Hi, good idea you have there. I just came outta high school and I am in university of Calgary taking Bsc in CompSci. After this 4 yr degree I am going to the university of South California and get my Master's in Animation. My high school had 3d courses and they used 3dmax r2.5 and r3 but 2 yrs ago they switched to maya. Now Maya is a pretty intensive software and I will not recomend as a introductory software unless your students already have some 3d background knowledge. Another thing is that 3d fundamentals is a MUST. If for some reason you do chose Maya, "Learning Maya 5" is a great book to start with. Its by Alias|Wavefront and comes with a tutorial dvd rom. As you and some others mentioned above about Vue Pro 4, its a great tool. Poser is a character animation tool whereas Maya is an allrounder (modelling, animation, environment, etc). If you do pick poser I will recomend Vue4 with mover/Vue Pro 4 with it. If you are looking more towards 2d then Flash. Either way fundamentals is a MUST and is the best way to get started on. Jot