Intent on showcasing his passion on the world stage, Sam Mason didn't waste any time in registering his team for the innovative Lego robotics tournament organised by the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET).

Good thing he did, despite his school initially being left in the dark about it - he won.

Proudly representing the UK at the National First Lego League (FLL) final in January, his team's triumph has set a precedent for schools in the UK in that 'Lego robotics' will now be a subject taught in Design and Technology lessons at Ralph Allen School in Bath.

Are you sitting comfortably? Then, we’ll begin... Once upon a time, Chris Evans launched a short story competition for children on BBC Radio 2 called 500 Words. And the response? Well, it was magical!

This year, over 90,000 youngsters entered their stories. The resultant 40 million words were, for the second year running, analysed by lexicographers at Oxford University Press. The analysis has revealed a wealth of fascinating insights into the lives of British children and the remarkable ways they use English.

Mum is far and away THE word of 500 WORDS 2013, with over 115,000 occurrences and regional variations, including mom and mam. Poor dad only just scrapes into the Top 15, although interestingly he does star as an action man in several of the Top 50 shortlisted stories - fighting aliens, exploding, and building a time machine!

Sky and WWF have launched an exciting rainforest themed competition to find budding ‘young reporters’ as part of an initiative called I Love Amazon Week. Pupils are being asked to write or produce a short video news report on why they think the Amazon is amazing.

The Young Reporters Competition, which is being supported by Sky News presenter Charlotte Hawkins, is part of Sky Rainforest Rescue - a partnership between Sky and WWF which aims to help save one billion trees in the Amazon rainforest.

Budding young writers get their pens at the ready as this year’s National Young Writers’ Awards has launched. The competition, organised by Explore Learning is now in its fifth year and will be judged by best-selling author, Cressida Cowell, writer of the world famous How To Train Your Dragon series, which inspired the hugely successful DreamWorks movie.

Children aged 5 to 14 from all over the country will be invited to write a 500 word short story on this year’s theme – “Around the World”.  The competition launches on Monday 15th April and the closing date is Monday 3rd June.  It is absolutely free to enter via www.explorelearning.co.uk/youngwriters or picking up an entry form from your local Explore Learning centre and the winner will be awarded with their prize of a trip to Disneyland Paris for their whole family – and £500 worth of books for their school – presented by Cressida Cowell in June. 

The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) has launched the new IET Product Innovation Challenge in order to find the next Engineer of the Year.

The competition, open to 11-14 year olds, challenges entrants to identify a problem or opportunity relating to communication, and then use their engineering skills to develop a solution.

For example, young people could investigate if there is a way communication between doctors and patients can be improved? Would climbers and hikers benefit from an electronic tagging system? Can a device be created to track lost pets?

Leading academic and President of the UK Literacy Association (UKLA), Alayne Öztürk, has today applauded a shadowing scheme run in conjunction with two of the UK’s most prestigious children’s book awards, the CILIP Carnegie Medal and the CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal, as an excellent way for schools to encourage reading for pleasure, a key agenda identified by Ofsted and the Department for Education.

Launching the findings of the independent research report into the scheme at the ‘Ways of Reading’ conference at the British Library today (Monday 25th February), Öztürk said: “This is a wonderful programme that enriches reading for pleasure, through the engagement with high quality whole books. It encourages communities of readers to share responses to texts, encouraging the young participants to become confident and enthusiastic lifelong readers, withwider reading repertoires. Every school should sign up.”

UK school children have voiced a strong desire to play an active role in solving major challenges that will affect the world’s future, such as avoiding food shortages and ensuring there is enough energy and water for everyone. 

A new study among 7-14 year-old children and teachers, commissioned by British Gas Generation Green to understand more about children’s views on the world’s biggest future challenges found that:

Whilst almost half (46 per cent) believe the Prime Minster is the most likely person to solve our biggest future challenges, they also feel strong personal responsibility for finding the answers – believing that themselves (40 per cent) and their friends (28 per cent) will be the people most likely to solve major challenges

Almost half (49 per cent) of children think our biggest challenge in the future will be making sure we don’t run out of energy – almost twice the proportion of teachers that were concerned about it when they were growing up

Nearly two-thirds (63 per cent) of teachers say their pupils are more or just as interested in the future as they were when they were children

If your child is a member of an after school club, reading group, or any other type of youth group, the Royal Society, the UK’s national academy of science, would like to invite them to help to judge the winner of this year’s Royal Society Young People’s Book Prize, which celebrates the best books that communicate science to young people aged up to 14. 

The books may be factual or fictional, just as long as they make science exciting – no textbooks or encyclopaedias will be allowed! Publishers across the UK have been submitting their best recent books that communicate science to young people and an adult judging panel will narrow down the choice to a shortlist of six books. Following that, groups of young people will discuss the books and collectively select the winner. Participation is open to any group of young people that is able to read and discuss the shortlist and recommend their choice for who should win.

Young people are being encouraged to use their creative thinking skills to be in with a chance of winning a Disgo 10.1 inch Android 2.3 touch screen tablet in U-Explore's new Christmas competition.

Launched this week, the U-Explore Christmas competition tasks students across all secondary school year groups with creating an A4-page advert for U-Explore's careers and employability platform, to be placed in a fictional magazine aimed at 11 to 19-year-olds. The aim of the advert will be to promote U-Explore to young people and let them know how it can help them when they are planning for their future.

This month, Daydream Education are offering teachers the chance to win an iPod Shuffle and an Interactive Subject Suite (worth over £250) for their school.

Like their Facebook page and send a photo of how you use their resources in your classroom! They will then post your submission to their Facebook album where you will be able to share your photo and get as many likes as you can.

The person who's photo has the most likes by the end of the competition will win an Interactive Subject Suite and an iPod Shuffle!