someone asked about flash projects for year 9s and i remembered this one - an animated acrostic poem (click the 'start' text).
Its pretty simple, but good for practicing layers and frames and tweens, and the kids seem to like it - so here's the instructions for doing it.
(This was originally done in Flash 5, and it works the same in Flash 8, so i expect it would be same in the later versions).
So, to start with - it needs staggered start and end points for each letter - (see the pic in step 4) .. so here's the process:
(1) set up as many layers as there are letters in your name -add label each layer
(in this case - 4 layers for FRED)
(2) on the bottom layer, add a key frame in frame 1, and use the Text tool to type in the first letter ("F') (choose a font of say size 24) .
(3) take the number of letters in your name, and multiply x 10. Fred has 4 letters, so the "magic number" is 40. Go out to the magic number (40 in this case), and add a key frame on the bottom layer.(So the 'F' starts on the stage at Frame 1; and ends at Frame 40 (or whatever your magic number is)
(4) on the second layer, add a keyframe into frame 10, type the second letter ("R" for Fred) , and offset the end point 10 frames on as well (see the pic) , so it is staggered in relation to the layer below.
(5) add the remaining letters into the other layers, and continue staggering the start and the end points 1o frames beyond the previous layer. (it doesn't look like the two top layers in the pic have staggered end points, but they do .. have just truncated the screen shot a little ) if you play it now, it will look like this (click the little "start" text at bottom)
so now to add in the rest of the word, and morph them (so 'F' morphs into 'Fruity' for example) :
(6) on the bottom layer, add another key frame 10 frames past the previous end point (now frame 50 for Fred). Edit the text so on this key frame so it has the full word (Fruity, not just F).
(7) Need to break the word into a shape, so its not ordinairy text. Select the text box (click the arrow tool first), then choose "Break-Apart" under the Modify menu, twice. (short cut : control-B twice).
(8) still on the bottom layer, break apart the single letter ('F') on the previous key frame.
(9) Now you can add a shape tween 
between these two keyframes, to morph the F into Fruity. Here's one method for this - with the "F' keyframe still selected (frame 40 in this case), and the properties window showing (select Window Properties if you need to), select "Shape" out of the "Tween" drop down
(10) all being well there should be a green arrow like this : 
between the key frames .... if you see the dreaded dashed line then one or other of the keyframes probably wasn't broken apart fully (needs to be done twice to break a word right down to a shape).
(11) so .. .repeat all that (step 6 to 11) on the other layers ..
(12) now add an extra keyframe to each layer so they all end in the same spot - so the end of the movie should look something like this
(13) from here, you could add images etc on other layers, to come in at appropriate times - an apple appears with the fruity layer etc, and motion tweens around, and maybe sounds, etc - or change the timing, if you want a delay between each letter etc
enjoy
I’ve wondered why ICT seems to lacks clarity of purpose in education. – why effective ICT usage is such an elusive thing. Also about the sense of alienation many seem to feel – that ‘technology is being done to us".
I think its because “ICT” is not one thing; it’s a million things.We might think a skilled IT person – in education say - is good at a set of programs {wordprocessing, spreadsheets, internet use; movie making … .etc}
Problem is that it is not a finite set – there are as many potential domains of ICT usage as there are domains of thought – so it’s a forlorn hope to try master it all. Taking a look at how software works, it can actually simulate every other system that can be thought of - any system that can be described, can also be simulated on a computer.
That might seem a big claim - but its what Turing mathematically demonstrated even before computers were built. And its why software is endlessly flexible–- its like the permutations of writing. - (and at bottom software is very like language) - so that set will never close.
(We don’t quite see this, partly because the physical object of a computer appears to be “one thing”, or one collection of programs – not quite seeing its capable of running every simulation that can be thought of – morphing into any conceptual form).
The first “meta medium” as Alan Kay called it.
So no wonder we’re not sure what the best way to “use ICT is” - its like asking what’s the best way to “use text”? It rather depends on what you’re wanting to do, express, analyse, what you are interested in. So what does an educator, with some responsibility for getting students or colleagues to “use it”, do?
