The affective function of a Greek animation-making project

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper presents a case study realized in a Greek model high school as an extracurricular animation-making project during an after-school club. The student-participants were 20 volunteers between 16 and 18 years old. The researcher studied the affective function of moving image literacy, i.e. the feelings and emotions experienced by the student-participants during animation-viewing, animation-making as well as the affective engagement they wished to cause to their audience. Their creation was a short animation film entitled ‘The Society’, symbolically dealing with the issue of the Greek economic crisis from a social viewpoint. The affective function studied is considered as one of the benefits of moving image literacy, whether this literacy is applied within a subject of the curriculum, is taught as a subject per se or is applied in an extracurricular project addressing all age groups. So, this case study shows the range of feelings students can experience during an animation-making project and how their emotional involvement contributes to the success of the pedagogic process. Its aim is to encourage teachers to use moving image literacy as a means of affective involvement of their students with the subject taught, an aspect that has not been widely explored so far.