Grammaropolis.com

Catchy parts-of-speech instruction, from hook to assessment

Learning rating

Community rating

Based on 1 review

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Expert evaluation by Common Sense

Grades

2–10

Subjects & Skills

Character & SEL, Communication & Collaboration, Critical Thinking, English Language Arts

Price: Free to try, Paid
Platforms: Web

Pros: Beyond the catchy -- if sometimes corny -- songs, grammar instruction goes in-depth.

Cons: Grammar taught in isolation doesn't always transfer to student writing; more connections to real-life grammar use would be a nice touch.

Bottom Line: The fun songs will stick, and so will kids' knowledge about the parts of speech.

Whether using Grammaropolis.com or the Grammaropolis app, students can log in from school or home, giving them, and you, a lot of versatility. While flipped-classroom application might seem obvious, many of the music videos might be best watched together, in class, as they're sometimes simply hilarious.

The songs and videos make great hooks when introducing different parts of speech to the whole class. Individually, students can then work through the slides (reading about each part of speech) and quizzes at their own pace. Grammaropolis.com is digital whiteboard compatible, so entire lessons could be done as a whole-class lesson; kids could then revise their own writing, using their new grammar knowledge.

Like Schoolhouse Rock for a new generation, Grammaropolis.com simulates a fun city populated by zany characters who personify each of the eight parts of speech. Students learn about each of the parts of speech through watching fun music videos, reading short cartoon-y books, and completing quizzes. As they move through the site (or Chrome app), kids select one part of speech and then follow a map of different learning stages, each explaining the part of speech through text, songs, and videos interspersed with quizzes.

As students work their way toward mastery, they earn certificates. They can also easily view their scores and progress for each part of speech on the main page, and teachers can view kids' scores from the teacher dashboard. For tablet users, there's also an app version of Grammaropolis that covers the same content.

Developed by a classroom teacher for his seventh-graders, Grammaropolis.com manages to keep students engaged while they learn about grammar through the parts of speech. The characters bring each part of speech to life in a way that gives meaning to its purpose -- there are superhero verbs and artist adjectives. The quizzes are challenging, and the songs are catchy enough to get stuck in your head for days. 

The way Grammaropolis.com explains each concept really makes sense, by giving students images of how these abstract terms work. For example, they may hear the phrase "Without Vinny the action verb, [Nelson Noun] couldn't do anything." The site includes a lot of content: nine illustrated books (one for each part of speech with a general book for all parts), nine animated music videos, 20 short animated clips, and hundreds of different quizzes. Overall, Grammaropolis.com does a good job of livening up an often boring (albeit important) topic for kids.

Learning Rating

Overall Rating
Engagement

Cute characters and extremely catchy songs engage kids to help them remember easy-to-forget grammar rules.

Pedagogy

Kids learn concepts through the clever personification of each part of speech. Content is delivered in a variety of formats to help different learners. Assessments are logically broken down to support authentic learning.

Support

Stats are reported as a percentage and a fraction so kids know how many questions were missed in each quiz. Although not adaptive, the site gives kids immediate feedback as they answer questions.

Common Sense reviewer
Amanda Bindel
Amanda Bindel Teacher

Community Rating

Entertaining way to review the eight parts of speech with videos, quizzes, and craft characters.

This is a good review tool for a general and co-taught ninth grade ELA class. It changed the pace of the class and provided a different type of 'text' for the students to use. This site has interactive quizzes that could be very useful for a stations activity in fourth and fifth grade. Due to the very 'elementary' look and entertainment value of the sources, I would not rely on this for direct instruction in secondary learning environments.

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