Cartoons and Animation in the Classroom

Many of us still remember (or watch) our favorite cartoons from our childhood. There were classics like Tom and Jerry alongside shows like Spongebob Squarepants and now Dora the Explorer and Handy Manny. Some of these were/are educational and some were/are not. Even if they do have a lesson imbedded in the program and children pick up on it, the level of thinking involved is very low. How could cartoons and animation possibly be useful to teachers, then, you ask?

Thanks to a free online tool cartoons and animation can have their place in education. MakeAGif is a web tool that allows anyone to create their own animation for free. There is no registration needed but you may log in through Facebook or Twitter, however, it is not required. Simply upload photos straight from the home page using the “add pictures” button. When you have chosen and uploaded them they will be displayed just below the first step instructions. In this area you may order them the way you would like them to appear in the animated rotation. Then, click continue. Finally choose the speed at which you would like the images to change. Because of the simplicity of the program all of the images will be displayed for the same amount of time so if there is text, make sure to slow it down. In the third step you will also be able to resize images and choose a category.  To finish click “create your gif”. You can then watch and download the finished product.

MakeAGif has extensive implications for the classroom. Children will have to use higher level thinking to create any projects. Their animations could be a representation of an event in history or the process of a caterpillar turning into a butterfly. Students will have to take the concept of sequence and step by step process in order to convey ideas without sound. Through MakeAGif they might be encouraged to learn about the history of cartoons, especially silent films. This tool has even more potential when used in conjunction with other software such as Photoshop. There students could add text to images to add to the effectiveness of their project.

Cartoons and animation can come to the classroom with MakeAGif. Enjoy!

This tool was originally selected as one of the best free tools to create animated pictures by Educational Technology and Mobile Learning and referenced in the blog Technology Bits, Bytes, & Nibbles.