How I Use It
BrainPOP has been a great addition to my teaching. I’ve been using it primarily with 6th and 7th graders (the youngest students in my school) and they get excited every time they see it written on the schedule. I have used it to introduce ideas or reinforce what we have already been learning. The videos are very good at giving the big picture overview of concepts and ideas. The quizzes do a great job covering what was discussed in the video and the kids really enjoy completing them on the computer or on their iPad. The ESL teacher has also been finding great success with BrainPOP Jr, particularly since you can add subtitles. It is definitely a great jumping off point for any lesson (and they have just about any topic you can think of) and the support materials make it a particularly useful teaching tool.
My Take
BrainPOP is an educational animated video site that is a great way to introduce a topic or add on as supplemental information to your lesson. These short, engaging videos explain concepts with clarity, as well as a bit of humor. Broken down into subject areas, there are videos on everything - writing bibliographies, carbon dating, causes of the American Revolution. Each video is then accompanied by a quiz, activities, and further reading that you can use. Accessible on computers as well as iPad app, BrainPOP engages students while teaching them fundamental concepts. While BrainPOP is geared toward late elementary and middle school students, there is also BrainPOP Jr for K-3, BrainPOP Espanol, and BrainPOP ESL for second language learners. In addition to being an excellent tool for students, BrainPOP provides teacher resources in their Educators section of the site. This gives you access to lesson plans from fellow teachers, professional development training (webinars, conferences, web tutorials, etc), and helps you to connect these videos to the common core.
