Primary children create an animated event at UNE

October 15, 2007

The University of New England's "Animating Learning" project, which has enabled children from four remote New England primary schools to project the magic of their imaginations onto the big screen, has culminated in an "Animations Premiere" at UNE.

More than 120 children from Kentucky, Kelly's Plains, Woolbrook and Kingstown Public Schools converged on the University late last month to participate in the event. They watched and judged the animated films they had created as part of this innovative project. (The photograph displayed here shows Woolbrook Public School teacher Fiona Uren at the UNE "Premiere".)

Having learnt much from the animation process itself, the children had another experience of technology as they used an audience response voting system after each animated film to assess each other's work. "At the culmination of their project they were able to get instant feedback through the system, with graphs charting their peers' ratings on the big screen almost instantly," said the leader of the "Animating Learning" project, UNE's Dr Chris Reading. The very short film festival was followed by the presentation of awards.

The procedures involved in making the animated films included creating the characters (often using clay or toys) and the backgrounds, taking a series of photographs, and using computer software to bring the photographs to animated life, frame by frame.

Anna Bragg, a 10-year-old Year 4 student at Kelly's Plains Public School south of Armidale, called her animated film clip The Amazing Sandwich. Simple but effective, it clearly showed the steps the young animator had taken in creating a chronological series of frames, with the sandwich coming together one ingredient at a time then being bitten into. "It was fun," Anna said. "It was hard moving all of the little pages. Now I can imagine how much time and work it must have taken to make good movies like Shrek and The Simpsons."

Funded by the National Centre of Science, ICT and Mathematics Education for Rural and Regional Australia (SiMERR), which is based at UNE, the project used animation to open a new medium of storytelling to primary school children. As part of the project, teachers and parents from the four schools spent a day at UNE in July, learning and practising the animation techniques they used to teach their students.

Dr Reading said that animation provided educators with an enjoyable and stimulating educational exercise that followed the themes of the existing syllabus. "The students have been able to work with technology in team environments of three or four students, and they've learnt to express themselves in a different way," she said. "This project has been very successful. It is an exciting way in which UNE can help small, remote schools to incorporate technology in learning and nurturing creativity."

Like many parents in remote country localities, Margaret Yarnold is quite actively involved with her local school. "This animation project has been great," she said. "It's taught the kids so much about movement, cameras, technology, and telling a story. All of the students have really got a lot out of it."

"In bringing new education methods and technology to isolated country schools, this project has highlighted the vital role UNE can play in rural and regional Australia," Dr Reading said. "It's always difficult for smaller schools to explore the educational benefits of technology like this, because they don't have the critical mass of students. So it's really important for them to get together at times to experience feedback from a much larger group of peers."

Posted by Jim Scanlan at October 15, 2007 09:51 AM