Animations

Animation in the learning environment was the ICT tool I chose from group 4.  I decided to chose animations as I feel they are a highly underused tool in education.  Everybody loves animations, just look at the worldwide gross earnings for these animated movies:

Madagascar: $532,680,671

Shrek 3: $798,958,162

The Lion King: $945,605,430

Toy Story 3: $1,063,171,911

Source: http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/

See, everyone does love animation.  But back on topic, animations within the classroom can be a great ICT tool.  Teachers can actually create animations quickly and easily using sites such as Xtranormal.  All you have to do is create a free account, then the step by step wizard walks you through creating your own animation with only a few clicks and then just type in the dialogue and you are done!  These can be a great resource for students to use also as they will have fun creating the avatars and giving them emotions.  By using animations in the classroom teachers can deliver content without having to stand in front of their class.  The major downside I found with creating these animations is that the text-to-speech conversion is still very robotic and some pronunciations are incorrect.  Also, as soon as I tried to search the internet for 'Xtranormal' videos I was greeted with a  whole list of inappropriate videos created with this website and posted on Youtube.

PLUS	MINUS	INTERESTING
·        Engaging ·        Free online resource ·        Great for visual learners ·        Encourages creativity ·        Fun to create	·        Poor text-to-speech conversion ·        can lose track of time creating avatars ·        inappropriate videos online when looking for examples	·        very popular in the 'car club scene' ·        some pronunciations.