SIGVirtualEnvironments

Comment

Comment by Kevin Jarrett on January 21, 2010 at 5:02am

Interested in Second Life & education? Please share ur thoughts in this brief survey by Discovery Educator Network & ISTE! http://ow.ly/YTi6

Comment by Donna Murdoch on December 27, 2009 at 3:49pm

I'm looking forward to it as well, although the one time Shelly was nice enough to guide me there I was suddenly doing Tai Chi in China and not knowing where the learning or discussion was taking place. Unless we were learning Tai Chi (which is a good thing too.) I think it is time for all of us to dig deeper into virtual worlds and environments for learning, and doing it ourself is the best way to get started. I did also join the ISTE Virtual Environment group. I think it holds great promise.

Comment by Melinda McCrossen on December 2, 2009 at 1:00am

To the question: I think it's a steep learning curve for adults to learn how to operate in a virtual world. I have shown several teachers and even did a demonstration for the district, and they don't see the teaching potential. Exactly like my experience with Twitter. It's perceived to be a waste of time and virtual worlds are stuck in the stereotype of a game. Secondlife is like this ning, edchat, and blogging in general; a community forms and friendships develop. It's a time saver because I can have conversations with people from all over the world and sharing something specific like educational philosophies is lifting.

Every snow day here, I think why don't we at least have a virtual world option. How about when students are out sick. It's so easy to stream audio and video. With voice chat now available it makes for a beautiful teaching environment.

Secondlife is a flat world platform. It's learning the technology that is the main road block... again.

Comment by David Kapuler on November 30, 2009 at 11:25pm

Scott, thanks for the advice I look forward to adding this aspect to my personal development as well!!

Comment by Scott Merrick on November 30, 2009 at 10:17pm

Barb this TESOL sounds like something worth exploring, and David, your experience is probably not unusual. Key to your experience is likely the "limited Times I've used Second Life." We had a wonderful meetup in ReactionGrid this afternoon (another time of day--and in fact another day-- for our Aussie participant) and I'd say in brief response that the thing VWorlds or VEnvironments can provide is a sense of place at a distance. Keep exploring and you'll discover some pretty amazing things. Or lurk at SIGVE and benefit from the explorations of others!

Comment by Barb Sakamoto on November 30, 2009 at 9:17pm

It is! All of the EVO sessions offered by TESOL before their international conference are amazing. You don't even have to be a TESOL memer to participate.

Comment by Shelly Terrell on November 30, 2009 at 8:03pm

Barb please keep us posted! This sounds like a great project!

Comment by Barb Sakamoto on November 30, 2009 at 7:19pm

I've been following the planning for the next TESOL EVO on teaching languages in virtual worlds, and it's going to be fabulous, I think. I'll have more information to share about it this month, although the class (which is free) won't begin until January. They'll just be focusing on Second Life, although they're calling it VW so as to not run afoul of the Lindens' copyright sensabilities.

Definitely the best 6-week course I've been involved with for teachers in Second Life, even if you don't teach languages.

I'll add registration details as I get them.

Comment by David Kapuler on November 30, 2009 at 5:47pm

I'd like to know this as well too. The limited times I've used Second Life I spent more time playing around then actually finding any educational benefit. I was flying all over the world and encountering all sorts of strange people.

The one virtual world I found rather useful was Edusim 3D - especially those w/ Smartboards.... http://edusim3d.com/

Comment by Shelly Terrell on November 30, 2009 at 5:34pm

I'm excited to be a part of this group! Will we be talking about Second Life as a learning tool?