POPtalk

Spotlight on…stupendous structures and oustanding construction. Gravity, compression and tension at work.

Topics for the Super Structures Spotlight include:

• Architecture
• Bridges
• Building Basics
• Calculus
• Dams
• Force
• Gravity
• Measuring Angles
• Pulleys
• Seven Wonders
• Skyscrapers
• Slope and Intercept
• The Great Wall of China

For our first Spotlight we’ve come up with a few fun activities you can try with your students.

1. Virtual lego

Get your class to create their own virtual lego super structures!

Download the Lego Simulator here. Tim & Moby aren’t too pleased with our sorry attempt…they think you can do better!

We'll get wet if it rains

2. Design a super building

We’d love it if you and your class created a Moby-related super structure but you could start off easy, draw Tim & Moby a house.

Tim & Moby House Blueprint

We used free software from SmartDraw but you could just as easily use Paint, Microsoft Word^©, Paint.NET or good old paper, pencil, ruler and rubber.

3. Get building!

Why not build a lego super structure together as a whole class activity? Look at what Zoe POPpette achieved!

Super effort Zoe!

4. Spotting super structures

Fancy some fun outside of the classroom? Here’s our suggestion…

Why not head out with your class to take photos of local super structures? Here’s a very famous super structure local to us BrainPOPpers, Hertford Bridge:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/djof/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Whether you draw, build or photograph a super structure, please send us the results.

Try and find at least 3 reasons your structure is so super. Who will use your super structure? Can people live in it? Any environmentally friendly features? Any robot friendly features?

Here’s what we said about our photo of Hertford Bridge:

1. Our super structure was completed in 1914
2. It is often referred to as the Bridge of Sighs because of its supposed similarity to the Bridge of Sighs in Venice but it actually looks more like the Rialto Bridge in Venice
3. It is called Hertford Bridge and is part of Hertford College

Not very exciting but perhaps your pupils come up with a super structure that:

1. turns orange when the sun shines?
2. recycles grey water?
3. knocks at least one of the world’s tallest buildings from the top ten?

Email photos and files to info@brainpop.co.uk with “We’ve got a super structure” in the subject line.

We’ll upload everything you send us to this Spotlight blog and, at the end of the month, Tim & Moby will pick their favourite.

Today we launched our “Free stuff” page. It does exactly what it says on the tin.

This one-stop-shop brings together ALL our free movies in every subject. And they will stay free for the forseeable future. So you can link directly to them if you want to highlight a movie to your students or collegues in your VLE, on your blog, etc. We’ve even made the weblink easy to remember.

http://www.brainpop.co.uk/free_stuff_from_brainpop_uk

We think, collectively, they represent some of the best things about BrainPOP UK. You may or may not agree with our choices but we love each one of these movies.

BrainPOP UK and Tim and Moby believe something important: we can’t just be there for the nice things in life.

Death, terminal illness, war, terrorism, crime… none of us like to face these difficult features of the human experience.

As teachers, parents and carers we all have a responsibility to help kids prepare and cope with the aspects of life that bring feelings like fear, terror, pain and uncertainty.

A close family member died of cancer this week, and while I mourn her passing, I find that I have a wealth of coping mechanisms – developed from many life experiences, accumulated knowledge and, of course, an adult peer support group who can identify and sympathise.

All of which will help me to come to terms with what happened.

Children do not always have these consolations.

BrainPOP UK is committed to supporting children through these experiences with our movies on the very hardest topics in life.

Our PSHE and Citizenship section is there to help you find our thoughtful, informative and sensitive movies such as addiction, bullying, cancer, drug abuse and even death.

Whether you need these as movies to simply sit with a child, for an assembly, or for whole class speaking and listening, is up to you.

I guess one of the hardest movies we have ever made has a special relevance today.

Eight years ago, at 12.53pm GMT, a plane crashed into one of the Twin Towers in New York. Even typing this sends shivers up my spine, so imagine how hard it is for a child to manage their emotions about this event.

Help them understand the facts by watching our September 11th movie movie, which is free on our site for this week. You may also want to view this BBC News 9/11  timeline of the event.

Normally I’d ask you to see it and enjoy it.

But in this instance I simply ask you to see it.

That’s the most important bit.

Our September 11th movie (will open in BrainPOP UK)

Author: Eylan

“Errare humanum est” said Seneca the Younger.

“Cuiusvis hominis est errare, nullius nisi insipientis in errore perseverare” said Marcus Tullius Cicero.

“To err is human, to forgive divine“, said Alexander Pope.

“Nobody’s perfect” says BrainPOP UK. But we try harder.

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/daviddoctorrose/ / CC BY-ND 2.0

We’d like to cut all you lovely folks who have bought BrainPOP UK a deal. If you spot an error on our website, in a movie or quiz or anywhere on the product site and you let us know we will extend your subscription by 1 week, as a thank you. Really.

You can submit as many errors as you like. We hope you don’t spot any, but we also know realistically on a site the size and depth of BrainPOP UK anything’s possible. This is an educational resource and needs to cleave to the highest standards.

As we are a webservice and not constrained to printing presses or CDROMs we can change things quickly. With your help and eagle eyes we can try to minimise issues and make BrainPOP UK the best it possibly can be.

Small print:

• We have the last word on whether something is an error.
• We’re not applying this retrospectively.
• We retain the right to accept or deny any submission.
• We can withdraw this offer at any time.
• The same error cannot be reported and/or claimed for twice. First come, first served!
• This offer is only open to customers who have paid for an annual  subscription to BrainPOP UK.

So, if a mistake we’ve made has been bothering you but you didn’t think it was worth bringing to our attention, well, now it is. So get in touch!