37. Physical Design Aug. 2-9 Aug. 10-17 Data collection: Using Maya Realities, a web-based database, and an event log
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Editor's Notes
Hi everyone, I’m Lisa Dawley and it’s great to be here with you today. I’m associate professor and chair of the department of educational technology at Boise State University. I was asked to speak with you about new trends in technology and online education. Concepts of social networking and web 2.0 technologies, especially immersive 3D, or virtual world environments, are starting to make a huge impact in our society. There’s no doubt they are also making a huge impact on our students, and on the teaching and learning process. On this opening slide, you see a screenshot of a presentation given in Second Life by Dr. David Gibson on the use of games in education. We had over 40 participants from around the world attend that talk from the comfort of their own home or office. Images like this help us understand the potential influence that virtual worlds can have on teaching and learning in a global society.
Virtual worlds—simulations, not games, although the simulation may include games within the world There.com – 750, 000 active members, New York Law school holds classes there, utilizes voice-enabling software (currently in beta in SL), strict no nudity/violence/cursing policy. Active Worlds: first 3D platform customizable by users Whyville.net—appropriate for elementary-middle school, same with ToonTown, Whyville requires parental permission by sending email to parent, 3 day waiting period to chat 3b.net—first 3D platform that interfaces with Myspace & Flicker Second Life—began 4 years ago, platform allow user to design and create the world.
A recent Pew Internet report on the Future of the Internet reported the most radical impact of the growing Internet on news, publishing, and education in the next 10 years, with more students moving to distance and self-paced learning. Education will begin to involve more student choice and virtual learning experiences. Experts, including myself, are less sure about the value of expanded social networks, although there is full agreement that social networks will continue to expand. There are both benefits and problems with expanded social networks; and how those networks will be used, to what extent users will be trusted, etc. remains to be seen. Arguments run both ways. There’s no doubt, however, that as social networking and the internet move forward, we are moving from 2 dimensions to 3 dimensions. Many articles have been written on this trend in publications such as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Inc. Magazine, and others. Corporations such as Microsoft are pouring millions of dollars into developing 3D technologies. Imagine you need to buy a refrigerator, so you visit the Sears website. Would you rather look at pictures of refrigerators, or would you rather be able to walk up the refrigerator, open the door, look inside, pull out shelves, and see how tall it stands in your own home? I’m particularly fascinated by the blended 2D/3D environments and tools we are starting to see pop-up such as 3B.net and Zwinky. 3B is promoting 3D villages and cities that look very much like a virtual world environment, but they interface with with 2D sites like MySpace and Flicker. For example, kids can start a 3B virtual space where they import their files and photos from MySpace in a large bulletin board format, and then invite friends to come visit and walk through their site, check out their photos, listen to their music, and hang out in person. 3B also offers a variety of 3D spaces that are specialized for specific populations such as Miss Teen 3B, Alternative Teen 3B (for teens into goth and punk), 3B animals, and 3B Learning, which offers live 3D homework help. Zwinky recently caught my attention through TV commercials--can you give a thumbs up if you’ve seen those “get zwinky” commercials? Zwinky is an avatar tool that allows you to “turn yourself into a 3D character, and interfaces with myspace, facebook, zanga, and blogs, to permit chatting. Finally 3D has come to K12 online learning. 3DLearn Interactive Academy was the first 3D accredited full-time public 5-12 school. These use certified public school teachers, emphasize an immersive and constructivist curriculum. An interesting feature of the school is that like Second Life, it allows the children to help build their own world…they create their own 3D objects, add books, papers, and customize their own school desk. Kids will do things like read “Treasure Island” and then role play the book in a virtual world environment. The school is also offering summer camps in building virtual worlds. The image on this slide is taken from Tiki Tiki Village, one of their environments in the school
International Space Flight Museum Experiential learning in space Life size replicas of actual rockets, NASA video, and interactive exhibits. Ride a rocket into space, land and walk on a space station, see the Hubble Telescope, and teleports to planets in the solar system created from actual space photography.
SL’s intersection with the social network is vast, and takes many forms: SL currently interfaces with blogs, email, web pages, audio, video streams Sloodle: Moodle and SL mashup GeoGlobe: brings Google Earth into SL Salamander: Merlot database project Inworld groups and ads Slurls SLExchange: The “ebay” for SL Anything on the internet can be brought into Second Life. SL is the “web plus.”
