POPtalk

We’ve been BrainPOPping in the UK for a year now so before we sign off to wish all of you a merry Xmas and happy new year we thought this is as good a time as any to stop and reflect back on an amazing year.

We sometimes say that a Tim & Moby movie takes your understanding of a concept “from nothing to something“. That also couldn’t be a better way of describing what we’ve been through in 2009.

There’s so many things we could list and the team will never agree on exactly what the top 6 should be, but we all think the following were pretty significant moments.

1. Our first customer!

You never forget your first time, so they say. Well our first ever customer was Okehampton College in Devon. Thank you for placing your trust in Tim, Moby and the BrainPOP UK team. We hope you’ve had a very BrainPOPpy year.

2. BETT 2009

If you’ve ever run or staffed a BETT stand you’ll know what a rush to the head it can be. We were a teeny tiny team at the start of the year and the sheer amount of tasks we needed to squeeze in took us by surprise. We thought we’d ticked all the many, many BETT boxes but we’d missed off one important thing: electricity. We just didn’t realise power was something you had to organise.

And for an online service electricity is pretty important.

Luckily our very able stand design company, BJA Designs, sorted us a last minute Sparky and we were up and running in time.

On the plus side our hard work paid off and we met 100′s of teachers, the vast majority of whom hadn’t heard of BrainPOP UK, and made some firm friends. Just don’t get us started on the amount of pens we ordered. It was also good experience for exhibiting at BETT 2010.

3. Teachmeet at the Scottish Learning Festival and multiple TeachMeet movie adaptions

Ollie Bray, a long time fan of BrainPOP (especially in Geography), asked us if we could produce a special one-off BrainPOP UK movie to inform people what a TeachMeet is all about. We’ve always been big supporters of CPD and TeachMeet – how could we refuse? You can see our TeachMeet movie on Youtube, where anyone can embed it into their own website.

Soon after, as tends to happen when an idea really starts to gain traction (go viral?), we were asked to do movie adaptions for Perth, Blackpool, East Lothian and Falkirk TeachMeets. Little known fact: If you ask for an adapted TeachMeet movie we put YOUR name into the famous Tim & Moby letter.

The TeachMeeters also kindly put the movie on the front page of the TeachMeet Wiki website. This year TeachMeet is going to happen across 3 nights: TEDxOrenda, AMPed (Amplified) and the TeachMeet itself.

As well as TeachMeet Takeover, where exhibitors open up a part of their stand for a TeachMeeter to “takeover” for half an hour to demo free and useful Web 2.0 type classroom tools. Naturally, we think that sounds really worthwhile and lots of fun so we voluteered too.

4. Our Swine Flu movie goes past 10,000 hits…then 20,000…then 30,000…

A little while back Swine Flu was a big headline topic. One thing BrainPOP does well is react quickly to classroom needs, when we are able.

In this instance we made a Swine Flu movie aimed at kids, to help answer some of the basic questions (“You can’t catch it from eating bacon, can you?”) and quell a few fears children may have.

We decided to upload it to Youtube and allow people to embed it in their own school blogs and websites. To keep an important topic free. We wrote all about our decision to do this on our blog: The little movie that could.

We got loads of favourable comments on the movie and it even ended up being reported in the TES and the Times Schoolgate blog.

5. Our first UK movie – Bonfire Night

BrainPOP UK is part of the global BrainPOP family. Our resources are currently nearly all anglicised versions from the incredible collection of movies on BrainPOP.com. But part of the appeal of a UK BrainPOP is to develop new UK resources that are meaningful to UK classrooms. Our first UK movie was Bonfire night. It was a UK subject scripted by a UK author. It was a very proud moment to finally launch a bit of BrainPOP history.

There’s lots more coming in 2010, but we won’t spoil the surprise just yet.

6. Listening to classroom stories

This is a fine entry as our last pick and a personal favourite. As well as the reviews BrainPOP UK has garnered over the last 12 months there’s little better than hearing from our users.

We love to tell classroom stories of how different teachers around the UK are using BrainPOP UK resources with their pupils. Whether you are a Newly Qualified Teacher, Home educator, Award winning ICT Specialist or Maths Teacher we’re happy to show off your BrainPOP thoughts on our blog.

We know there will be many more stories to tell in 2010 (2009 was just lighting the touchpaper for the BrainPOP fireworks coming in 2010) so we’ll simply wish you a very merry Xmas and happy new year from all the BrainPOPpers, from around the world.

