On the Spotlight homepage you’ll also find a Flu & Flu Vaccine FYI, a Fitness Quiz, and Lesson Tips & Ideas from a very good friend of BrainPOP and ICT virtuoso, Jon Audain.

The Healthy Living collection of topics includes:

Addiction

Blood Pressure

Body Weight

Diabetes

Fitness

Flu & Flu Vaccine

Food Safety

Immune System

Nutrition

Organic Food

Sleep

Smoking

Sun Protection

If you have a Promethean whiteboard, download our Healthy Living flipchart from our Promethean Resource page.

Topics in the Growing Pains Spotlight include:

• Acne
• Addiction
• Adolescence
• Adulthood
• Body Weight
• Bullying
• Braces
• Drug Abuse
• Eating Disorders
• Fitness
• Hormones
• Puberty
• Smoking

A here are a few fun things to ease those Growing Pains..

1. Competition time!

You could be in with a chance to win a £100 gift voucher for Health Edco.

Who are Health Edco?

We met Health Edco for the first time at the Health & Wellbeing Exhibition back in November and were really impressed with the range of cool (and helpful!) PSHE classroom tools they offered. We were particularly affected by these Drunk & Dangerous Glasses (it was impossible to walk in a straight line with these on) and seeing just how much tar builds up in a smoker’s lungs in one year (Tobacco Health Package) – not pleasant!

So take 5 minutes out of your day for some Growing Pains Word Search fun and you and your students could be enjoying some fantastic Health Edco resources in the new school term:

Click here to download.

Competition guidelines:

• Download and print the word search
• Complete and submit to us by Friday 2nd July
• You will be entered into a prize draw to win a £100 gift voucher for Health Edco
• 10 runners up will get our ever-popular BrainPOP UK badges

Send by…

Post: BrainPOP UK, 1st Floor Barclay House, 242-254 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 7BY

Fax: 01865 55 77 66

Email: info@brainpop.co.uk

For competition terms and conditions see here: http://www.brainpop.co.uk/support/competition_terms_and_conditions/

2. Match ‘em up

A fun Match the Movie activity! See if you can tell which letter question kicks off which movie!

Click here to download.

Hopefully it’s easy enough but we’ve provided an example to get you started. Hint: watching the Spotlights movies should help you along nicely.

3. Dear Tim & Moby

At BrainPOP UK we appreciate how difficult growing up can be – after all, we’ve all done it (well, most of us!) – and adolescence can be such a confusing time. So it’s good that Tim & Moby pride themselves on answering tricky questions.

If you have a question you’d like answered, here’s the letter template for you to download: Dear Tim & Moby letter.

Fill it out, send to us and we’ll make sure Tim & Moby get back to you.

Think of Tim & Moby as your own personal Growing Pains Agony Uncle and, er… Agony Robot?

You can also ask Tim & Moby a question here.

4. What’s the worst thing about growing up?

After you’ve enjoyed our Growing Pains movies, done fantastically well in the quizzes, found out some interesting facts from our Adulthood FYI, and completed the activities in this POPSpot post, take a second to vote in our Growing Pains poll and see how the results are shaping up:

BrainPOP UK had an interesting couple of days at the Health & Wellbeing in Education Exhibition 2009.  We, along with everyone else, didn’t really know what to expect – it was the first year of the exhibition – but we like to think BrainPOP UK isn’t afraid to try new things. And anyway Tim and Moby always draw the crowds.

So we tripped off into the unknown – otherwise known as the Birmingham NEC – and set up camp next to Rethink and Slimming World.

While struggling to keep warm and yell over the bongo drums workshop or the Yoga lady who was running sessions that went very quiet and THEN GOT VERY LOUD we met quite a few teachers and TAs which was great.

We also met Social Workers, School Nurses, Occupational Therapists, Physiotherapists, and SEN specialists. A delightful mix of folk.

