Exploring Animaker for Teaching and Learning

      EdTech Sandbox, Event Recap, Fiscal 2024-2025, Learning & Teaching, News

By Maryam Safa Schneider, assistant professor, University Canada West

On February 26, 2025, as part of the BCcampus EdTech Sandbox Series, we explored how to use Animaker for teaching and learning. Animaker is an intuitive online tool designed to help educators create professional-looking, engaging animations, even with no prior experience in animation. With its simple drag-and-drop system, you can easily add characters, backgrounds, and effects to presentations, lessons, or videos. Animation can boost student engagement and appeal to a variety of learning styles, making it invaluable in today’s diverse learning environments. 

Animation can transform abstract or challenging concepts into visually compelling and easily digestible narratives. Visual learners learn best through images and visual aids so animated explainer videos are particularly effective for them. Auditory learners can benefit from hearing the material explained. For kinaesthetic learners, animated videos can simulate real-world actions, helping them better understand theoretical and abstract concepts.

With a free plan, users can access basic features, including 10 premium asset credits, five premium downloads, and the ability to create five custom characters each month. Short animations can be exported in HD quality. Additionally, animated videos can be uploaded and seamlessly integrated into learning management systems.

Key Features of Animaker

  • User-friendly drag-and-drop interface
  • Access to extensive character and scene libraries
  • AI-powered subtitle creation 
  • AI voiceovers 
  • Versatile animation styles, including explainer videos

By integrating animations into lessons and activities, educators can make learning more interactive, accessible, and enjoyable. This tool allows instructors to create short, animated lectures or micro-lessons that break down complex topics into smaller, more engaging pieces. Educators can also create explainer videos, which are particularly useful for short overviews.

The subtitles feature can help educators address the needs of diverse users, thereby widening opportunities for participation in learning. Animated videos with subtitles are accessible to learners of various language backgrounds and those with hearing impairments. Additionally, learners can use the platform to create explainer videos or scenario-based content to demonstrate their understanding of key concepts, promoting active learning and critical thinking. 

Animaker fosters engagement, creativity, and deeper learning by catering especially to visual learners. Incorporating animation into teaching practices can transform traditional learning methods into more dynamic, modern experiences, helping students retain information more effectively. The platform supports visual storytelling, allowing both educators and learners to bring their ideas to life and recreate their personal life experiences. For learners, the tool promotes creativity, collaboration, and enhances their storytelling and communication skills.

Animaker can be a powerful tool to enrich teaching and provide students with creative ways to demonstrate their learning, but there are a few challenges we should be aware of:

Time constraints: While this tool simplifies the animation process, creating high-quality content still requires an investment of time—especially when you’re first learning the platform. Balancing the time needed to create animations with other teaching responsibilities can be a challenge.

Technological barriers: Although the platform is user-friendly, it does involve a learning curve, particularly for those unfamiliar with animation or video editing tools. Instructors and learners may need time to explore the platform before diving into a project.

Purposeful integration: It’s important to carefully consider when and how to use Animaker in a way that enhances learning, rather than using it solely for the sake of adding visuals. The goal should always be to ensure that animation supports, rather than overwhelms, the educational message.

Resource availability: Access to reliable computers, stable internet, and sufficient time are crucial factors when using this tool. Ensuring that both instructors and learners have the necessary resources is key to making the most of the platform.

How to Use Animaker in the Classroom (Activity Ideas)

a. Creating scenario-based learning content

In education, learning becomes more impactful when placed in a meaningful context. Traditional classrooms often lack the resources to simulate real-world situations. However, by using animation tools like Animaker, we can easily create scenario-based learning content that immerses learners in lifelike scenarios.

Scenario-based learning involves presenting learners with real-life scenarios or situations where they are required to make decisions that influence outcomes. For example, you might create a video where a character faces a dilemma and students must choose between options A, B, or C, leading to different consequences and learning paths. Scenario-based learning aligns with the theory of situated cognition, which suggests that knowledge is best understood when presented within the context in which it applies. According to Wenger’s (2022) interpretation of this theory, learners grasp concepts more effectively when they are situated within practical, relatable situations.

Practical example:

  • Create scenarios that mirror real-world challenges students may face in their careers or fields of study. For instance, in a business course, you could animate a negotiation scenario where students must choose the best strategy to close a deal.
  • Interactive decision points can be added where learners choose different actions for the animated characters, allowing for a personalized learning path and immediate feedback on their decisions.

b. Drawing from life experiences and creating scenarios

A powerful way to deepen learning is by connecting course content to learners’ real-life experiences. According to David Kolb’s experiential learning theory, learners grasp concepts more effectively when they actively engage with them and relate them to their personal experiences (Kolb, 2014). By having students reflect on their own lives and then bring those reflections to life through animation, they go through Kolb’s experiential cycle of experiencing, reflecting, thinking, and applying.

Practical example:

  • Get learners to think back to a moment when they observed or experienced the fundamental attribution error. This is when we overemphasize personal traits (internal factors) as the cause of someone’s behaviour, while underestimating the influence of situational factors (external factors). For example, if a colleague misses a deadline you might assume they are disorganized or lazy (internal attribution) rather than consider that they might have been dealing with an unexpected workload or personal issues (external factors). Learners will recreate the situation, focusing on how they or others fell into the trap of the fundamental attribution error.
  • Learners share their scenarios with the class. This allows for group discussions on how the fundamental attribution error impacts perception in different situations. The activity encourages critical thinking as students explore the biases and discuss how their views might change with a more balanced understanding of internal and external factors.

References

Kolb, D. A. (2014). Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and development. FT Press.

Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Webinar Resources and Transcript

If you missed the webinar, or want a quick refresher, you can access the webinar recordings and transcript here:
EdTech Sandbox Series: Exploring Animaker for Teaching and Learning