor Ltd has been used extensively in a brand new purpose-built kindergarten recently opened at Bury Grammar School. Providing underfoot safety to children and staff alike, decorative Polysafe Mosaic has been specified in a tonal Grey Fusion colourway and installed throughout numerous classrooms and teaching areas, staff rooms, kitchenettes and washrooms. In the walk-in showers, Polysafe Hydro has been chosen for its performance in continually wet areas, whilst Polyflor Sport 67 provides the necessary resilience for sports played in the school gymnasium.

Mitsubishi Electric's Visual Information Systems division, a leading manufacturer of innovative, high quality display solutions, has introduced a range of short throw projectors and a specifically designed boom arm for easy installation within classrooms and meeting rooms that may have space limitations.

More than six million pounds of taxpayers' money has been spent on paying redundancies - a hidden cost of the government's landmark academy programme.

More and more coursework is now being done digitally but what about the images used to create it. Are enough checks being done to make sure selected images are legal to use and are good enough quality? Education Today talked to image specialist Bridgeman Education to find out more...

Personalised learning is the key to increasing children's ability and interest in maths, says Whizz.com.

The new infrared wireless microphone system from Panasonic will transform educational establishments. Allowing teachers to be heard from the front to the very back of a classroom, the system is a voice amplification system using infrared technology. The system is aimed at promoting an improved quality in the teaching environment and especially provides solutions for students' learning issues such as concentration and listening in class.

Muratec Europe (UK), manufacturer of multifunction office equipment and business solutions, has launched the MFX-C3400. As the company's first colour multifunctional, the Muratec MFXC3400 combines high quality A3 colour output with flexible multifunction features for copy, print, scan and fax, as standard. It comes with a compact footprint, making the MFXC3400 the smallest A3 colour multifunctional in its class. For colour output the powerfulMFX-C3400 has a 26 page per minute (ppm) print and copy speed, making output of colour documents, such as reports and training notes, easy and quick. It is supplied network ready for network printing and scanning.

It is almost 20 years since the first interactive whiteboard was introduced into the teaching environment. Anybody who used one of those early boards would recognise the technology as largely unchanged. But with many schools and colleges now planning their second generation of teaching technology, alternatives to the whiteboard and projector combination are of increasing interest.

Steer has been a government advisor on school behaviour issues since 2005. He is a former headteacher whose other reports on drugs, weapons and alcohol in school led to actual changes in the law - giving schools the right to search pupils. However, in his latest report, he calls for pressure be put on schools to identify children who need help, and to use the money they are already allocated to support these children.

A school's Management Information System (MIS) traditionally sits in the school office collecting data for the DCSF. That includes a wide range of information about your pupils including attendance, behaviour and assessment data. So, if your school already collect this data for the DCSF (a statutory requirement), what's stopping you from using it to inform decisions in the classroom?

Sustainability is an issue that is becoming increasingly important for school leaders everywhere, as the government increases its pressure on schools to become Sustainable Schools by 2020.

The ‘Classroom Voting' system is a powerful interactive teaching aid for use in all levels of education. It can be run entirely with the provided software or with independent applications such as Microsoft Power Point. All types of multimedia can be incorporated into the presentation including pictures, videos and audio files.

This time last year Samantha Cropley was a lecturer in Beauty & Holistic Therapies at Boston College, Lincolnshire. Today, Samantha is still a teacher at Boston College - the difference is, this year she feels she's a better one. Samantha was one of those who took part in the pilot phase of Business Interchange, a programme which takes further education professionals out of their teaching routine and back into the world of business - where they can update their skills.

"See it, try it, teach it" ... that's the theme being adopted for the Education Show 2009 and it perfectly sums up this key annual event.

Do your students know ‘bills' from ‘budgets' or ‘debts' from ‘deposits'?  A recent survey by the Institute for Citizenship found that 61% of young people didn't feel anyone had prepared them to deal with financial issues in the future. 

With widespread news of a national recession and fears of budget cuts in education, school leaders are more concerned than ever about making the most of the funding available to them. 

Schoolchildren are being invited to join the debate about improved meat labelling following the launch of the RSPCA's ‘Rooting for Pigs' campaign. The RSPCA's primary and secondary farming lesson resources help explain the issues of animals being reared for meat highlighted by the Society, as well as recent television programmes by Jamie Oliver and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.

Young people from low-income families, ethnic minorities and girls are being given a financial helping hand by the Government to encourage them into engineering. A £1.1m grant will enable The Smallpeice Trust, in partnership with STEMNET and the WISE Campaign to promote the importance of Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) subjects to 8000 school children from disadvantaged backgrounds over two consecutive years.

93 years ago, rugby clubs across the country were closing their doors as players went to fight in the Great War, but Rosslyn Park helped to keep the faint flicker of british rugby alive. In January of 1916, a set of schoolboy matches were hosted to boost morale for local supporters and players alike. Now, almost a century later, the famous old club showcases the finest upstarts of international schools sport in the largest rugby tournament on earth and this year celebrates its 70th birthday from its official beginnings in 1939. A place in the history books is up for grabs in this epic competition.

Wednesday 18 February 2009: The British Educational Suppliers Association (BESA) and Affinity Media are pleased to announce the finalists of the eleventh Education Resource Awards. Honouring excellence within the education sector, the Awards recognise the outstanding achievements of teachers and educational institutions, along with educational suppliers and individual leaders.

Promethean, a global leader in interactive learning technology, has announced the worldwide launch of its latest innovative interactive software, ActivInspire. The software development included a successful trial period and collaboration with specialist teacher user groups, who have given valuable feedback to ensure ActivInspire meets today's teaching and learning needs.