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SINGAPORE: As a kid, did you spend time drawing your favourite cartoon characters? Well, 560 students from Wellington Primary School did that and more recently when Hewlett Packard and Cartoon Network teamed up to bring animation to the school.
The Toon Creator Awards is a collaborative effort between Hewlett Packard and Cartoon Network that aims to provide a new interactive platform to inspire creativity among kids through the use of technology.
Wellington Primary School was the only educational institution in Singapore to be selected for a two days hands-on session much to the delight of the students.
"The reason why we chose Wellington Primary School is because of their strength and support of Information Technology (IT) in their curriculum," said Michelle Ang, Consumer Marcom & Public Relations Manager, Hewlett Packard.
When the students were told of the plans involving Cartoon Network with its host of characters such as Ben 10 and Chowder, the loud cheers from the 300 students ranging from Primary One to Primary Six was clear indication of how cartoons play a significant role in their lives.
But shouldn't cartoons be confined to homes instead of being used as an educational tool?
"Nowadays, even if you stop your child from watching cartoons on television, they can easily get it from the Internet such as YouTube," said Roslee bin Jalie, Head of Department of Information, Communications Technology of Wellington Primary School.
"In that case, why don't we try to include cartoon animation as part of their learning?"
That is what Hewlett Packard and Cartoon Network had in mind when they created the Toon Creator Awards which aims to promote and enable self expression, as well as inspire creativity amongst young children in a fun and exciting way.
The like-minded school which initially made the workshop available only to Primary Three to Primary Six students, came to a decision to also allow the Primary One and Two students to participate.
"For the lower primaries, it is to create awareness among them. As for the upper primaries, it can help to infuse thinking and entrepreneurship," explained Mr Roslee.
"The workshop combines the usage of the English language and IT skills whereby it allows students to express themselves by writing their own content and applying their IT knowledge when creating the storyboard," said the teacher, expanding on the other benefits of the workshop.
If terms such as "animation" and "storyboard" are seemingly complex to you, along with video editing – start blushing.
The basic functions required in the workshop such as editing and storyboarding are similar to Wellington Primary School's IT curriculum where students as young as seven are introduced to programs such as Windows Movie Maker to develop projects.
Mastering the Toon Creator, a simplified and user-friendly program created by Hewlett Packard and Cartoon Network, was as easy as ABC for the kids, with some even trying the program at home before the workshop.
At school, the fun began with a five seconds animation clip on Toon Creator which the students had to watch.
They then had to create their very own 25-seconds animated ending.
"The program was easy to use and I have the freedom to do my story," Bin Sheng, a Primary Four student told channelnewsasia.com.
His fellow schoolmates, Keith Leong and Felicity Chua, who said they found the workshop interesting, enjoyed creating their own dialogues in the story.
Another bonus, their works could just emerge winners in The Toon Creator Awards ending 30 September.
Participants aged 6 to 14 from Australia, India, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand. Winners stand to win a Hewlett Packard TouchSmart personal computer and a Cartoon Network Digital Pack, among other prizes.
So who says cartoons aren't good for the kids? - CNA
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