Computer animation for kids - what software for a begginer?

[Yogi(n)]

My 13 yr old daughter is interested in computer animation. As I know
nothing about that I cannot give her any advice - where to start? What
software (preferably free or shareware, just to see how it works) should
we look for? Where to begin? It has to be easy enough to begin without
being pushed off by the interface or amount of knowlegde/skill needed at
the beginning.
She can draw and paint quite well for her age, she's making steady
drawings and animated gifs in GIMP, but that's all her computing
experience.
Any piece of advice will be appreciated.

--
Yogi(n)

[olun]

I recommend playing with Blender. It's free and let's you delve into the various aspects of the craft. The industry uses Maya or 3DMax but you will have to pay for those or access a trial version. If she is more into FX visuals like smoke, water, particles, as opposed to character anim, Houdini from SideFX has a free non commercial use version but it has a steep learning curve and is an industry package. She can also play with Pixar's Renderman which is an industry package with a non commercial use free version and can be used with Blender. Blender can do everything but is mostly used by students and artists that can't afford the bigger packages so you see a lot of work from that package on Vimeo/Youtube.