For Education
Part 1
DSU Faculty Development
November 14, 2008
Risë L. Smith, Karl E. Mundt Library
Dakota State University
What is Second Life?
3-d virtual world
(began 2003)
Has tools to communicate,
collaborate, create
World is created by members
Members are represented by
their avatars
Members participate in
social, educational,
business, etc. activities
Not a game
Login with free account (or pay
for premium account)
WOW vs. SL
• Game virtual worlds– e.g., World of Warcraft (WOW), City of
Heroes, etc. – pre-scripted; specific game objectives and
goals; often focused on warfare; unsuited as general learning
environment
• Open virtual worlds – e.g., Second Life – created by its users,
who build and create content. It’s an environment more
suited to educational use, because educators can create and
insert instructional material
Why bother with Second Life?
“Eighty percent of Internet
users are expected to engage in
some form of virtual world
activity
by 2011 (Gartner Research
Group), and librarians and
educators
are already there.”
M2 : Metaverse Messenger, 26 Aug 2008,
http://www.metaversemessenger.com
/pdf/2008/08/MM20080826.pdf
How SL Is Being Used for Education
•
Look here first
Second Life in Education wiki: Educational Uses of Second Life
http://sleducation.wikispaces.com/educationaluses
Scan this list to get an overview of the variety of ways SL is being used for
education.
•
101 Uses for Second Life in the College Classroom - Dr. Megan S. Conklin,
Elon University, Dept of Computing Sciences. Last updated: February 25, 2007
http://trumpy.cs.elon.edu/metaverse/gst364Win2005/handout.pdf
Conklin describes key elements of teaching in Second Life and provides examples
from various disciplines.
•
Second Life Education Wiki
http://simteach.com/wiki/index.php?title=Second_Life_Education_Wiki Simteach
information about Second Life includes: Getting Started: Frequently Asked
Questions and Guidelines; Programs for Educators; Institutions and Organizations
in SL; Competitions; Press, Blogs & Presentations; Second Life Mailing Lists, Blogs
and Forums; In-World Groups; Educational Pricing on Private Islands; Academic
Research; Classroom Management, Lesson Plans; Teaching Resources; Educational
Locations in Second Life
Continued…
How SL Is Being Used for Education
 Texas State Tech – delivering in Second Life a Digital
Media certificate program focused on virtual world
technology in fall 2008; associate degree in spring
2009. Campus Technology, 7/30/2008
 ”California Bar Association Approves Credit Gained
using Second Life” , SLED Blog, Jul 18, 2008
 Seriously Engaging: The Story of NMC Campus in
Second Life (July 2006)
 Ohio University Second Life promotional video
Advantages
• Engages students.
• Provides multiple communication methods. text-based chat,
VOIP talk, and gestures
• Decreases social distance of online communication. Having a
physical representation as avatar and ability to move spatially
makes connections among students working digitally feel
more “real”
– “create a sense of class community…tied…to the ability to
create and interact….” [Ritzema & Harris]
• Provides global experience. Interact with individuals from all
around the RW (real world), making international connections
global…
“During one recent lecture, people from all over the world came
to hear a scientist from Royal Holloway, University of
London, talk about climate change. …[These] ‘mixed
world’ events, gatherings that take place simultaneously in
SL and real life, remove many of the long-standing barriers
in science communication. ‘Chances are, the scientist would
never have traveled all over the world to talk about his work,
and nobody from South Carolina would have traveled such
a great distance to listen to him,’ Scott says.”
[Questi 2008]
Advantages – cont’d
• Faculty and students create. Have modeling tools to build objects
and scripting language for building interactive features into objects
(e.g., doors that open)
-- can create simulations of RL (real life) locations, events, and processes
-- “Robert Amme, a physicist at the University of Denver, has a laboratory
in Second Life…. There his avatar double, Dr. Bob Vandeverre, is
building a virtual nuclear reactor to help train the next generation of
environmental engineers on how to deal with nuclear waste.” Science
News, 4/24/2008
• Learn by “being there.” -- walking within simulations of the real
world or real world events. Walk inside a weather map; Land of
Lincoln, Renaissance Island, city of Dublin
Advantages – cont’d
• Have new individual abilities. Avatars fly and
teleport; can change appearance.
• Create real businesses. The in-world (that is, Second
Life) currency of “lindens” or “linden dollars” have
real-world value.
