Literacy & storytelling through Animation

Teacher toolkit

The Challenge

How can we support positive literacy learning experiences for young Travellers? How can increase learning opportunities for reluctant readers and writers? How do we ensure preferred learning styles are used and oral traditions and cultural interests are acknowledged? What can young Travellers create at home, using technology which is available to them?

The Solution

Animation is a great creative tool that makes literacy learning accessible and exciting for young learners. It offers alternative ways for learners of all ages to create their own texts regardless of literacy abilities. Drawing on ideas of storytelling, multimodality, and interest-driven content, animation encourages meaningful and intrinsically motivated learning experiences for young Travellers.

USING ANIMATION TO ENGAGE LEARNERS

STEP research has shown that animation provides a pedagogy that enables Gypsy/Traveller children to reach their highest potential. Children are able to make choices that reflect their personal and cultural interests while developing skills in all areas of the curriculum. Animation provides children with a strong communicative language where they can express their ideas and collaborate without having to overcome traditional language barriers. Using the STEP approach, animations can be created in homes, outdoors or in schools using laptops, tablets or phones.

YOUR VIDEO GUIDE TO GETTING STARTED WITH ANIMATION

These ‘how to’ videos have been developed in partnership with Animation Jam and were inspired by the work of Gypsy/Traveller pupils from STEP’s national animation projects. All the support materials and templates were created through consultation with teachers and Traveller community members to ensure their relevance and accessibility. Simple animations can be done using an iPad, laptop or smart phone. There are many apps available including Stop Motion Studio , Animatic and Zu3D . These apps are easy to use and their websites provide lots of guidance including video tutorials.

Video 1: An introduction to learning through animation

Video 2: Getting started – setting up your tablet device

Video 3: MAKING ARTWORK FOR 2D ANIMATION

VIDEO 4: A GUIDE TO ANIMATING IN 2D

Video 5: MAKING A 2D BACKGROUND

VIDEO 6: MAKING ARTWORK FOR 3D ANIMATION

Video 7. ANIMATING IN 3D

Video 8: Adding sound effects

VIDEO 9: MAKING A FLIPBOOK

Templates

Find a range of templates below to create characters, objects and animals to use in your animations. Pupils can download, print adapt and cut out these templates to make versatile puppets for stop-motion filming.

Yaffin template

Animal template

Yaffin blank

Person blank

Person template

Training and more

STEP offers training for staff to increase their own animation skills and to plan how to integrate animation into a cross-curricular curriculum for Gypsy/Traveller children.

Contact STEP to find out how you and your learners can get involved with our animation projects.

Visit the Education Scotland website to find more information and ideas on how to link the curriculum to learning through animation.