1
Accessible 3DVLE Project
3D Virtual Learning Case Study
Institution
University of South Australia
Course/Subject
Accessible Interactive Media (INFT 3012)
Contact
Denise Wood (coordinator)
Prerequisite Skills
Students have completed level 1 and 2 courses in digital media. No prerequisite skill in using
3D virtual learning environments assumed.
Aims and Objectives
This course introduces students to the principles of usability and accessible Web design,
understanding the audience, social and ethical implications, legislation relating to
accessibility both in Australia and Internationally, W3C accessibility guidelines, techniques
for accessible design including alt attributes, table attributes, captioning, transcriptions, style
sheets, interactive multimedia, and policy formulation. On completion of this course, students
should be able to demonstrate:

their understanding of the principles of usability and universal design;

the ability to relate disability legislation to the principles of accessible Web design;

their understanding of the social and ethical issues of Web design and their impact
on different user audiences;

knowledge of the World Wide Web Consortium's Web accessibility guidelines and
differences with Section 508 amendments;

the ability to create accessible Web pages that meet the W3C's WCAG 1.0 triple-A
compliance and WCAG 2.0 Level AAA Success Criteria;

the ability to prepare accessibility policies and guidelines for client groups.
Intended Learning Outcomes
The course places emphasis on analysing websites according to accessibility guidelines,
developing a design solution to retrofit a non-compliant website to ensure it meets W3C
WCAG 2.0 compliance, and developing a web accessibility policy. The topics covered in this
course combine theoretical information presented through a series of readings and
reflections on theory, with the applied skills. These topics include:
 Introduction to disability and the importance of web accessibility
 W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
 Website analysis and use of accessibility auditing tools
2
Accessible 3DVLE Project


