Virtual Worlds and the New Frontiers of Learning vid

Thanks Terran Timeless (Michael Galvin)

Collaborative Technology and Engaging the Campus 2008
Track 1: Community Engagement: From local impact to global influence

Conversations about assessment, transfer of learning using virtual worlds by Lev Gonick, Stacy Williams and Mark Turner from Case Western Reserve University, Ed Lamoureux from Bradley University, Cory Ondrejka from co-founder of Second Life and now at University of Southern California.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-nq1q3FeKk&feature=PlayList&p=A878DF07BE7B51A3&index=78

Cory
15% of people in SL script

 

The Who

I used to be a singer. Singing – to perform – it’s not easy. It comes from within. You have to dig deep and give it your all. You have to expose yourself, the real you. Each song, each phrase, each word, is studied, memorized, internalized, and then shared. And people critique you. A lot. Especially when you’re doing it as a student; you have to sing in front of other students and other faculty and they have to give you feedback to help you improve. If your confidence isn’t there; wow; it can be painful. In fact it was so painful I quit. I needed something not quite so personal.

Fast forward to yesterday. Teaching in Second Life. The experience stimulated a conversation with a friend about virtual worlds. Why and how is it different than teaching in the real world? Is it different? I think the answer is no. And yes. I told my friend that I think the difference lies in the connection between the avatar and the user and the environment and content. We talked about context. Context is key. Esp in VWs. She told me yes, but that’s not saying much. I thought, “Huh? I just told you my belief and that’s not saying much?? ouch!”

Then she started asking me a series of questions about my own learning preferences. I am a visual and aural learner but suspect that the aural is simply a matter of lack of choice. I’m lectured to, and I like it because I can sit back and listen to ideas and assimilate them into what I know. Now that I have a pretty solid body of knowledge, I love making connections between concepts and sharing my ideas on those connections with others. But, really, that’s not saying much. She’s right.

Because what I don’t know, is the “who.” Who am I really, as a learner, without the constraints put upon me by formal education? No clue. Why not? Because I have refused to experiment. Any time an opporutnity to play with the tools has come along I hide behind “too busy.” Why? Fear. Fear of rejection, failure, lack of perfection. Wow. Big insight.

So now I have to figure that out. Who am I as a learner? AND, I have to STOP intellectualizing/analyzing everything that comes my way. I hold stuff out at a distance and say hmmmmmm what really intelligent and impressive comment can I make about that? It’s only on the occassion when I finally forget about doing that and personalize what I’m writing/talking about do I actually say something meaningful.

Back to singing – I think I’ve learned from this that no matter what I do – it has to come from within before it can truly mean something to me, or anyone else.

Learning who I am as a learner will make me “become” the teacher (instructional designer) I really want to be. Thanks Friend.

 

institutional expectations

1.  Should there be agreement with your institution about what is acceptable

2.  appearance and dress for a faculty member in SL?

3.  Should there be an agreement with the institution at some point?

4.  What are the implications relating to teacher identity in SL in relation to:

o  multiculturalism

o  inclusiveness

o  middle-aged white stereotypes

o  gender

o  “local standards of decency” – what is “local”?

5.  What might reasonable institutional expectations be?

6.  What about your academic freedom of expression?

 

With regard to the institutional issues raised above (from the T&L class):

These are difficult questions. I can understand an institution’s collective desire to represent a certain standard of appearance and behavior, and at the same time I think academic instructions should encourage and support freedom of expression. There is too much censorship in this country as it is. Honestly, I don’t know how to answer this question, but I think much of the answers will depend on the institution, its alumni and its geographic location

 

 

Changing roles

 From the T&L in SL class discussion board; questions written by Dr. Mauri Collins and Ann Jeffery, instructors:

 

       Berge, Zane, The Role of the Online Instructor/Facilitator http://www.emoderators.com/moderators/teach_online.html

       Mason, Robin, Moderating Educational Computer Conferencing http://www.emoderators.com/papers/mason.html

When instructors move from the classroom into online courses, their roles change – and change again when they begin to teach in Second Life.

