UNICEF (via RuralShores) · Foundational Literacy & Numeracy — teacher training
Foundational Learning, Animated
A multi-module Vyond course helping teachers in Odisha and Jharkhand run foundational literacy and numeracy classrooms.
- Role
- Multimedia developer — instructional design support, animation, delivery
- Year
- 2024–2025
- Focus tool
- Vyond
- Client
- UNICEF (via RuralShores)
- Toolchain
- VyondIllustratorPhotoshopEleven LabsAuditionPremiere Pro
The problem
Teacher-training decks weren't landing: dense theory, unfamiliar contexts, and no time in a teacher's day to read them.
Megha's role
Turned the curriculum into animated modules — script support, scene design, animation, versioning.
The constraint
Rural connectivity and shared devices: files had to stay small, legible on low-end phones, and meaningful with sound off.
The outcome
A course teachers can watch between classes — short modules, familiar classrooms on screen, one technique per film.
Teaching the teachers
The program trains government-school teachers in foundational literacy and numeracy practice. The source material was solid but heavy — workshop decks and manuals that assume reading time teachers don't have.
The brief: convert the curriculum into short animated modules a teacher can absorb on a phone, between classes, in their own language.
Learners
Primary-school teachers across districts in Odisha and Jharkhand.
Format
Short modules, each teaching exactly one classroom technique.
Brainstorming: find the classroom
The team mapped every module against one question: what does this look like in a real classroom? Techniques that survived that test became scenes; anything that stayed abstract went back to the instructional designer.
The winning device was a recurring cast — one teacher, one classroom, the same children — so the course feels like episodes of a story, not a playlist of clips.
Script: show the technique, then name it
Each module's script follows the same spine: a classroom moment that goes wrong, the technique applied, the moment again — working. Theory gets one line, after the viewer has already seen it succeed.
Scripts locked as two-column AV docs, with voiceover drafted for easy localization — short sentences, no idioms that break in translation.
Visual · Classroom, morning. Teacher Asha writes on the board; back-benchers drift. Text: “Class 2 · Reading period”.
Audio · VO: “Asha ma'am has thirty-eight students and one reading period. Here's the moment it usually slips away…”
Visual · Close on three students sharing one book, lost. Gentle zoom — no blame framing.
Audio · VO: “When one book serves three readers, only one of them is reading.”
Visual · Technique: Asha forms pairs, assigns reader/listener roles. On-screen label: “Paired reading — 2 roles”.
Audio · VO: “Paired reading gives every child a job. Reader reads. Listener follows the line with a finger.”
Visual · Same classroom, minutes later: pairs engaged. Asha circulates. Recap card with the 3 steps.
Audio · VO: “Same books. Same class. Every child reading. Try it in your next period.”
A cast that looks like the audience
Vyond's stock cast doesn't look like an Odisha classroom, so the recurring characters were customized — skin tones, hair, sarees and kurtas, the classroom itself — with reference sheets kept in Illustrator so every module stays consistent.
Asha ma'am
The recurring teacher — warm, practical, never a caricature. Saree palette chosen to hold contrast on low-end screens.
The class
Six recurring students with distinct silhouettes so scenes read instantly at small sizes.
The classroom
Modelled on real government-school rooms from field photos — blackboard, charts, floor seating. Familiarity is the point.
Scene by scene in Vyond
Vyond earned its place here: template-driven speed for a multi-module course, but pushed past defaults — custom entrance timing, camera moves saved as reusable scene templates, and hand-timed gestures synced to the voiceover.
Every scene keeps text on screen for the sound-off viewer, and every visual metaphor was checked against the local context.
Scene templates
Classroom, blackboard close-up, and activity layouts reused across modules — consistency for free.
Timing discipline
Voiceover first, always; scenes are cut to narration beats, never padded.
Classroom, morning. Teacher Asha writes on the board; back-benchers drift. Text: “Class 2 · Reading period”.
Close on three students sharing one book, lost. Gentle zoom — no blame framing.
Technique: Asha forms pairs, assigns reader/listener roles. On-screen label: “Paired reading — 2 roles”.
Same classroom, minutes later: pairs engaged. Asha circulates. Recap card with the 3 steps.
Versions, not translations
Modules shipped in multiple language versions — voiceover regenerated per language, on-screen text swapped, and scene timing re-checked because the same sentence rarely takes the same seconds twice.
Review with the program team
Program specialists reviewed each module for pedagogy; field coordinators reviewed for authenticity — is this how the classroom actually looks? Both kinds of notes made the films better, and both went through the same timecoded review sheet.
Pedagogy team: technique steps must be numbered on screen, not only narrated.
Added persistent step cards; recap scene now mirrors them.
Field note: classroom looked too urban — desks instead of floor mats.
Rebuilt the room set; floor seating and charts matched to field photos.
Modules approved for LMS rollout across the districts.
Rendered language versions and packaged SCORM exports.
Small files, everywhere
Finals rendered lean for low-bandwidth delivery and packaged for the program's LMS. The reserved slot below links the released films once cleared.
Final film — link pending clearance
Module films are client property pending clearance. Slot reserved for the released UNICEF links.
Want the full story behind this project?
Megha can walk through the working files, review rounds and all.