The techniques for designing sites that meet Success Criteria Level AAA of the W3C
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
The skills required to develop a web accessibility policy for a client.
Assessment
Students are assigned community organisations as their clients and work with those clients
throughout the semester. The students are required to assess and redesign an existing
website that is non-compliant and write a web accessibility policy for the organisation.
Students undertake the following three assessment points in the course:
Form of assessment
Weighting
Due date
1
Assignment 1:
Project analysis report and web accessibility policy
15%
Friday 5:00pm,
Week 5
2
Assignment 2:
Design of a web template
35%
Friday 5:00pm,
Week 9
3
Assignment 3:
Design of the final website that meets W3C WCAG 2.0
Success Criteria Level AAA compliance
50%
Submit for peer
review start of
Week 12
Final version due
Friday 5:00pm,
Week 13
Description of Learning Activities
Students enrolled in the course in 2009 were given the option of undertaking their Web
projects with health or disability related groups in Second Life. Of the 21 students enrolled,
seven opted to work with Second Life groups including: ‘Health Support Coalition’,
communities of people with HIV/AIDS and ADD/ADHD, a group of leaders of the various
support groups and an organisation known as ‘Virtual Helping Hands’. They met with their
clients on a regular basis in Second Life and they also met with the course coordinator on a
weekly basis for debriefing sessions.
The primary use of the 3D virtual world was as a conduit for communicating with clients and
for debriefing. Some students chose to meet their clients via Skype or communicated
primarily via email due to the challenges of synchronising meeting times, given the different
time zones of their clients. Most students attended the weekly debriefing sessions with the
coordinator and the periodic sessions with the facilitator of the Health Support Coalition (see
screen shot below).
3
Accessible 3DVLE Project
Debriefing session conducted with students, course coordinator
and the facilitator of the Health Support Coalition
Evaluation
Students were asked to complete an anonymous online questionnaire at the conclusion of
the semester (see appendix). This questionnaire included questions aimed at identifying
students’ familiarity with and use of Web 2.0 and 3D virtual world technologies, and to
assess the extent to which the Second Life platform of delivery was perceived by students to
support the objectives of the course and enhance their learning. The questionnaire included
a mix of Likert-scale (5 point scale ranging from 1 strongly disagree to 5 strongly agree) and
open-ended text field questions.
All seven students participated in the online evaluation. Of those respondents, five were
male and two female. Ages ranged from 18-34 years. All of the respondents were
undertaking degrees in the either computer science and/or media arts. Four of the seven
respondents reported that they rarely use online 3D computer games, one reported that
he/she had never used online 3D computer games and two described themselves as
occasional users. No respondents were frequent users of either online 3D virtual games or
3D virtual worlds such as Second Life. All reported that they had access to a high speed
broadband connection at home.
More than half (43% (3) strongly agreed; 14%(1) agreed) of the students stated that they
were willing to put the effort needed to complete the learning activities, and most (14% (1)
strongly agreed; 43% (3) agreed) that they liked using Second Life as part of the course and
would recommend the instructor continue using Second Life. Five respondents (28% (2)
strongly agreed; 43% (3) agreed) that the activities in Second Life offered opportunities for
interaction and communication.
4
Accessible 3DVLE Project
Positive experiences reported by students included:
 The ability to combine my IT abilities with my artistic passion.
 Learning about the world of SL, it affected me personally after meeting with my client.
I learned that there is more to SL than idiots buying land that they can not even step
on.
 Understanding why people might engage in such an environment.
 I liked the possibility of customisation.
 It taught me about Second Life and showed me Second Life is slightly over-rated
 Changing user appearance.
 The weekly meetings provided a very helpful tutorial environment for this directed
study course.
Less positive experiences reported included:
 I did not mind using Second Life as a component of my course. However, I do not
think I would have enjoyed using it as a basis for any course. I do understand the
need for such communication mediums, however, it is not something I would use
personally. I am just not a big fan of Second Life anyway, which is why some of my
answers may seem harsh.
 The experience was a good one but it is one i would not like to repeat again, I found
it difficult to communicate with certain people due to time differences and I just
couldn’t get into the program like so many other people have.
Conclusion
Observations of students’ interactions with their clients, the group meetings held with the
facilitator of the ‘Health Support Coalition’, Alice Krueger (AKA Gentle Heron in Second Life),
and regular debriefing sessions with students suggest that the students gained considerable
