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All the education news, articles, teaching resources you need today, plus the best of edu Twitter.

"Like to create treasure hunts, audio feedback printables, easy links to video instructions and more? Use this Bulk QR code generator. Simply add the link or text to this spreadsheet and the QR code will pop up ready to print."

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"Development of technology within the classroom can aide the identification of contextual factors that may or may not contribute to effective use of technology in enhancing quality learning experiences. Factors such as organisational culture, teacher self-efficacy and their confidence and experience in utilising technology, resources and learner engagement all have to be considered to allow for an integrated approach."

""Concerns regarding the allegedly disastrous consequences of social networking sites on school performance are unfounded," says Professor Markus Appel, a psychologist who holds the Chair of Media Communication at Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (JMU) in Bavaria, Germany. Markus Appel, PhD student Caroline Marker (JMU) and Timo Gnambs from the University of Bamberg have taken a closer look at how the social media use of adolescents correlates with their school grades. "There are several contradictory single studies on this subject and this has made it difficult previously to properly assess all results," Marker says. Some studies report negative impacts of Snapchat & Co., others describe a positive influence and again others do not find any relationship at all."

"This is a maths resource that can be used to challenge pupils to complete a magic square, using only the numbers provided, to make sure that each row, column and diagonal all add up to the focused magic number. The resource provided challenges students to add up to 9, 12, 15 & 18, and could be used as a homework challenge, an additional classroom activity, or as a main activity within a maths lesson. Challenge pupils to work on two different methods for each magic number. This activity could be adapted with larger number, and other mathematic operations"

"Young children literally see words and faces differently from adults. Where adults can most easily comprehend a word when they look at it straight on, children need to look a bit up and to the left. For faces, they need to look a bit up and to the right. What's more, those differences are accompanied by previously undetected changes in the brain circuits responsible for processing words and faces, researchers report Feb. 23 in Nature Communications."

"There's no doubt about it - getting students involved in their own assessment and marking has a wide variety of benefits. Take this great summary by Rosario Hernandez at University College Dublin for example, which explains that peer-assessment benefits students in four key ways: Promotes high-quality learning Contributes to skills development Furthers personal development Increases students' confidence, reduces stress and improves student motivation"

"Any research based or inquiry-based project seems to work well for me. I enjoy leading the children through the process of developing a research question. It's always interesting to hear what goes on in the minds of these inquisitive learners. Last year my grade 8 (14-year-olds) were working on the impact of government systems on individual and Societies. Students took up the case studies of India and Pakistan, some of them worked on Arab-Israeli conflict, and yet another group picked the Berlin Wall and its impact on the population."

"In their new book, Debra Kidd and Hywel Roberts firmly place teachers, and ultimately their students, in a range of different locations, where the learning inhabits, offering a fantastically imagined context with prompts, ideas and illustrations helping exploration and discovery. In a fascinating resource book, which can be used in many subject areas, across most stages in schools, the authors break down each chapter destination (including a forest, castle, graveyard, ship, zoo, cave, theme park) into a story starter - introducing the location and providing provocative initial questions; key landmarks (either for primary or secondary aged students), a stopover - providing a more in-depth account of their learning journey; stepping stones - context based tasks provided to also prod your imagination, and; the bedrock - offering a debrief of the processes, helping teachers understand the justification of the processes undertaken."

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"what strategies and plans can senior staff follow to ensure that they are truly making a difference to the work-life balance of teaching colleagues? Following a recent #UKEdChat session (click here to view), our community came up with a collection of ideas which you can adapt yourself, or share with the senior leaders in your school to set into motion to help improve the work-life balance of all staff."

"It may always be possible but life is busy and although I don't think that most people (including me) intend to be unkind they can sometimes be thoughtless rather than unkind. At school amongst other bits and pieces, I oversee the School Council. Our School Council consists of children from Y1 to Y6 and at a recent meeting, they brought their suggestions as to what we could do to make our school even better. They came up with several suggestions including Reintroduce Random Acts of Kindness awards Reintroduce Headteacher awards"

"It was once said 'It's difficult to make predictions, especially about the future'. There are so many factors, technological, political, societal, which could change the course of learning, but in this discussion we are future-gazing and trying to imagine what learning will look like in a generation from now and beyond."

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"Journey to the centre of the Earth and view the amazing facts about what can be found beneath our feet with this BBC microsite."

"New research from Monash University has found that girls in single-sex schools are more likely to study chemistry, intermediate mathematics, advanced mathematics and physics in their senior years when compared to their co-ed counterparts."