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As digital multimedia tools become more affordable and easy to use, they also become increasingly appropriate for the classroom learning environment. Current research indicates that digital video affords new opportunities for learning, and the professional education associations for science, social studies, mathematics, and English language arts are devoting extensive consideration to the application of digital video technologies to strengthen student learning (Bull and Bell, 2008). Student-created animation is a perfect example of a visual technology that can increase understanding and engage students in the secondary science and mathematics classroom.
In both math and science, students are often asked to remember the steps to complex systems. When students spend their time memorizing answers, rather than understanding and internalizing new material, they are less likely to create links between their prior knowledge and what they are studying. This new “knowledge” is often only short term, likely to be lost or forgotten after the test or quiz has taken place. Digital animation offers an alternative to this process, providing a vehicle for students to create their own meaningful connections with the content. Students who produce their own unique graphics for a mathematical animation are creating their own interactive Visual Mathematical Representations (VMRs), which, in my experience, has a far greater impact on their learning than using pre-existing images to create an animation or watching an existing animation. When students must simultaneously keep several pieces of information in mind while learning something new, it is advantageous to reduce cognitive load by providing depicted objects and parts of objects proximal to textual discussions (Iding, 2000). Using the drawing tools in Frames, students can produce their own unique computer-based Mathematical Cognitive Tools (MCTs) which support and enhance learning and the cognitive processes of learners (Sedig and Liang, 2006).  For example, the Unit Circle is the foundation of trigonometry. When students create an animation that contains the basic transcendental functions, they forge their own relationships between the function and its definition. When students animate these graphics for the purpose of describing a mathematical process, they are also creating an artifact that evidences their understanding of the process.
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Biography
 Brad Smrstick
Brad Smrstick is a former high school math and science teacher with more than 20 years of experience in the classroom teaching physics across all levels from conceptual to A.P. He has participated in summer research programs at the FermiLab, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the University of Florida, and the University of South Florida. He now applies his craft as team lead for Technology Training at Staff Development in Hillsborough County, Florida.
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