expertise in research, problem solving, communication, collaboration and also learning firsthand about the life-experiences of people with disabilities. Students were not required to
attend the weekly debriefing classes (which are held Saturday afternoons) yet most students
turned up on regular basis and in some cases the sessions have gone on much longer than
the allocated time because students have been engaged in the discussions.
As with any ‘real life’ student service learning situation, students encountered many
challenges in the course of their placement. For example, while students had assignment
deadlines they needed to meet, they also had to manage their interactions with clients who
did not always deliver content within negotiated timelines. Students also learned that timely
response to client emails or Instant Messages (IMs) was critical to the timely delivery of
content, particularly since many of their clients had other ‘real life’ constraints limiting their
ability to be available for consultation when it suited the students. The students also had to
negotiate the complexities of multiple time zones and various preferred methods of
communication; some clients preferred email correspondence, others IMs through Second
Life and others wanted to meet with the students via Skype. Sometimes students’ preferred
approach to the design of the artefacts for their clients did not match their clients’
preferences; hence students, as with any ‘real life’ placement, had to balance their own
aesthetic desires with the needs of their clients.
5
Accessible 3DVLE Project
The virtual medium proved to be a safe environment within which students could be guided
through the complexities and challenges of dealing with ‘real clients’. Regular in-world
meetings with teacher and client representatives has provided an effective means for
negotiating many of these difficulties and there has been a demonstrable increase in student
confidence as a result. All of the students took great pride in their work and demonstrated
commitment to achieving excellence, while also balancing the needs of their clients within
the relatively safe virtual environment. Finally, the students developed a much greater
understanding of the difficulties experienced by individuals with disabilities. As Alice Krueger
described in email communication to the coordinator:
Members of these communities enjoy participating in research opportunities
and particularly interacting with students whose ethics are still being
formed. We appreciate the opportunity to express our concerns and show
our value as fellow human beings. The virtual medium of Second Life
allows us to do this. From the opposite side, Second Life is a great
laboratory for your students. When your students enter the virtual world,
they are then able to connect to people whom they would likely never meet
in their real lives. (Alice Krueger, Virtual Ability Inc, 2008)
While most students reported the experience to be a favourable one, and acknowledged the
potential of the environment, as the comments in the previous section indicate, not all
students were comfortable with the 3D virtual learning platform. However, given most
students had little prior experience in 3D virtual worlds, this is perhaps not a surprising
finding. Moreover, as one student suggested ‘I think in time it will not seem as foreign as it
does now and that if you stick with it, it can be a powerful learning tool’.
Relevant References
Bakioğlu, B. S. (2007). Collaborative Story-telling: Performing the Narrative of the Griefer.
In D. Livingstone & J. Kemp (Eds.), Proceedings of the Second Life Education
Workshop Community Convention (Vol. 2007, pp. 41-46). Chicago Hilton: The
University of Paisley.
Bloomfield, R. J. (2007). Worlds for study: Invitation-virtual worlds for studying real-world
business (and law, and politics, and sociology, and....). Retrieved 1st September,
2008, from http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=988984
Carter, B. (2006). Imagine the real in the virtual: Experience your Second Life. Retrieved
22 March 2009, from
http://www.uwex.edu/disted/conference/Resource_library/proceedings/06_4202.pdf
Chen, S. (2005). Serious games: Games that educate, train, and inform. Retrieved 22
March 2009, from Gamesutra, October 31,
http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20051031/chen_01.shtml.
Clark, S., & Maher, M. L. (2003). The effects of a sense of place on the learning
experience in a 3D virtual world. In Communities of Practice.Research Proceedings of
the 10th Association for Learning Technologies Conference (ALT-C2003) (pp. 82-101).
Sheffield, UK: University of Sheffield.
Cohen, J., & Yapa, L. (Eds.). (2003). A Blueprint for Public Scholarship at Penn State.
University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University.
Cooper, T. (2007). Nutrition Game In D. Livingstone & J. Kemp (Eds.), Proceedings of the
Second Life Education Workshop Community Convention (Vol. 2007, pp. 47-50).
Chicago Hilton: The University of Paisley.
6
Accessible 3DVLE Project
Dickey, M. D. (2005). Brave new (interactive) worlds: A review of the design affordances
and constraints of two 3D virtual worlds as interactive learning environments.
Interactive Learning Environments, 13(1-2), 121-137.
Hurd, C. (2006). What is service learning? Retrieved 10 April 2009, from
