The application of custom made animated gifs  is in my opinion, one of the great advances in the teaching of science made possible through the use of computers. Never before has it been possible for teachers to show students how the inside of a body looks like or how an electric motor works, all complete with moving parts and to take apart the body or motor so that students may identify individual components!  

The sample teaching modules shown below are examples of how Animated Gifs may be incorporated into PowerPoint Slides or HyperStudio Stacks in the teaching of Science. Similar Teaching modules may also be complied using Macromedia Authorware programme which has the added advantage of  being able to package these teaching modules into executable files so that users can run the programme even if they do not possess Authorware. You are welcome to download and view the abbreviated lesson modules but please do not repackage the files. If you intend to use the complete full size modules in your class, permission may be obtained from the Author via email.

 

This programme was created using Macromedia's Authorware 5.2. It is a self standing application with it's own executable file, PlanetEarth.exe. However due to the Web Server restriction on the size of the files that may be up-loaded, a web version of this shareware programme is available here for viewing. The shareware version is a full version of the programme with some navigational buttons disabled. To open the file, Macromedia's 'Authorware webplayer' plug-in must be installed. This webplayer is available for download at Macromedia's website for free.
The programme will take a while to download and the transition between pages may not take place smoothly.  This is understandable as the total size of the files is almost 3.9 MB.  The programme should ideally run off a hard-drive or a very  fast network but these pages are for demonstration purposes only and are not meant to be used for teaching!
If you wish to purchase the programme in a CD Rom it is available from the author or  from Edge Multimedia Ltd, New Zealand.

 

The animated gifs may be inserted into HyperStudio and used as part of a presentation of students' lesson, in this case of the Circulatory System. A complete lesson may be customised in this manner for a particular class. This abbreviated HyperStudio lesson  above may be downloaded as a 490Kb zip file. To view the presentation, you will need HyperStudio 3.1(PC  version) and above or a HyperStudio browser plug-in or HyperStudio Player. Unzip (with WinZip) the into a known directory and open the file.

 

Here is another example of an animated gif of the venous and arteriole circulatory system inserted into a PowerPoint file and use as a teaching module for a lesson on the human circulatory system. The main advantage of using PowerPoint as teaching tool is that most schools have the programme and many teachers are familiar with its various facets.  However students can and do tamper with the module when left on their own to operate the programme.
For the PowerPoint slide show of one slide of the lesson complete with animation you will need Microsoft PowerPoint 2000.
 

 

 

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