--SLExchange takes payment in Lindens or US dollars, delivers goods
to person’s avatar, and pays vendor who is selling the goods.
--Real world companies are marketing in Second Life with storefronts
for SL communities
--Established businesses like IBM have firewalled campuses for
employee training, meetings, mixers
Advantages – cont’d
• Create valuable services/organizations.
e.g., support groups for chronic diseases; established organizations like
American Cancer Society are present; Virtual Ability Island
M2 : Metaverse Messenger, 26 Aug 2008,
http://www.metaversemessenger.com/pdf/2008/08/MM20080826.pdf
Challenges
• Learning curve for participating, for creating
content
• Lacking or weak integration with course
management systems
• Technical issues: graphics card - hardware
requirements for handling 3d rendering;
bandwidth
• Safety & security -- gambling, nudity, violence,
griefing, phishing, money laundering, pyramid
schemes
[Elliot]
See 50 virtual worlds in 7 minutes
2008 Metaverse Tour Video: The Social Virtual World’s A Stage
By Gary Hayes, PersonalizeMedia
http://www.personalizemedia.com/2008-metaverse-tour-video-the-social-virtual-worlds-a-stage
Terminology
• Avatar: a 2- or 3-D graphical representation of a person that is used when
the person is “inhabiting” a simulated (i.e., virtual) environment
• MUVEs (Multi-User Virtual Environments) or CVEs (Collaborative Virtual
Environments): multiple users with their avatars interacting (e.g., Second
Life; World of Warcraft)
• MMOs or MMOGs (Massively Multiplayer Online games), and
MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games): MUVEs
with game rules and goals (e.g., World of Warcraft; Everquest)
• Virtual world – “a synchronous, persistent network of people, represented
as avatars, facilitated by networked computers.” [Bell]
• Metaverse – another term for “virtual world” (first? used in 1992 novel
Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson)
• 3D3C – 3D environment that exhibits characteristics of community,
creation, and commerce (e.g., Second Life)
SL Resources
•
Second Life in Education wiki: Educational Uses of Second Life
http://sleducation.wikispaces.com/educationaluses
Scan this list to get an overview of the variety of ways SL is being used for education.
•
101 Uses for Second Life in the College Classroom - Dr. Megan S. Conklin,
Elon University, Dept of Computing Sciences. Last updated: February 25, 2007
http://trumpy.cs.elon.edu/metaverse/gst364Win2005/handout.pdf
Conklin describes key elements of teaching in Second Life and provides examples from
various disciplines.
•
Second Life Education Wiki
http://simteach.com/wiki/index.php?title=Second_Life_Education_Wiki Simteach
information about Second Life includes: Getting Started: Frequently Asked Questions and
Guidelines; Programs for Educators; Institutions and Organizations in SL; Competitions;
Press, Blogs & Presentations; Second Life Mailing Lists, Blogs and Forums; In-World Groups;
Educational Pricing on Private Islands; Academic Research; Classroom Management, Lesson
Plans; Teaching Resources; Educational Locations in Second Life
•
Top 20 Educational Locations in SL
http://www.simteach.com/wiki/index.php?title=Top_20_Educational_Locations_in_Second
_Life
….continued….
SL Resources
…continued
•
SLED Blog: K-20 Education Using the Second Life World
http://www.sl-educationblog.org/ Provides wide range of information, including technical tips (e.g., how
to use a YouTube video within SL)
•
RezEd: The Hub for Learning and Virtual Worlds http://www.rezed.org/ The virtual world hub of Global
Kids. See, for example RezEd (virtual worlds hub of Global Kids) blog post “What research question would
you fund to generate data on learning and virtual worlds?
http://www.rezed.org/profiles/blog/show?id=2047896%3ABlogPost%3A7520
•
Second Life Grid: Education Programs
http://secondlifegrid.net/programs/education Information provided by Linden Labs
•
CTER Port at UIUC
http://cterport.ed.uiuc.edu/technologies_folder/SL
Provides tutorials for creating things in Second Life.
•
Scripts
http://www.simteach.com/wiki/index.php?title=Scripts
Education tools and where to get them
•
ICT
NOTE: SLURLS are web addresses that take you into Second Life to a specific location.
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island/54/202/37 Explore teaching tools.
Attend courses/presentations
Make presentations
Meet in Virtual Spaces with
Instructors or Peers
Attend
events
Participate in
and create
simulations
Do research