I’ve heard a lot about Animoto but it’s always been filed away in that “I’m sure it’s great, but I’m on technology overload here” part of my brain. This week I decided to finally jump in and make one.
If you stick with the basic account, it’s more than mildly annoying that you can’t do anything past 30 seconds without a paid account. But thanks to @ckendall for the heads-up that you can apply for a free educator account. Mine came through immediately (no 2-week wait like they cautiously say). That gives you unlimited videos for you and up to 50 students.
Yesterday, our first day of school, I was in the new position of actually not knowing my Spanish 3 students. This is the first class I’ve had that I didn’t already have in a previous class. So, we talked about why each one of them elected the class. I took some of their ideas, grabbed some photos from Flickr Creative Commons, and made a quick Animoto. Today I did the same thing with some vocab from AP’s first unit.
What will you make?
Make your own slideshow with music at Animoto.
Try our slideshow creator at Animoto.
At animoto educators can get the Plus account for free – and then you won't be limited to 30 seconds. Information is at http://animoto.com/education
Do you use a certain textbook for AP?
We use Triángulo (Wayside Publishing) sparsely just to get students really used to the AP format. Their fall final exam is the practice AP from College Board's website. Other than that, I do my own thing. I have nine thematic units and each unit we work through at least 1 oral presentation and 1 essay based on sources I find on the internet. Also, every Wednesday we work on reading our novel, Ciudad de las bestias by Isabel Allende.
HTH!