Making Second Life Work for
Training & Education
Kevin Harvey (a.k.a. Qwerty Hansen)
Assistant Director,
Center for the Advancement of Distance Education (CADE)
School of Public Health
University of Illinois at Chicago
kqharvey@uic.edu
Tel: 312-413-0102, M: 847-644-3593
Danny Goldberg
Co-Founder, Learnstorm, Inc
dgoldberg1@wi.rr.com
Tel: 414-218-4873
With a special appearance by Sarah Granofsky, Program Director for
Wisconsin Charter Schools Association.

About CADE
CADE does:
• Games, simulations, and virtual worlds
• Public health preparedness and training
• Research data management
• Multimedia and webcasting
• Web development
• Online database development

About Learnstorm
• Offer the best collection of innovative digital
learning applications – including learning
games, for use by schools
• Provide a secure online community where
teachers, students, mentors, and parents
can teach and learn together
• Enable collaboration with digital learning
experts and peers through the use of social
media and collaboration tools

CADE Virtual Worlds Clients
• Chicago Department of Public Health
• Illinois Department of Public Health
• Indian Health Services (CA)
• Ohio Health and Human Services
• Alameda Department of Public Health
• Contra Costa Health Services
• Columbus Public Health
• Wisconsin Charter Schools Association

Educate the Client
(or potential client)

Explain Virtual Worlds
“A computer-based
simulated environment
intended for its users to
inhabit and interact via
avatars.”
One of the leaders in virtual “life” is Second Life, a 3-D
virtual world entirely built and owned by its residents.

Legitimize Virtual Worlds
The CDC has joined the
virtual world environment
in an effort to inform the
public about health issues.
CADE has led the way in
using virtual environments
for training, planning, and
assessment.

Explain the Benefits
Preparedness Training Benefits
– Rapid Prototyping
– Shared Experience
– Distance Participation
– No risk of infection
– Cost Effective
– Facilitates inter- and
intra–agency collaboration
School Centered Benefits
– Distributed Expertise
– Schedule Flexibility
– Empowering your students

Know Your Audience
• Identify early adopters
• Find the champions
• Sell from within

Know Your Firewalls
• Make sure the application will work
• Make friends with the IT people
• Send your IT friend the technical
requirements
• Test, re-test, then test again

This is “just a game”
• Games are for fun; Fun is not serious
• Training/Education is serious
• Ergo:
– Serious Games
– Games for Education, Games for Health
– Simulation Games
• OR… even better:
– Virtual Tabletop (public health)
– Enhanced Tabletop (public health)
– Simulations
– Classroom of the Future (education)

Virtual Tabletop

Virtual Tabletop

Demonstrate Value
• Compare to expensive alternatives
• Don’t underestimate the “cool factor”
• Be truthful about the initial time investment
(and how it will be worth it)
• Use success stories
• Don’t overpromise
– e.g., this is not yet a diagnostic tool, but it is an
awesome planning tool

Replication vs.
Representation
• “I recognize that” (and I like to see
things I recognize)
• The problem with replication and what
to do about it
• The classroom of the future is not a
classroom at all (at least not yet)

Mass Dispensing

Warehousing

Secure Transport

Baby Steps
• Above all, avoid initial frustration
• Facilitated Exercises vs Train-the-Trainer
• Usability
– Provide a friendly environment
• HELP!!!
– Mentoring
– Support (and support materials)
– Websites, tutorials, blogs

Support Materials
• Provide support material
• Each scenario comes with a
curriculum plan including a
– player’s guide
– an inventory list
– how to use Second Life (tutorial)
– what to do when you get home

What to do about Naysayers
• There will always be naysayers
• One naysayer can ruin your whole day, so
you have to neutralize them
• Be understanding, but counter them in
order to sell those that are on the fence
• Don’t be upset if they are not convinced, or
if they leave.. actually be happy if they leave

Key Barriers to Adoption
• Time
• Performance pressure
• If I invest X amount of time in learning a new
technology, how do I know it will pay off?
• Priorities
• Support from within

Where is the Evidence?

Training Evaluation Results
• 71.4% rated the training excellent or good.
• 78.6% said that the content was clear,
understandable and well organized.
• 95.2% said that the trainer was knowledgeable
and comfortable with the material
• 69% said that they can apply the skills and
techniques that they learned
• 80.9% said that the content was relevant to their
jobs

CDC Preparedness and Emergency
Response Research Center (PERRC)
CADE is one of the four research projects that make up the
University of Minnesota Research Center
Preparedness and Emergency Response Using Simulated
Environments
• Team members
• Colleen Monahan, DC, MPH , PI
• Kevin Harvey, MA, Co-PI
• Steve Jones, PhD, Co-PI
• Andrew Cooper, MPH, Project Manager
• Brian Mustanski, PhD, Consultant

Research Question
Does the use of a Collaborative Virtual
Environment (CVE), an electronic performance
support tool, improve individual and system
performance in public health preparedness and
response planning?

Learnstorm
• Structured social networks and learning
guilds.
• Importance of personalization
• Mapping to learning needs
• Sessioning
• Establishing expectations

Contact Information
Kevin Q. Harvey
Assistant Director
Center for the Advancement of Distance Education
University of Illinois at Chicago
kqharvey@uic.edu
Tel: 312-413-0102, M: 847-644-3593
Danny Goldberg
Founder, Learnstorm, Inc
dgoldberg1@wi.rr.com
Tel: 414-218-4873
http://www.virtualpublichealth.com
http://www.publichealthgames.com
http://www.learnstorm.com/