SL has many diverse cultures, sub-cultures, and social networking groups. SL provides teachers and students the opportunity to engage in experiential learning opportunities with diversity, in a non-threatening environment. Avatars can take on any physical shape including human, animal, robots, and objects such as the KoolAid man.
… .stand in the virtual world and consider, “Now what?”
There are many, many educational uses with Second Life. Currently, there are over 100 universities in Second Life on the main grid (the adult world). Here we see some of the pedagogical techniques that are being used inworld. Simulations are a very powerful inworld experience. In this picture, I am visiting the solar system at the International Space Flight Museum. This area is amazing! I was able to literally ride a rocket into space, watch it dock at a space station, walk on the space station, view the Hubble Telescope, and then visit different planets in the solar system. I even landed on Mars and walked on the planet which was created using actually photographs of the surface of Mars. This type of virtual experience can’t be duplicated in a live classroom, or a 2D online classroom. SHOW VIDEO
(Barry Johnson, Director of Global Kids) Camp Global Kids: kids from US, Canada & UK, 3 hours day, 5 days a week for four weeks to discuss global issues such as genocide, global human rights, and the impact of globalization. Using SL at IDLA: begin with demos of relevant main grid areas using Elluminate…for example, take a virtual field trip to the solar system that the students are allowed to direct via text chat; record the field trips and make the URLs available for later viewing by students.
You may or may not be a user of social networking, but I do think its important to understand the impact of social networks and how they can and are affecting education and the way kids learn. I believe that web 2.0 technologies truly are changing the way we are learning to communicate. And when you change communication mechanisms, you can affect the way people think and learn. So in this diagram here, we see that historically mass communication, and teaching since the Industrial Age, at least, has involved transmission from a main source (whether it be a teacher, the TV, or an advertiser) out to the masses. In our case, this would be from the teacher out to students. In this scenario, who is the credible authority? NEXT SLIDE
Now compare that diagram to this one, which illustrates a simplified communication pattern involved in social networking. Communication here is now supported among all users ands is multi-directional. I find it fascinating that this mirrors the exact process we are seeking in andragogy and constructivist learning theories. For those unfamiliar with the term, andragogy is a distinct theory of adult learning that distinguishes itself from pedagogy, theory of teaching children. Malcom Knowles discusses principles of andragogy such as: *The need to know - adult learners need to know why they need to learn something before undertaking to learn it. ･ Learner self-concept -adults need to be responsible for their own decisions and to be treated as capable of self-direction ･ Role of learners' experience -adult learners have a variety of experiences of life which represent the richest resource for learning. ･ Readiness to learn -adults are ready to learn those things they need to know in order to cope effectively with life situations. ･ Orientation to learning -adults are motivated to learn to the extent that they perceive that it will help them perform tasks they confront in their life situations. Constructivist theory follows along the same lines proposing the teacher’s role is a facilitator supporting the student’s own construction of knowledge. In the social network, the user (the student or the teacher) can become the expert just by owning a blog or contributing to a wiki. Students report feelings of empowerment and self-worth when they’re involved in knowledge generation. These types of networks and activities have the potential (and note I said potential) to facilitate self-directed learning and autonomy. What’s important to realize here is that credibility and expertise in social networking comes from EXTENT in involvement in the network, including the amount of participation and the frequency. A recent issue of the Wall Street Journal had an article about how to be a “star” in social networks, and discussed this very phenomenon. For example, there is a 28 year old photographer who has over 750 photographs posted in Flicker. Because of her following, over 3 million views, she received a contract with Toyota Motor Corporation. What does this mean for a teacher and students? What does this approach to learning mean for the teacher? I am proposing that a teacher then becomes a facilitator in the network, to integrate these tools into their teaching and learning to model, facilitate, and assist their students in successful use of the network. Other examples we see of the influence of social networks include the bloggers who can and do influence outcomes in political campaigns in the US, teachers who use K-12 classroom blogs to have students recap and report back their learning to their parents or larger community, and Sarah Reynolds, a PhD candidate at Ball State University whose avatar “Intelligirl” has become quite a figurehead speaking at many conferences on the use of virtual worlds for teaching and learning.
