Second Life – found some advantages

Just did a tutorial on Second Life and to my great surprise got quite lost in the experience.  My frustration of previous visits where I was alone and had no idea what I was doing or even how to do anything, has been allayed. With Carole’s patient instruction I learnt how to chat, send private messages, move, sit, stand and even had a go relating with interactive ‘stuff’ like power points and web pages. Feeling like I could ask any question I wanted was great too, no matter how silly.  And seeing the difficulties other avatars had meant I didn’t feel foolish when I flew into a tree or pushed people out of the way or got stuck facing a  wall with no way to turn around. I can easily see how this can be so attractive. 

The You Tube from Northern Beaches Christian School in Sydney showed me quite clearly the 3D spaces are being used for quite legitimate and pedagogically valuable means.  The narrator quite rightly points out that 3D space is just a space.  It’s how you use the space that proves its worth.  His students are using those higher order thinking skills that we as teachers strive to get happening, and they are doing it almost independently while using their own initiative: pay attention teachers!

Students are designing and building virtual buildings with items to sell. One is an art gallery with pieces of student art that change weekly.

One class is building a Maths labyrinth.  Each week there is another room or area to unlock, can only be unlocked by solving a maths problem.

Ever had trouble getting kids to pair up sensibly and hold decent, pedagogical conversations?  In a “classroom” space students are given a ‘seat’ then instantly find themselves paired up and alone with 1 other student.  They discuss a topic as a timer runs, when timer runs out they are instantly paired with another student and the conversation continues.  Every comment is marked by the teacher.  So everything the student says is recorded, viewed, and graded by the teacher – no slacking off here! And this gives you some definite data for that all elusive “Speaking and listening” mark on the report card.

There is a virtual radio station where the playlist is made up of student pieces or interviews or the school bands. 

Students chat in French while on a dance floor – psychological barriers seem to be down while dancing!

It gives students a forum to publish, celebrate their work, audio, visual, text.  It is NOT A GAME but a space. A space targeting specific skills in controlled environment and being used to encourage higher order skills in students.

One comment from Carole in the tutorial was that SL is still in its infancy.  Although it has some really great stuff and attractions, it’s not yet ready for or hugely beneficial for many libraries.  But this area will indisputable grow and develop and as it gets easier to interact, as new features get added, it will lower those barriers.