A Royal occasion: HM Lord-Lieutenant of South Yorkshire presents Twinkl with second Queen’s Award for Enterprise

13th August 2021

The Sheffield-based global publisher Twinkl has received a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in Innovation. This is the second award the company has achieved after winning the award for International Trade in 2018.

The Sheffield-based global publisher Twinkl has received a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in Innovation. This is the second award the company has achieved after winning the award for International Trade in 2018.  

Team members from Twinkl, which began as a business operated from a spare bedroom, were delighted to welcome Her Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of South Yorkshire, Andrew Coombe, to present the award. 

The company won the award in Innovation in 2020, but due to the pandemic the ceremony marking the achievement and receipt of the award had to be put on hold. 

Jonathan Seaton, Co-founder and CEO of Twinkl, said: “We are over the moon to achieve this second award and it has been absolutely worth the wait to bring team members together from across the business safely to receive it. Every team member at Twinkl has contributed to this award through their commitment to innovation and finding new solutions.” 

Twinkl was one of only 66 companies in the UK to be honoured with the award in innovation and one of only 220 to receive a Queen’s Award last year.

The award for innovation recognises businesses that demonstrate strong, commercially successful and innovative products or services. It takes into account the uniqueness of the product, any challenges that had to be overcome, the problem it solves and the benefit it brings beyond immediate customers.

Twinkl received the award for the creation of its ground-breaking product-line TwinklPlanIt.The line covers core and foundation subjects for primary schools and provides resources ranging from lesson plans and differentiated class activities to home learning tasks and challenge cards. It was developed to address the significant changes that were made to the National Curriculum in 2014 and to support teaching professionals and schools with this. 

Twinkl was recognised by the judges for its unique approach to creating Twinkl PlanIt, including how the team engaged with teachers directly to develop the materials and hired current and former teachers to make them, as is still the case at Twinkl today. 

Jonathan Seaton, said: “At Twinkl, innovation is all about questioning what more we could do to fulfill our mission to help those who teach and finding solutions that address a problem and provide a clear solution. This was the same approach we took with TwinklPlanIt. But none of this would have been possible without the support of our members and the education community, who inspire us each and every day. This award is for them too.” 

Founded in Sheffield in 2010 by Jonathan and Susie Seaton, Twinkl provides high-quality resources to educators around the world. The materials available range from activity sheets, information packs and interactive presentations to online educational games and videos. For more information please visit twinkl.co.uk