The Show has a proud reputation for bringing together the suppliers of education products and services, all under one roof, and last year's event attracted almost 17,000 professionals from all parts of the UK and beyond.
It provides an unrivalled opportunity for bursars, heads, senior managers, governors, heads of departments and teachers to discover what is fresh on the market in an exciting and informative environment, and to share ideas by networking with experts and peers.
For the 600-plus exhibitors, the Show also represents a three-day period that can have a huge impact on their financial year. A survey carried out by Fusion Research at last year's Show established that each visitor had an average of £3,275 to spend - a combined buying power of more than £55 million.
Keith Clifford, Marketing Manager for The Education Show said: "It is fairly unusual for the same show to celebrate its 18th birthday and I see this as indicative of the fact that it has always achieved what it set out to do.
"It has always been renowned as the ideal place for exhibitors to launch new products, and for the teaching industry to find them, and we have also worked hard in recent years to ensure that the overall package offers much more.
"That certainly applies in 2008 because we have lined up some fascinating new feature areas, and an extensive programme of seminars that will be more relevant to the hot topics in education than ever before.
"It is clearly going to be the year of change in 2008 for people working in education at all levels, and we see it as a key part of our responsibility to ensure that The Education Show enhances the knowledge of visitors in all sorts of ways."
One of the major new feature areas will be Primary in Practice, where exhibitors will use their expertise and products to run practitioner led sessions that provide practical solutions for teachers. There will be eight sessions a day, ranging from internationalising the curriculum and achieving the five-hour fitness offering, to interesting ways of teaching subjects.
A Secondary Skills area is also being introduced this year, run along similar lines to Primary in Practice except that presentations will be interspersed with those from SSAT. There will be six sessions a day and content will range from special needs through to ICT.
The Show will reflect very prominently the fact that 2008 is the National Year of Reading, and the Saturday has been designated Literacy Day. Many of the seminar sessions will be devoted to reading and there will be a special feature area in the Publishing Zone, called Learning by Reading.
As always in this zone, visitors will be able to discover thousands of text books, library resources and software solutions. But the new Learning by Reading feature will involve publishers, authors and practitioners working together to demonstrate how newly-published resources can stimulate lesson ideas and enhance learning.
The live demonstrations will help teachers re-engage their pupils in reading and provide advice on how to plan for the National Year of Reading.
The Healthy Schools Zone, such a success last year, will be returning with school catering companies and nutritional expert organisations lining up alongside outdoor play companies and sports equipment providers.
Four of the exhibitors in that zone will be making presentations in Primary in Practice - Davies Sports, Gymkids, Lafour Prima Dance and Playtop Safer Surfacing.
Lyndsey Whiteside from Davies Sports will lead a session on ‘Pathway to Health - try to play for an hour a day'. This initiative is concerned with developing a play equipment bag with resource cards to encourage KS1 pupils and their parents to try to play for an hour a day.
The Gymkids session by Rick Dalton is entitled: ‘Achieving the Five-Hour Offering' and will show how Gymkids equipment can help provide variety in delivery if schools have limited outdoor space - especially on those wet PE days.
Lafour Prima Dance are among this year's first-time exhibitors at the Show and Mandy Fouracre will make the point: ‘You Don't have to be a Dancer to Teach Dance to Early Years and Key Stage 1.' Mandy will provide practical help and suggestions, which will include demonstrating movement ideas.
The Playtop session, from one of the world's leading suppliers of children's safety surfacing, will look at the basics to be considered as well as the legal requirements, design ideas, construction, accessibility and many other issues that need to be considered when providing a safe play environment.
As always the Arts, ICT & Software Zones are sure to prove popular, and the line-up of feature areas is completed by the Special Needs and Early Years Zones.
The Show caters for all levels - Early Years, Primary and Secondary - and the programme of more than 80 CPD seminars and workshops will reflect that. Delivered by teaching practitioners and experts, they will cover every subject area and provide practical insights, examples of best practice and thought-provoking ideas.
At a time when so many areas of education in the UK are set to change, there's a particular need for professionals to keep up to date with modern thinking and the planned changes, and the seminar programme has been carefully compiled to assist as well as stimulate.
QCA Director of Curriculum, Mick Waters is a keynote speaker and his two sessions are sure to prove extremely popular. The first will be ‘'Looking Forward - a new secondary curriculum for teachers and learners' and will explain how the new curriculum - announced last year - provides an exciting opportunity to create learning experiences that are fully focussed on the learner's needs and abilities.
Waters will also speak on ‘How could the primary curriculum meet the needs of children in the 21st century?' Primary schools have shown an appetite for change, to drive up standards of learning, and the QCA has been working with them to discover what makes a dynamic curriculum.
Other seminar speakers include Paul Collard, National Director of Creative Partnerships, the Government's flagship creative learning programme, Maggie Fenwick from National Strategies who will update visitors on the functional skills pilot programme, and Sue Owen, Director of the Early Childhood Unit.
The National Year of Reading will also be strongly reflected in the seminar programme and among the speakers will be Jonathan Douglas, Director of the National Literacy Trust, and Miranda McKearney, Director of the Reading Agency. Jonathan will speak on how to motivate young people to read more, and Miranda will highlight how libraries and schools can work together to inspire children to read.
A visit to the UK's leading educational event is guaranteed to be a stimulating experience and many schools arrange an inset day around it, so that they can close down and take all their staff.
That is made easier by the fact that BESA, the co-organisers of the Show along with Emap Education, run a sponsored coach scheme and many schools take full advantage of this.
One of these is Glemsford Community Primary from Sudbury in Suffolk. Their headteacher is Liz Steele who said: "I'm a big fan of The Education Show. We go every year, taking all 25 members of staff and this time we will be even more mob-handed because we're combining with two other local schools who have never been before.
"We always take advantage of the BESA scheme to hire a coach and as we have spare seats, it makes sense to fill them up. We always identify in advance what we need to help us do our jobs more effectively - then set out to find those products when we get to the NEC.
"There's always a massive choice and the huge advantage with The Education Show is that you can get expert advice, inspect the goods and then choose the items that will be most suitable."
BESA, the co-organisers of the Show along with Emap Education, operate a Leadership Lounge, which is open to headteachers, deputy/assistant heads, bursars and business managers. It offers an opportunity to relax with a free cup of coffee while discussing the issues with colleagues.
Ray Barker, Director of BESA said: "Where else can you find help more easily than at The Education Show - where more than 600 suppliers and three days of CPD come together with over 16,000 educators?
"The chance for educators to see, test, and compare products and to meet manufacturers and service providers face to face is still one of the most cost-effective ways to establish sound and effective purchasing practices in schools. Hence the popularity of the UK's most prestigious educational resources show, The Education Show."
It's a recipe, which has stood the test of time for 18 years and continues to provide an unrivalled service to the education sector.
Admission to The Education Show is free and you can register at http://www.education-show.com/ or request tickets on 0844 557 2780
