Animation Part 1!

This week we've been looking into using anmation in the classroom. I have to admit I was a bit skeptical about it all... the animations im use to seeing are in movies that cost millions to make and years to create, however I was suprised to see how easy it is to make a simple but effective animation using resources found in the classroom.

Donna, Tori, Vicki and myself are working together to create an animation of a tree going through the seasons. During last weeks seminar we created some of the props we would need and had a play around with the Digiblue camera. It was interesting to test out some ideas and work out how much movement was required between each frame and how many frames to take before we moved the image.

Overall I think using animation in the classroom is a great idea. Collaboration, creativity and problem solving are just a few of the skills it promotes in children and for them to see the final end product allows them to see for themselves how all the stages involved come together.

Ill update next week and hopefully have the final animation to add!

Rachel

Blogging So Far!

Ok so ive been on blogger for just over a week now and so far its going ok. Ive spent the past week playing around a bit trying to figure out how to change things and edit my blog and profile. At first it was a bit annoying not knowing how to change what I wanted or doing something and then not knowing how I did it but im finally getting there now. For some reason people nowadays dont read instructions or avoid using the help section to work things out... why is that?! Instead like me we end up just playing and experimenting with things, instructions are a thing of the past! So I was thinking, if I was in school using blogs with children should I help them out and tell them how to change the colours or add links to videos when they want to or should I just let them figure it out themselves by playing around. I know for myself it can be pretty fustrating when you can't do it and I tend to just log off... so wheres the balance? Is it the same for every child?

Ive added a link to the next generation learning website where it gives a clear outline of blogs and their use in schools to support learning.

http://www.nextgenerationlearning.org.uk/en/Technology/Other-learning-technologies/Blogs/

Rachel

My First Post!!

So this is my first post and im not quite sure how to use blogger very well but im going to just keep playing around with it and hopefully ill finally understand what im doing!

I've been asked to set this blog up as part of my BEd Primary Science course to reflect on ICT and its role in the primary classroom...basically were trying out new ideas that we can take into the classroom and see the benefits first hand.

Over the next few months ill be adding my thoughts and ideas about lots of different education based things and adding lots of random stuff to hopefully make my blog nice and interesting.

Feel free to comment on any ideas or thoughts,

Rachel