 

Please read the Mason and Berge articles.  For those of you who are teaching in Second Life reflect on your own transition; for those of you who are working with inducting faculty into Second Life, consider how you can help them transition in their roles:

       Pedagogical

       Social

       Managerial

       Technological

***********************************************************************

Last summer I worked as a student grunt worker for UND’s Online Team. Most of what I did was copying and pasting from a pre-written storyboard in Word to cookie cutter courses in Blackboard with occasional HTML re-working for those pain-in-the-butt M-dashes. The real learning happened as I eavesdropped on the professional instructional designers gently guiding and sometimes not-so-gently cajoling instructors towards good online practices. I had the privilege of acting as ID for the building of a Music course and learned a TON about the transitional process instructors experience. As I’m sure most of you have seen, professors who have been teaching for a long time tend to be resistant to change. But the bottom line is, methods have to change when you’re not standing in front of a room full of people to teach them. Even when conducting a video conference, which would probably be considered the closest online alternative to face-to-face, there are different dynamics that the technology brings to the classroom. Many of the instructors that work with the Online Team come back saying they have altered their in-person instruction to reflect what they do in the distance courses they create simply because it works better! Imagine that!

Dr. Berge’s list of recommendations seem dead-on with regard to the things that instructors need to be cognizant of when teaching (in general and) online. I have experienced both exceptional and not-so-great online instruction (from the same person, ironically) and as I look down this list of recommendations, I can easily pick out the reasons why the good instruction was good and the bad instruction was bad. I would say the biggest factor in this is feedback. Dr. Berge states, “Provide Feedback. Provide swift feedback, especially to technical problems.” In fact, the problem was that we were getting little, if any, feedback on the discussion board and on the assignments. The complaint was universal; this course is well–designed and I am learning a lot, but I’ve had to do it alone and I’m getting no guidance as to whether I’m going in the right direction. What am I paying for? The fact is, we’re paying for the expert’s input and guidance on our work so that we can model ourselves after someone who knows what they’re doing. So, they need to make their presence known through timely and thoughtful feedback.

When it comes to Second Life, I think management of in-world courses is a monumental task which requires a second or even third person. For example, there are many good reasons to conduct a two-track session; voice and text. One is ADA which requires us to accommodate all learners; another is simple courtesy for those in the class who cannot use audio or voice. If time cannot allow good planning for prewritten text, then other instructors or students can be assigned the task of transcription. This is also a method for archiving which is good to have for students who were absent.

 

 

Replication in virutal spaces

From the T&L in SL Discussion board (names used with permission):

 

 

Learning spaces is a subject of continuing debate between your instructors.  One instructor, MissAnnie (Ann Jeffery) is an advocate for the abandonment of formal mimic-RL learning spaces (classrooms and ampitheatres) in SL in favor of experiential and immersive learning spaces.

The other instructor, MsMauri (Mauri Collins) is of the opinion that they have their place.  Humans are encultured into the formal learning space from the moment they first step into a preschool classroom and it can reduce cognitive load to be learning in familiar (if dysfunctional) learning spaces.

Both agree that “bottoms in seats” learning spaces do not meet all the learning needs of all adults all the time.

 

 

I agree that we have to find more immersive ways to use SL, but I have to say I agree with the way MsMauri states her opinion here. I have watched many people coming into SL and I see them struggle with the process of building skills in-world. Experienced gamers tend to acclimate more quickly but still the learning curve is steep. Students and instructors who go into SL for the sole purpose of instruction still require a varying degree of skill to function. Whether the level of skill is high or low, I see the process of scaffolding or transitioning new users into the environment as vital to a positive experience. Using tools (like powerpoints) and settings (like replication of RL) that are familiar seem to be one way to do this.

Once I was showing SL to a group of faculty on campus (in RL at UND) and one person saw a building in-world that he recognized from real life and he became very excited…I believe it helped him identify with the unfamiliar environment. I perceive other tools that are replications of RL as the same potential benefit. I do believe that the amount of RL replication should be minimal but I think it has a place as scaffolding. As the learner matures as an SL user, as the educators in SL grow and come with new and innovative ways to use the space, as more research is done and as the environment itself evolves, this need for scaffolding may lessen.

