Comics of varying sorts have been around for hundreds of years. From political cartoons to Sunday funnies, people of all ages can enjoy their humor and analyze their meanings. There are a number of comic strip websites out there, but the one I'm looking at today is GoAnimate. It's free to join, but comes with a limited number of themes and a time limit (30 seconds) on the comic strip videos. This also requires an email address to sign-up, which as talked about in my last post, might be an issue for the younger grades. It's nice though, because within the themes, there are many options to choose from and objects that can be manipulated. Voices can be added to the characters, either through a voice file, a voice recording, or a text-to-speech option. Again, in the free version, the comic strip video can only be 30 seconds long, so it limits how much speech can be added in. Music files can be uploaded as well. It's not overly complicated, but does take some time. If I were to have students use it, I would definitely make them have a plan in advance. I think that overall, I would just use it to introduce various topics instead of having students make them. I would consider using them in the upper grades (10-12) potentially.
Idioms are used in everyday speech. When a student is learning any language, eventually the topic of idioms must come about. The comic below walks through some idioms that can be heard in the news or daily conversation. I envision it being an introduction to a section on common (American) English idioms. It would be discussed and broken down into the various idioms that appear in the 'news report.' This technology doesn't have to be limited to just a language classroom. I can picture any number of topics being presented through one of the comic strip videos.
Breaking News: Idioms by katiemcf on GoAnimate
Wow! You were able to put a lot of idioms in that short clip.
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