http://www.slce.colostate.edu/files/slce/servicelearning/faculty/Is_ServiceLearning_Effective.pdf
Jarmon, L., Traphagan, T., Mayrath, M., & Trivedi, A. (2009). Virtual world teaching,
experiential learning, and assessment: An interdisciplinary communication course in
Second Life. Computers & Education, 53(1), 169-182.
Kemp, J. (2006). Putting a Second Life “Metaverse” skin on Learning Management
Systems. UK, San Francisco: The University of Paisley.
Kent, C. (2008). Interest in virtual worlds. SLED . Retrieved 20 August 2009, from
https://lists.secondlife.com/pipermail/educators/2008-August/024944.html
Krause, T. (2008). Real Life (RL) Experiences with Second Life (SL): Participatory
Learning as a Means for Increasing Student Engagement and Retention. Computers
and Writing Online. Retrieved 2 September, 2009, from
http://www.uwsp.edu/wdmd/tkrause/second_life_paper.pdf
Krause, K.-L., Hartley, R., James, R., and McInnis, C. (2005). The first year experience in
Australian Universities: Findings from a decade of national studies. Retrieved 22
March 2009, from http://www.cshe.unimelb.edu.au/pdfs/FYEReport05KLK.pdf
Lee, J. J., & Christopher, M. H. (2006). Ugly in a world where you can choose to be
beautiful: teaching and learning about diversity via virtual worlds. In Proceedings of the
7th international conference on Learning sciences. Bloomington, Indiana: International
Society of the Learning Sciences.
Levine, K. (2008). Interest in virtual worlds. SLED. Retrieved 20 January 2009, from
https://lists.secondlife.com/pipermail/educators/2008-August/024935.html
Liu, C. (2006). Second Life learning community: A peer-based approach to involving more
faculty members in Second Life. UK, San Francisco: The University of Paisley.
Mason, H. (2007). Experiential education in Second Life. In D. Livingstone & J. Kemp
(Eds.), Proceedings of the Second Life Education Workshop Community Convention
(Vol. 2007, pp. 14-18). Chicago Hilton: The University of Paisley.
Mili, F., Barr, J., Harris, M., & Pittiglio, L. (2008). Nursing training: 3D game with learning
objectives. Paper presented at the Advances in Computer-Human Interaction, 2008
First International Conference.
Oblinger, D. (2008). Growing up with Google - What it means to education. Emerging
technologies for learning, 4(March 2008).
Oblinger, D., and Oblinger, J. (2005). Educating the Net Generation. Retrieved 22 March
2009, from http://www.educause.edu/books/educatingthenetgen/5989
Penfold, P. (2008). SL Hotel and tourism student feedback. Retrieved 22 March 2009,
from http://www.scribd.com/doc/4612817/SL-Hotel-and-Tourism-StudentFeedback?autodown=pdf
Polvinen, E. (2007). Educational simulations in Second Life for fashion technology
students. In D. Livingstone & J. Kemp (Eds.), Proceedings of the Second Life
7
Accessible 3DVLE Project
Education Workshop Community Convention (Vol. 2007, pp. 61-64). Chicago Hilton:
The University of Paisley.
Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On the Horizon, 9(5), 1-6.
Qunhua, E. (2008). Interest in virtual worlds. SLED . Retrieved 20 August 2009, from
https://lists.secondlife.com/pipermail/educators/2008-August/024931.html
Rolig. (2008). Interest in virtual worlds. SLED . Retrieved 20 August 2009, from
https://lists.secondlife.com/pipermail/educators/2008-August/024943.html
Robbins, S. (2007). A futurist’s view of Second Life education: A developing taxonomy of
digital spaces. In D. Livingstone & J. Kemp (Eds.), Proceedings of the Second Life
Education Workshop Community Convention (Vol. 2007, pp. 27-33). Chicago Hilton:
The University of Paisley.
Tadros, M. (2008). Interest in virtual worlds. SLED. Retrieved 20 January 2009, from
https://lists.secondlife.com/pipermail/educators/2008-August/024923.html
Tapscott, D., Lowy, A., and Ticoll, D. (1998). Blueprint to the digital economy: Creating
wealth in the era of e-business: McGraw-Hill Professional.
The University of South Australia’s teaching and learning strategy. Retrieved 20 August
2009, from http://www.unisa.edu.au/teachinglearning/strategy/default.asp
Veen, W. (2005). Net generation learning: Teaching Homo Zappiens. Retrieved 20
January 2009, from
http://www.etwinning.de/aktuelles/veranstaltungen/dokus/Vortrag_Veen_19_09_2005.
pdf
Wood, D. (2009). Experiential learning in 3D virtual worlds: Students making a
difference to ‘real’ lives in ‘virtual’ places. Proceedings of the 26th Annual
ASCILITE Conference: Same Places: Different Spaces, Auckland, New Zealand,
6th-9th December, 2009.
Wood, D. and Hopkins, L. (2008). 3D virtual environments: businesses are ready but are
our ‘digital natives’ prepared for the changing landscape? Proceedings of ASCILITE
2008: Hello! Where are you in the landscape of educational technology? Deakin
University, Melbourne.
8
Accessible 3DVLE Project
Evaluation Tools
Example of the online questionnaire students completed at the end of the course.
Experiences using 3D virtual worlds such as Second Life in courses at UniSA
Thank you for agreeing to participate in this survey. Data collected through this
survey will be used to improve the quality of teaching and learning at UniSA and
could also be used in external publications and presentations. Individual responses
will remain confidential and no individuals will be identified.
Demographic
1. What is your Program at UniSA?
 (Enter text into this box, maximum 2000 characters)
2. Age Range