We showcased our PSHE movies and were chuffed to see a particular favourite for the Physiotherapists was Broken Bones. Well, chuffed, but not surprised. And, one School Nurse we spoke to even said “that’s exactly what we say when we’re talking to children!” after watching the Addiction movie.

Everyone we spoke to seemed to like what they saw so we were really pleased. It’s always hit and miss at events like this as you never know if you’ll fit in or if BrainPOP will appeal to the crowds. There were a few requests for movies we don’t currently offer but we take all suggestions on board so watch this space.

A couple of exhibition highlights:

1. 5 a Day Fitness and their great exercise DVD. 5 minutes of exercise for schoolchildren to do in the classroom everyday. We’ll be implementing this plan for mornings at BrainPOP HQ soon enough (maybe to banish the inevitable Festive season weight gain?).
2. Another memorable event: Squishing and squashing a pound of fat at the Health Edco stand. DISGUSTING!

Hmm…bearing in mind that rather realistic pound of fat, we think the deliciously cheesy garlic bread scoffed the evening of the first day shows BrainPOP UK’s commitment to health and wellbeing.

Maybe not.

Report card reads: must try harder.

Dawn, a Senior Year 6 teacher and ICT Co-ordinator at Oakdale Junior School, has very kindly offered to give us her take on using BrainPOP UK.

Dawn is perhaps best known for her ground breaking work with game based learning in the classroom  – see her presentation here using Nintendo DS in the classroom. She is also deservedly a finalist for the Hand Held Learning 2009 Special Achievement Awards winner of the Hand Held Learning 2009 Special Achievement Awards!! (Well done, Dawn!)

If you’ve been fortunate enough to hear her speak you’ll know what an inspirational teacher she is, and how passionate she is about integrating exciting and engaging ICT into the realities of classroom life.

“I am not sure when or where I first heard of this product but have a feeling it may have been at BETT.

I remember being drawn by the bright colours and the characters of Tim and Moby. This is true as well of the students themselves when they first use it; however there is a lot more to this package than colours and characters.

BrainPOP UK is an online environment, where as a teacher and as a pupil you can watch short (5 minute) videos explaining a range of subjects across the National Curriculum.

The videos are well presented and convey the information in both a child-friendly and factual way as well as injecting humour – a must I feel with some topics! After each video there is a short activity and a quiz, although you do not need to complete this if you chose not to.

I used BrainPOP UK a lot during the Summer Term with my year 6 class, and found their videos covering puberty and PHSE invaluable as they dealt with these topics sensitively, but with a sprinkling of humour!

When I asked the class which part of the topic they had enjoyed – they all agreed watching Tim and Moby as it:

• ‘…made it clear’
• ‘…did not talk down to us’
• ‘…I felt they understood us’
• ‘…I liked the fact that the letters are written by real children’ (a fact that I nor they knew until we asked via Twitter – another recommendation by one of the class when I admitted that I did not know).

Once we had used it for this topic – the class were eager to explore other areas – they wanted to know what else Tim and Moby talked about!!! We then discovered some great resources for Literacy and Maths which we watched before we sat the SATS.

Again this idea came from the children not me and proved a hit as one they were all watching, learning and relaxing before their tests. There are numerous ways of using the resource. I tend to use it to introduce the topic, and use the quiz at the end as I find that this equips the children with a good degree of knowledge before we start any topic.

BrainPOP UK is a subscription service, but the range of subjects that they cover is vast and they are constantly looking at ways of improving and are great at listening and responding to suggestions from both pupils and teachers.

They also offer free videos each month – a great idea particularly when the Swine flu hit schools and children were worried. We embedded this onto our school blog and children were able to share this with their parents at home.

It can also be watched on a trial basis, which as a teacher I feel invaluable when trialling out resources with my children. It can look really good and sound really good in a sound bite or blurb on company website but it is when it is used in a real context that, for me, is the real test!

I and the class thoroughly enjoyed trying out BrainPOP UK during the Summer term – now the only question is – where did I leave that order form?”

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