Educational Value of Animoto

Recently I put together a video for U.S. Geography using the Web 2.0 tool Animoto. Honestly, I was dreading the idea of using this tool and was thinking it was going to be complicated to use, but it was so easy and so much fun! If I had that much fun using this tool, I can only imagine that students allowed to use this to create work for a class would greatly enjoy getting to work with technology. While students may see it as fun or games, they are really learning how to collaborate, communicate, and create lasting products on a global scale. Animoto is a great tool that even students who don't view themselves as creative would enjoy. This site lets you upload photos or videos, text, music, and style of your video. Then you can arrange the information and Animoto will put it all together for you. It's great! I can see kids getting excited about research topics now because they can take their research and put into a video that synthesizes what they've learned to help others understand their topic. This is a great tool for collaboration, summary and synthesis, and authentic learning and producing. My Animoto shows different landmarks around the U.S. and my students love trying to figure out which state each landmark is in.

Make a video of your own at Animoto.