Ho ho ho!

We are very lucky and privileged to regularly get Tweets and emails from our customers telling us what they think about BrainPOP UK.

A while ago we received a letter. A real letter on real paper from a real person. This is actually a pretty rare occasion in this digital era.

It was from Vickie Bacon, a Maths Specialist and Enrichment co-ordinator (and huge fan of all things BrainPOP) who teaches Years 3 to 8 at Hurstpierpoint College in Sussex , and simply had to write in and tell us how much her and her students loved BrainPOP UK.

“…I immediately decided to sign up for a free trial. I am so glad I did! Since then I have been converted into a passionate user of BrainPOP! I couldn’t wait to introduce it into my classes. So much so, that I’d like to share with you the different ways in which BrainPOP is now being used throughout the curriculum…”

Well, it seemed like a perfect excuse for Tim, Moby, Eylan BrainPOP and Mike BrainPOP to jump in the BRAINmobile and go and say hi.

During the first class, Y7 maths, we were impartial observers, seeing how she incorporated Tim & Moby into her front of class teaching. She mentioned on several occasions how well behaved and quiet the children were that day. We’d like to think it was BrainPOP’s super engagement power but we secretly suspect this was mostly because there were two BrainPOPpers watching from the back of the room

Tim and Moby’s movie on Fractions took centre stage as Mrs Bacon framed the whole lesson around it. The movie had the students undivided attention and the message seemed to sink in as the POPquiz was shared by all.

One by one the pupils hopped up from their chairs to tap the interactive whiteboard to answer the POPquiz questions. It’s always fascinating to see how the product we pour our hearts into used so effectively and engagingly. She clicked around the screens with ease, pausing for discussion points on several occasions. We’ll be blogging the detail of the lesson in Part 2.

The lesson came to an end and the children began to pack up their things. At this point, Mrs Bacon officially introduced us to the children, although it felt more like the big reveal at the end of a game show, because the kids mobbed us immediately! We survived the demands for Moby t-shirts and mouse mats, but only just. Vickie was very happy with her new Tim & Moby mug.

It was very special getting to speak with the children, who subsequently never left our side for the remainder of the day, helpfully making suggestions for such things as new products and movies. They were big, big fans.

We went on to have encouraging chats in the staff rooms and corridors, eventually seeing BrainPOP UK used on a one-to-one basis. This showed that BrainPOP UK is just as engaging on this smaller, more personal level, as it is for larger classes.

Overall, it was about as positive as a customer experience can get. We plan to return to Hurstpierpoint in the New Year for an open day, where other schools in the area will attend to see it in action and to share experiences.

Following that, Vickie Bacon hopes to join us at BETT in January as a VIB (Very Important BrainPOPper) to present BrainPOP UK on the Promethean Planet stand. It will be great having her there and suggesting to teachers that they don’t just have to take our word for it.

So we got to spend most of the day seeing Tim and Moby in action across a selection of classes and to not only meet the teachers who use it, but to also meet the children (or should we say BrainPOPpers?) who adored it.

Big thanks to Vickie, her kids and the staff at Hurstpierpoint college for making us feel so welcome.

Are you an educator that uses BrainPOP UK?

• Would you like to join the team on our stand for a few hours at BETT 2010 exhibition and talk to fellow teachers about BrainPOP UK?
• Would you like us to pay your travel/subsistence expenses to go to BETT?
• Would you like your very own exclusive Moby T-shirt and a few stories to tell in the Staffroom?

Aha! We thought that last one would get your attention.

We have a stand at BETT 2010 (S46, on the balcony). It’s not a big stand; it’s not a glamorous stand. It will look very similar to this one from last year.

But it will be a fun and busy stand; full of BrainPOPpy goodness.

We’d love a few teachers to do a couple of hours with us each day, between 10am and 3pm. You’ll be showing BrainPOP UK to other teachers, simply telling them what you already know. This is not a sales thing – you’ll just be teaching them about BrainPOP UK. We’ll be on hand at all times to support you.

You’ll connect with so many educators from all walks of life from around the world and make a few new friends into the bargain.

You can join us on any day you like. BETT runs from Wednesday 13th to Saturday 16th.

Plus you get the rest of the time to take a look round BETT too. And you can keep the T-shirt.

So if you think you, or a colleague, might want to work with Tim, Moby and the BrainPOP UK crew for the day email us: info@brainpop.co.uk as soon as you can and we’ll take it from there.