Powtoon - Create Animated Videos and Presentations

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Well, I missed my post last week just due to a lot going on, and this week we have no school tomorrow, so I'm going to post this one a day early.

One of the biggest challenges teachers face when having students create presentations is how to provide them some options beyond the traditional Powerpoint slides they have created since the third grade.  Additionally, options for creating videos are numerous, but most involve meshing pictures and music and all of the options can sometimes be overwhelming.  Powtoon is a tool that puts a new twist on videos and presentations by allowing students (or teachers) to create animated videos.

The easy dashboard and drag and drop options make it a nice option for creating quick animated videos or presentations with little assistance and easily publish and share them. Additionally, there is app available in the Chrome store, which will make Powtoon even easier to access from your Google Drive and allow one-click sign in.

While there are some limitations to the free version (5 minute video limit, 11 styles to choose from, 10 tunes to choose from, etc.).  However, even with those limitations, the options are wide and varied for the animations and students can exercise a lot of choice and options when making videos.

Overall, I found Powtoon to be a fun, easy-to-use site to make videos and presentations a little different and to try something new and fun.  Check out the links below for more information, examples, and tutorials!

Example Powtoon About Creating Presentations
Example Powtoon by a Teacher About Electricity
Powtoon Video Tutorials - short tutorials from the Powtoon website

Video Creation

There are a variety of tools available online, as software, and as apps that can be used for video creation. Some, like Windows Movie Maker, we have had access to for years on our school computers and most teachers and students are fairly familiar with.  Others, only a few teachers have ever tried, and still others are completely new to us all.  This blog post will cover a couple of tools that are not as frequently used in our school or that have specific features that make them unique.

Zoetrope is actually at Windows 8 app that is available for install on our student devices and teacher computers that have Windows 8.  This app is a great choice for creating stop-motion movies for classroom projects.  The app makes it easy to take pictures and provides an overlay of the previous image, making it easier to create the stop-motion effect.  Once the images are completed, it is easy to save the video and then share it with others, or put it into another program such as movie maker to add more effects.  A couple of our math teachers recently used this app to have students create stop-motion videos about trig functions and it worked really well.  Overall, what makes this app appealing is that it is easy to use.  See the links below for more information on downloading and using the app.

Zoetrope App in Windows Store
Directions for Students for Downloading an App on their PLDs
Directions for Using the Zoetrope App

Stupeflix is a website that is great for classroom projects with younger students, students who aren't as technology savvy, or when you want a fast and easy option without a lot of bells and whistles.  Stupeflix lets students create videos using a premade theme that they choose (and there are only two free options to choose from), and then students add in their own pictures or videos to use.  There are a few features like being able to add a title and credits, or adding text overlay on an image, but there are no frills or extras with those features.  Additionally, music or audio can be added to the project, and the site provides a database of free music that can be used, or the students can upload music or audio recording.  Once a video is finished, it is easy to complete and share.  The biggest benefits of this site are how easy it is to use and that younger students or those without strong technology skills can still create videos.  We recently used this site with our ELL New Americans class where they created videos about their learning styles and likes and dislikes.  The limited options worked well because they were able to focus on the content and ideas instead of getting caught up in how to use the technology. Click the links below for more information or to access the site.

Stupeflix Website
Directions for Using Stupeflix
Link to Stupeflix Youtube Channel - How-to and Example Videos