Making Avatars
Distribute the handout Avatar Outline and tell students to use it to draw an avatar they might use in a game or virtual world.
Tell them it can be anything they want, as much like or different from them as they like (if they want to draw something not even human-shaped they can use the blank side of the paper) but remind them that this is how other people will see them in the game.
When students have had time to draw their avatars, have them form pairs and discuss the choices they made.
How is their avatar like them and how was it different?
What do they like about their avatar?
(Older students can write answers to these questions next to their avatar.)
Now ask students who made their avatars. (They did.)
Distribute the handout Avatar Options and tell students they’re going to draw another avatar, but this time they have to start with one of the outlines on the handout.
When they’re done, have them reflect on the choices they made:
Which outline did they pick and why?
How is this avatar different from the first one?
How was making the avatar different when you had to pick from just a few outlines to start with?
Which was more fun?
What did you not like about making the second avatar?
If you wanted to make an avatar who was like you, would it be easier with the first handout or the second one?
Now ask students:
- Let’s talk about your avatar. Is its personality similar or different to yours?
- What kinds of things does your avatar do that are like you?
- What kinds of things does it do that are different?
- For those of you who have used avatars on the Internet, is your avatar like you or different?
Explain that avatars are lots of fun, but sometimes, wearing an online “mask” can make kids behave in ways that they wouldn’t in person.
If possible, have students lie down on chart or butcher paper and have partners trace their outlines.
Have them write inside the outline all of the things they like most about themselves. (Remind them to include both physical characteristics and character traits.)
If that is not practical, distribute another copy of the handout Avatar Outline and have students write their strengths on the blank side.
Now have them draw an avatar that has all of those things they like about themselves.
Encourage them to think about how you would show things like “kind” or “friendly” in an avatar.
Have them reflect (orally for younger students and in writing for older students) on the choices they made and the ways they represented them in the avatar.
If you wish, you can have students use the Reflection Recorder for oral reflections.
If you have already delivered the Introduction to Stop-Motion lesson, you can have students make clay characters as their avatars instead. These clay figures can then be used to “represent” them in other stop-motion projects.