 

Virtual Hallucinations

Virtual Hallucinations has been one of my all time favorite sims thus far in SL. It was one of the first experiences I had in SL and it really turned me on to the idea of using SL as a learning tool in ways you cannot achieve in RL.

 

It’s layout is such that you have to put on a badge to hear the voices that a schizophrenic would hear and walk through a building which has other “tricks” to demonstrate what a person with schizophrenia would experience in that environment.

 

As I put on the voice badge and listened with my headphones to the very negative voices, I found myself feeling very disturbed. As you move into the main section of the building, a poster shifts from normal to some obscene name calling, the floor appears to fall out from under you, and the TV tells you to pick up a gun and kill yourself. After walking through the sim with a friend I started thinking I should turn off the voices – they were REALLY getting to me. I started to panic when I couldn’t figure out how to turn it off and I was so immersed it didn’t occur to me to take of the headphones!!

 

The pedagogy here was experiential and somewhat authentic. I can imagine using this sim to teach psychology and counseling psychology students about psychosis, schizophrenia, paranoia, hallucinations, etc. I have in fact used this sim for my learners but that is because my learners are SL beginners looking to understand how it can be used in education! 

 

SL as an adult learning environment

During week 3 of the BSU T&L class we had to read Chapters 1, 2, 3 and 10 of “Creating Environments for Effective Adult Learning. ” I contributed the following to the discussion board:

There are numerous factors that contribute to an effective adult learning environment from the expectations of the instructor to the physical environment. As instructional designers we are taught to take as much of the environment as possible into account when we design courses. Learning preferences, physical environment, content, are all considerations in the analysis phase of design and each effects the instructional strategies that we use. Constraints of the institutional environment must be considered of course, things such as size and sometimes arrangement of the physical classroom. UND has tried to update its classrooms by upgrading the technology in them. Larger classrooms have viewing monitors so that students in the middle and back can see the instructor, and all buildings offer wireless Internet. Some classrooms support distance teaching and learning with cameras, mics and Adobe Connect Pro.

I tend to gravitate toward concrete ideas and therefore I really liked the SPATIAL model (satisfaction, participation, achievement transcendent/immanent attributes, authority, layout). I also like the holistic approach that his model takes toward learning environments; “this model has potential for weaving together findings from architectural, psychological, sociological, aesthetic and human factors engineering studies” ( p. 14). The emphasis on learner perception here is interesting as well, because I helps to know that we can potentially influence perception through communication. The idea that learners should have authority over their space is something I have been thinking about in regard to SL, wondering if items in a learning space should give all permissions for movement…I would have to experiment with that to see if it made a more chaotic environment. The camera controls obviously give learners more control over their sightline (Chapter 3, p. 28) and their environment, even without the ability to move or change the seating.

In Chapter 3 Vosko talks about territoriality; “Adjustment of things in our personal spaces is another of our interesting habits….When someone encroaches on our space we tend to become defensive and protective.” How true this is, even in SL! Vosco also says, “We do this to give meaning to our space and to create a sense of comfort or familiarity.” (p. 27). We have talked a bit about what we can do to help newbies feel more comfortable in SL but I’m not sure giving new people control over this space is a such a good idea. It IS interesting to note that we “give meaning to our space” and this is something we can consider more fully as we create learning spaces in SL.

Many of the items on these instructional audit checklists are applicable to SL and I am glad I have these to turn to when I do start designing instructional space in SL.

Works cited:

Creating Environments for Effective Adult Learning. Sand Fracisco: JoesseyBass, (1991) http://home.twcny.rr.com/hiemstra/creating.html

 

Hello world!

Hello All -. I am an instructional design masters student and I have spent the last 4 months investigating SL as a tool for education. I have turned out to be an enthusiast for this virutal world with all it’s challenges and flaws. Who’d'a thought a 37 year old non-gamer mother of three would be such a convert? It’s time I finally started blogging my experiences in Second Life so….here we go!