GifGear

This week's ITRT Play of the Week features a cool website that lets you create your own animated GIF files.  GifGear, lets you add you own photos, add text, and edit timing to easily create these looping videos.  Animated GIFs are those cool animated video loops that you see floating around the Internet from time to time.

Although they are often used for funny things, they can certainly be used for education!  Animated GIFs could be created by teachers to show to the class or by students  to show their understanding of a concept.  Cycles (life cycles, lunar cycle, water cycle) and patterns (growth patterns, number patterns, word patterns) work well, but students could also create GIFs with historical figures or literary sequences.

Here's one I made of the Lunar cycle:

Here's one I made showing the progression of a math problem:

An animated GIF could also be used to show a technique or method in Fine Arts classes, CTE classes or Physical Education.  Students could even show examples of emotions for Guidance.  I made this GIF to demonstrate turning a frown into a smile:

The finished product can be downloaded to your computer to show on a projector, to email, or to add to your webpage.  As with many free sites these days, there are lots of sneaky adds, so be sure to warn students if you are letting them create their own GIFs.

Check it out here:

http://gifgear.com/

Enjoy!

~Alan