The 5 – 10-year-old audience at the 2024 Friends Seminary Animation Assembly did not disappoint. Their heartfelt reactions to and smart insights about the films I showed were the perfect send-off to a sabbatical about animation, the goal of which is to find even more ways to bring smart and expressive shorts to children.
These assemblies began ten years ago when Friends Seminary parents asked me to help promote the New York International Children’s Film festival. This was a joyful assignment because I had been taking my own children for years and wanted to share our delight in the beautiful and unusual films we watched each year.
Because I am a huge fan of stop motion, and children are enthralled by the physicality of the stop motion process, stop motion is what I chose for the theme of the first animation assembly. Back in 2015 I offered grades K-4 a behind the scenes look at Ukrainian animator Katya Chepik stop motion short “Imagination”
The Letter from the stop motion versions of Arnold Lobel’s Frog and Toad Series, also captivated the students for they, like Toad, were hoping for their own letters as they participated in the First Grade post office project.
The behind the scenes documentary of animator John Matthew, the animator of bringing clay and cellophane to life is impressive, especially because the technical advances enjoyed by today’s stop motion studios were decades away.
Since that first assembly in 2015 I’ve developed a series of themes for the animation assemblies that I cycle through – hand drawing in animation, CGI, Sound, and Story.
These are screenshots from just a few of the beautiful films I’ve been able to showcase at Friends.
The assemblies occur in late January so that children can get excited about the New York International Children’s Film festival around the time when parents can get tickets. (In late October, I’ve added in a bonus topic, the idea of transformation in animation and how Halloween is also about transformation.)
Though a big part of these assemblies is giving children a chance to see films by lesser known animators, to illustrate important points, I’ve also included show clips from favorite animated features such as Secret of Kells, Song of the Sea, Inside Out, Encanto, and Soul.
As I reflect back on these assemblies, what consistently made for a successful assembly were the riveting stories the stop motion, 2D and 3D animators told through their art and the compelling personal stories about becoming animators.
Here is the slideshow from this year’s Friends Seminary Animation assembly
The theme was the Importance of Story in Animation.
Stay tuned for more classroom activities to support the animation assembly themes.