The Teachers' Animation Toolkit

Materials:
White card, glue, scissors, zoetrope strip template
Resources:
Zoetrope Strip Template:
Construction guides:
http://www.sonypictures.com/classics/shadowmagic/zoetrope/pdf/
instructions.pdf

---

26
The Teachers’ Animation Toolkit
http://www.the-making-place.co.uk/pages/zoe.html
Zoetrope kits for the classroom:
http://www.leons-craft-workshops.co.uk/other-zoetrope-kit.php
Viewing images in a spinning zoetrope
WORKSHEET: BREATHE LIFE INTO TEDDY
Teachers’ note:
This can either be used as a simple drawing exercise, or as a 
template for a cut-out puppet. If you use it to create puppets, this 
can lead naturally onto the cut-out animation exercises to be found 
in Part Three.
Copy the template and ask your students to draw and colour in 
teddy’s features. The template can be glued to a piece of card 
before students cut out the different parts and fi x them together with 
BluTak or paper fasteners. They might also want to experiment with 
different poses and different shapes for the body parts.
Materials:
Glue, thin card, scissors, template
Resources:
Handout: Teddy template:

---

Getting Started
27
WORKSHEET: TWIST’EM, BEND’EM, SQUASH’EM
Teachers’ note:
This is a simple drawing exercise that can be used as a warm-up 
before trying some simple-drawn animation work. The basic 
shapes in the handout can be used as the basic building blocks for 
characters and forms.
Alternatively, just ask the class to begin by drawing a circle, an 
oblong, a square and a triangle on a large sheet of paper, with 
plenty of space between each one.
Suggest the following: Can you extend some of the shapes into the 
third dimension? Can you redraw a shape with a bend or twist in it, 
or as it would look if squashed? Think of the shapes as if they were 
made of modelling clay!
Draw some different basic shapes, then try transforming those into 
characters.
Encourage the students to work with simple confi dent strokes and 
to resist using an eraser. It is not about right or wrong, it’s about 
building up confi dence in drawing.