It’s important to understand that Second Life, and most of the virtual worlds I’ve mentioned so far, are considered simulations, not games. MMORPG games such as World of Warcraft and Everquest use virtual world technology, but are based on a gaming genre—there are goals, quests, rewards, competition, etc. Virtual worlds such as Second Life may or may not include game elements, depending on how the user chooses to operate in the environment. As a simulation, Second Life can be equated to simulators used to teach pilots to fly. Instead of sitting in a cockpit, however, you are situated in a simulated world. These worlds can be used for many educational purposes. LOGIN and VIEW SECOND LIFE HOME PAGE
Most school districts have AUPs that inform the appropriate use of internet resources in the classroom. Parental permission and awareness is definitely a must.. Student education of appropriate and safe behavior in virtual worlds is also a must, and should become part of the curriculum prior to introducing the virtual world. Linden Labs offers safety tips to teens such as: Stay anonymous, keep password to yourself, trust your instincts, never meet offline, keep your parents involved, don’t respond to nasty comments. Engines use profanity filters and /ignore inworld, as well as “report abuse” features, ban, mute. A recent Pew Internet Report of teen safety on the internet showed that teens are starting to take their own safety seriously. Some statistics from that report include “ Some 55% of online teens have profiles and most of them restrict access to their profile in some way. Of those with profiles, 66% say their profile is not visible to all internet users. Of those whose profile can be accessed by anyone online, nearly half (46%) say they give at least some false information. Teens post fake information to protect themselves and also to be playful or silly.” Other safety measures used by Linden Labs include Background checks, and turn 18 and booted from teen second life. This can be an issue for seniors who are preparing to graduate, or for those enrolled in dual credit classes in college where the professor might require adult Second Life, but the student is only 17 years old. Each of the situations needs planning and negotiation in order for students to be successful. Parental Involvement: Account Activity Request Form, provides info on: Hours spent in-world in the last 30 days Linden dollar balance Amount of land owned by account Disciplinary status Access: Technical concerns (bandwidth and firewalls); cost of accounts; potential exposure to adult content in SL; meeting special needs for visually or hearing impaired and motor skill problems; operating system—only SL and whyville run on both PC and mac., Wednesday patches and scheduling classes, time zones. Teacher Training: Learning curve is still somewhat steep for SL, at least two weeks of coordinated introduction and training to operate semi-independently, longer before ready to teach. Costs: Accounts are free, who is paying for the land, tier fees, land/activity management? Requires a coordinator, builder, etc. Griefers are people who take pride in causing trouble. Examples of this might include people who hover over events and drop bombs, or people showing up nude at events much like streakers of the 1970’s. (Teen SL doesn’t provide the ability to become nude). There is better control over griefers inworld recently through the use of eject and ban commands, and the ability to report abusers immediately via the SL interface. For awhile they were banning less offensive griefers to the cornfield, a literal cornfield that was empty of other objects and people, and the individuals had to serve out their time before they were allowed to return to world.
Cheryl
If you can dream it, it can be done in Second Life. SL is a simulation, and because the world is built by its users, the possibilities in that world are truly endless. Some common activities in Second life include building, building cities, cars, gardens, jewelry, clothing, hair, skin, you name it; people also like to role play--I once role played Super Woman with the Avenger League Society--that was fun; and there are many, many activities, as you can see here (read the list). I’ve also taken classes, gone to social events, and participated in charitable events such as the Run for Life. The ability to build within the world is the greatest strength of the design of the simulation. The USERS create the space, not the software company. As an individual, if I can conceive it, and I develop the skill set, I can build it. No where else in life or education is this level of creative expression available in quite the same way. I am an inworld clothing designer and business owners with seven clothing stores. This is a ad I created to sell my clothing inworld. That is a picture of me in the ad wearing my own clothing. Through such an exercise, I have become a fashion designer, photographer, marketer, and business owner. Now imagine you are teaching a course in finite mathematics to business students, and used such an environment as this to study the use of linear programming to maximize the income or minimize the costs of a production scheme. The power of the simulation is very significant and long-lasting. I’m not only role-playing being a business owner, but I literally AM a business owner in a virtual world.
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