Task 10 - Document what you are going to produce.

Introduction

Stories4All is a small company that produces 5-10 minute long animations for primary school children to help them with their literacy. These 5-10 minute long animations are subtitled to encourage the child to read, and the appropriate visual style is used to keep them interested. They also produce interactive games along with the animations through the use of buttons that the user can click to produce different outcomes.

What I have been asked to do

As a new administrator I have been asked to make a short demonstrational piece to show what Stories4All is all about. This short 1-2 minute animation will act as a sample of the work from them in order to attract the primary schools without going overboard with a long 5-10 minute animation.

The target market for this sample is likely all those involved with the school. Obviously the pupils themselves who will be around the age of 4-11, however the upper range of those children will likely already be able to read and so will not find the animation beneficial, the target market would probably be better for those aged 4-8. The sample needs to appeal to teachers and parents as they will be able to judge whether they think it will be beneficial for the children and to see that it covers everything that is needed.

The animation

The animation itself that I will produce will likely be based around classic fairy tales, nursery rhymes or even a new story altogether. If I were to use one of these options it would have to be one that they may be familiar with (or at least know of) so that they can identify with it which will make it more fun. The language used will be fairly simple and it will probably not have many words and will be in grammar that they will be able to understand, with only a few words in each scene. Interactivity will also play a role in the sample, such as using buttons to select a particular picture and then text comes up showing what it is. This could also be used after a particular scene where the children can try and remember what they have learned and click one of the multi-choice buttons to see whether they got it right.

The particular fairy tale I will be using for this sample will be “Twinkle Twinkle little star” because it is a fairly well known story and features some challenging wording for this particular age group, along with a catchy tune that the children will be able to sing along to. The words of the nursery rhyme will be displayed at the bottom one line at a time with an indicator above the words that show which word is being said (like karaoke). I will also add sound to it (such as a backing track) that accompanies the animation to make it more immersive to the audience to make it better to sing along to.

User Requirements

The user will be both the children and the teachers. The requirements from the teachers will be that it teaches the children what they need to be taught, i.e. it follows the syllabus and lesson structure the teachers have set out. The requirements from the children will be that it is entertaining visually and interactively, so that they do actually learn from it since they would probably prefer this to other activities like reading from a book. It needs to be at a level the children are comfortable with, yet still quite challenging.