Why use Powtoon in the classroom?

by Maria Victoria Pineda

We have moved to a decade when all the information we need is just one Google line away– what about FIBA2016? who are the real parents of Jon Snow? or is a tarsier a monkey? At the same time almost all urban spaces have accessed to wifi connection. So if this is the case, then the classrooms, canteens and homes of the learners are no different from the urban space that will allow anybody to read her email, post a photo in FB or instagram or even tweet the coffee place where she is handing out.

So in the classrooms nowadays, teachers are not expected to be the all-know-person when it comes to the subject matter. Teachers are now the coaches that challenge the minds of the learners. Teachers are the experience designers that provide the suitable activities to enhance cognitive momentum among the students. Teachers are now free to ask a question she or he may not be certain about because most likely that the learners are informed or may be more informed if they have developed great desire on the topic.

So there is no point now to make Powerpoint presentations that have 30 or 50 slides. It is too much power for points you want to send across. As a teacher, you may want to develop the topics of your subject matter in other ways and enable intelligent questions or messages through a short, animated presentation like Powtoon. Powtoon is like a presentation movie in 2minutes or 3minutes.

Here is my Powtoon arguing why we have to make a short presentation.

 

 

Here is an example made by one of my trainees last June and he showcased about their province, Trà Vinh in South Viet Nam. Positive messages are sent across about Tra Vinh.

Created by Huynh Khoa of Trà Vinh University

Powtoon as a video explainer or a presentation movie provides a set of easy-to-follow functions on how to create animations. The use of the templates also make it very convenient for a beginner. What is important for any movie presentation is that the content or the message has been planned and thought well. And this should work for teachers who have arranged and prepared well-thought activities to generate the mental and creativity challenges among the students.

Powtoon products can be exported to Youtube or as a Powtoon web link, https://www.powtoon.com/online-presentation/gfJye1Qppx6/vietnam-is/?mode=movie#/ too.

So here is another channel of making a presentation.. short, straightforward, fresh and reflective..

 

 

 

Short video as a powerful tool

Youtube has been around since 2005 and since then it has generated different kind of interests and communities. Youtube has been the company that made us realize the power of animated or moving pictures in a short length. If the plan is carried on properly, the shorter the video, the more powerful is its message and more meanings are generated. This is pretty much at the end of the storytelling sphere where you have on the other end the film format that extends to two hours or more to convey a story and a message.

In the digital age quality is not measured by length but how the content is expressed. In this segment I will showcase different short videos that were produced by former students and try to make a point that a short video is just as powerful too.

The following examples are from the project I did with Lennarth Bernhardsson, a Digital Media instructor from University West Sweden back in 2011. We wanted to uncover what makes “a great learning experience” and the students express their answers by creating a two-minute video or less.

 Learning is not only confined in the classroom setting, on the contrary it’s the experience you gain that makes your learning worthwhile. It’s true that you can never learn without guidance, but guidance being itself is only there to aid you in your learning experience. Our group believes that people learn best if they discover something and this something sparks their interest, the interest they gain will keep them motivated to learn and through enough practice will give them the skill they need to succeed. The video was directed by John Eric Uy.

 

Failing a class doesn’t always mean the end of the world. This video shows how one can turn little setbacks into learning experiences.

Next Time by Igoy Dimaano, Iya Del Rio, Kevin Caballas, Mark Moraga, Nicole See-Diet is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

 This was done as a part of a video and editing course at University West. We were to express a “Great Learning Experience” through the use of mostly only Creative Commons Material.- Linus Forsell

The three videos exhibited 21st century student outputs. It shows and demonstrates students today have a medium of their own blended with their own creativity.

Thank you Youtube for this wonderful digital invention. Everyone can create a story or tell a message and broadcast it in a platform that is accessed by the whole world. As most institutions recognize the power of video, even the Ministry of Education of Singapore has made it as a very meaningful tool to tell their citizens and to tell the world the importance of the teaching profession. Here are two videos they have made to tell that teaching is an important business and profession in the development of a nation.

The video Mrs. Chong was uploaded in 2012 in Youtube and the Why video was only uploaded this 2016.

Each of these videos of the Ministry of Education of Singapore is three minutes. But each is filled with insightful questions, narrative and reflections to tell. This is the power of the short video.