3. Gender
 (Enter text into this box, maximum 2000 characters)
Computer Us
4. How often do you use a computer at home?

5. How often do you use a computer at University?

6. How often do you use chat software / instant messenger (e.g. AOL, MSN, ICQ,
etc)?
9
Accessible 3DVLE Project

7. How often do you use social networking sites (e.g. Facebook, MySpace, Flickr.)?

8. How often do you use online multi-user computer games (e.g. World of Warcraft,
Everquest, etc)?

9. How often do you use 3D online virtual worlds such as Second Life?

10. How often do you use social bookmarking sites?

11. How often do you use the computer to access podcasts / webcasts?

Internet Access
12. Do you use a high speed connection to the Internet from home or dial-up?

Second Life Student Survey
13. What communication tools did you use?

None

Second Life chat tool

Second Life audio tool (Voice Over IP - VOIP)

Tools outside of Second Life (discussion boards, chat, blog, etc)

Other (explain in final comments)
10
Accessible 3DVLE Project
14. How would you classify your performance in this course (i.e. grades)?

Excellent

Above Average

Average

Below Average

Poor

Other (explain in final comments)
Social Presence (immediacy and intimacy)
15. I felt as if I was communicating with a real person in Second Life.

16. I was able to be expressive in Second Life.

17. I was comfortable interacting with other participants in Second Life.

Engagement
18. I was engaged in the learning experience in Second Life.

19. Second Life was an enriching experience.

20. The learning experiences were active and collaborative in Second Life.

21. Using Second Life was fun and exciting.
11
Accessible 3DVLE Project

22. I was willing to put in the effort needed to complete the learning activities in
Second Life.

23. Second Life was a waste of time.

Online Learning Community
24. The learning activity encouraged contact between myself and my classmates in
Second Life.

Satisfaction
25. I would take another course that used Second Life.

26. I would recommend that the instructor continue using Second Life.

27. I liked using Second Life as part of my course.

28. Participating in Second Life was a useful experience.

29. It was difficult to access Second Life.
12
Accessible 3DVLE Project

30. Getting into Second Life was easy.

31. Technical support was available when I needed it in Second Life.

32. I would avoid classes using Second Life in the future.

33. I would not recommend this course to a friend.

Learning
34. Second Life allowed me to better understand concepts.

35. Using Second Life helped me think more deeply about course material.

36. Second Life did not help my learning in the class.

Online learning design (support, design, delivery, assessment)
37. The introductory explanations on how to use Second Life were clear.

38. The activity in Second Life was well-organized.
13
Accessible 3DVLE Project

39. I understood all components of the activity in Second Life.

40. The instructions for Second Life were clear.

41. The activity offered opportunities for interaction and communication in Second
Life.

42. The goals in Second Life were clearly defined.

43. I understood what was expected of me in Second Life.

Open-Ended Questions
44. How did Second Life impact your communication and interaction with others in
this course?
 (Enter text into this box, maximum 2000 characters)
45. How was using Second Life different than using tools in a Course Management
System, like discussions or chat tools?
14
Accessible 3DVLE Project
 (Enter text into this box, maximum 2000 characters)
46. What was one thing that you would change about your experience in Second
Life?
 (Enter text into this box, maximum 2000 characters)
47. What was one thing that you liked about your experience in Second Life?
 (Enter text into this box, maximum 2000 characters)
48. How did Second Life impact your learning for this course?
 (Enter text into this box, maximum 2000 characters)
49. Is there anything else you would like to share with us about your experience?
 (Enter text into this box, maximum 2000 characters)