This article substantiates and tests a comprehensive methodology for teaching English to university students through an animation-based approach that integrates principles from multimedia learning, dual coding, and cognitive load theory. The study addresses a practical and theoretical gap: while short form animations are ubiquitous in students’ media ecologies, their systematic use as core instructional artefacts in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) courses remains under-theorized and weakly operationalized. We therefore designed an intervention composed of micro-animations (60–120 seconds) aligned to explicit communicative functions, lexical sets, and pronunciation targets, embedding signaling, segmenting, and modality principles to optimize cognitive processing. A quasi-experimental mixed-methods design was implemented with first-year non-English majors (N=118) at a large public university. Over twelve weeks, an experimental cohort received animation-centric instruction in vocabulary, speaking, and listening; a comparison cohort followed the same syllabus without animations but with static visuals and text-based explanations. Pre/post testing covered receptive and productive vocabulary, holistic speaking performance, and listening comprehension; motivation and cognitive-affect indicators were collected through validated questionnaires and reflective journals, and classroom discourse was sampled to examine interactional effects. Quantitative analyses indicate medium-to-large improvements for the animation cohort in vocabulary breadth and depth, as well as statistically significant gains in speaking fluency, prosodic control, and comprehensibility. Listening scores improved modestly but consistently, especially for fast connected speech. Qualitative evidence shows higher task engagement, more self-initiated repair, and richer discourse markers. Pedagogically, the study articulates a reusable pipeline for scripting and producing pedagogical animations with low-cost tools, a lesson architecture that phases input–noticing–practice–performance around the animations, and an assessment framework that ties micro-objectives to observable language use. Limitations include instructor learning curves and the need to balance novelty with load. The article closes with implementation guidelines and a research agenda for scaling animation-based EFL instruction in resource-diverse settings.  

Animation-based learning, multimedia learning, dual coding

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