A common approach is instrumentalist - we try to be adept at knowing a relatively wide range of tools, and potential ways to use them for learning and teaching. And then we expose others to some sense of the range of tools, and their use in mastering various domains.
(So implicitly some progressive position on education and curriculum etc often accompanies this - Marco Torres is really on about a passion for social equality, and Ken Robinson is really about creativity, as much as they might be interested in ICT as a vehicle for their ideas etc).
The mantra of this sort approach is ‘Its not about technology– its about achieving your goals etc / its about learning etc”
I think this goal driven approach is a productive and useful path, especially for busy teachers.
There is, though, a set of generic skills that still applies and is worth teaching children, who have time to learn. This seed will be more congenial for some than others – potentially grow some very big trees.Its understanding that software really is a “meta-medium” – that has a creative potential similar to language or mathematics; or some hybrid of the two.
That is, getting students to see that software is, behind the scenes, a particular type of formal language, limited in some ways – non emotive, analytical - but can be expressive and descriptive of ideas, and empowered to run at such speed that the simulation is tangible, interesting, expressive.
(listen to Steve Jobs describe the people who built the Apple
If you study these people a little bit more what you'll find is that in this particular time, in the 70's and the 80's the best people in computers would have normally been poets and writers and musicians. Almost all of them were musicians. Alot of them were poets on the side. They went into computers because it was so compelling. It was fresh and new. It was a new medium of expression for their creative talents. The feelings and the passion that people put into it were completely indistinguishable from a poet or a painter. Many of the people were introspective, inward people who expressed how they felt about other people or the rest of humanity in general into their work, work that other people would use. People put a lot of love into these products, and a lot of expression of their appreciation came to these things. It's hard to explain
So its interesting that when schools are talking so much about 'creative use of ICT', that the capacity to escape the boundaries of some else's simulation; and build ones’ own – to create at the language level – is not promoted more widely. One would think building and taking control like this would be included in the canon of constructivist / constructionist approaches to ICT.
It would help to get kids and teachers to understand that all flavours of software - spreadsheets or word docs or movie editors or browsers etc – everything is a system that begins life as an idea and becomes reality through a series of interactive expressions and rules.
It’s a pity in some ways the art of creating this is called 'programming' – since that feels like a dry, behaviourist sort of term. But as Seymour Papert said, its better for the kids to programming the computer than the other way around – and he investigated the wide ranges of “styles” that students brought to this medium.
As with other forms of literacy we want to be on the creating (writing) as well as consuming (reading) side. (The trap is because its so much easier to consume than produce - and using well designed software is such a compelling experience that we might be happy to leave creating it to the 'tech nerds').
Yet I think not doing this also contributes to a our sense of alienation – that ICT is being 'done to us', and we’ll never 'catch up'. That is, in a sense, probably true, if we’re just observing and positioning ourselves to try to use that set, which keeps growing.
Proprietary systems that position the “user” as completely apart from the “developer” and give little accessible or obvious means to get started with creating software are also part of the problem – most people sense that’s it all too difficult or involved to go the 'developer tools' and all that.
But really it doesn’t need to be that way - simulations that allow software development at some level should be quite accessible.
Ironically, the first generation of personal computers had a much easier starter language inbuilt (called BASIC) : Beginners All Purpose Symbolic Instruction Language.
Sounds like the sort of things schools should be interested in – and indeed many were.
Purists despise it of course – but it wasn’t bad for getting started – and that’s whats missing today – kids never get that start.
I'm not suggesting all should be programmers, (although if we called it software creativity it might sound more appealling) ; but the seed of that capacity should be on offer in schools; accessed via maths or english or science or robotics or overlaps of these - we should be able to cultivate that sense of creative control - which can grow in as many directions as there are ideas (in fact the idea can be the motive for learning the art).
this meta-medium allows any system to be created, simulated, transmuting one thing into something else – this is, from a particular point of view, the essence of ICT – and its what happens inside this software stuff, and so is worth understanding – or at least offering a scaffold for those how want to understand, since it becoming so pervasive and powerful. Its a slower discipline, compared to using software (maybe analogous to learning music, rather than the easier task of appreciating it) - but avoiding it seems to rule off a literacy that can be very empowering.