The Link Homeschool News Network Product Guide: BrainPOP Review

BrainPOP®

By Michael Leppert

BrainPOP.com is a subscription-based educational website with a current catalog of 600 interesting animated “movies” that impart information covering six topics: Science, Math, English, Social Studies, Health and Technology. The movies all feature two characters, Tim and Moby, a young man and his robot. Together, they explore the topics, answering questions and discussing pertinent aspects of the fields of study. The history of agriculture, for instance, is fascinating in providing a short insight into the development for farming and its effects on people since the Sumerians.

Click to visit BrainPOP's web site

BrainPOP is perfect for children to view themselves or with their parents. The content is “safe” and there is nothing to download. You simply subscribe, receive your user name and password and you are ready to access BrainPOP’s material for hours of fun and learning. For home users, there are two subscription options – annual and monthly. The annual, at $99, is the cheaper, since the user pays everything all at once. The monthly price is $9.95 per month, which equals $119.40 per year. Both options allow for three log-ins per day.

There is also a Homeschool Access package for $175 for 12 months, which is somewhat like a site license. It allows for 3 simultaneous computers, 15 logins maximum per day. This option is the best for 1 - 2 students who are using BrainPOP throughout the day.

Older children use BrainPOP to gain research information in an overview fashion that allows the basic facts and pertinent knowledge to stay in their minds. The BrainPOP movies appeal to auditory and visual learners more than text-based products do and the movies can be paused, so discussion can occur between parent and child, for instance. The BrainPOP approach gets the child engaged in the subject matter before s/he goes into more depth later on.

Another product offered by BrainPOP is their new K-3rd grade movie line, BrainPOP Jr. This group of movies was launched in September and is designed for very young children and allows them to navigate the presentation themselves. There are questions and cues that stop and anticipate what is going to occur next, so the movie is action viewing, with all of the skills used in a picture book in a moving format. BrainPOP Jr. is suitable for all different levels of reading and English skills, with all text being read aloud and close-captioned. Visit brainpop.com for much more information and to sign up for their free newsletter with updates on new releases and other pertinent news. M.L.■