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Life in Education portal
Second Life in Education
Notable projects and
implementations
General examples of exemplary use of Second
Life
- The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), Telstra and Tourism
Australia are building islands in the virtual online world of Second Life.
Companies are recognising the huge marketing potential of the three-dimensional
world, where people escape their own existences to live a different virtual
life, and are racing to set up shop there and in other virtual worlds. ABC New
Media manager Abigail Thomas moonlights on Second Life as Abi Goldflake. Ms
Thomas says the site's 3 million residents will be able to visit the ABC's
island, which is in the shape of the broadcaster's logo, in a few months. "We
think there are real opportunities in Second Life to connect with our audiences
in new and innovative ways," she said. "It's a new platform, it's a growing
platform. We think there are great ways to educate, inform and connect with
people in Second Life." Telstra and government agency Tourism Australia are
also planning to establish themselves in Second Life. Telstra's virtual base,
to be called The Pond, will offer visitors similar services to its website.
Quoted from: http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200701/s1836755.htm
- Mark Warner, presidential hopeful and former governor of Virginia,
has staged political events (news conference, town hall meeting) in Second Life
in September, 2006:
http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2006/08/the_second_life.html
and http://www.forwardtogetherblog.com/story/2006/9/15/18268/4612
- Gavin Dudeney points us to a "recent Dutch parliamentary election
campaign appearance at EduNation. Worth noting what the politicians did in
Second Life (apart from the press conference in one of the EduNation huts)...
Dutch Politicians campaign in Second Life
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kqod_Fyyot0
" He also mentioned "creative projects that have been carried out on the Teen
Grid (the child sex trafficking exhibition, for example), in the health world
(the Schizophrenia Awareness program)" including Money matters in cybercash
game Wells Fargo has set up Stagecoach Island to teach young people the
basics of managing their money
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4248074.stm
- Sweden has become the first country to establish and embassy in
Second Life. It was reported on either CNN or BBC (I can't remember which I was
watching) that it had opened, but if you Google Swedish Embassy Second Life
these are just a couple of the articles announcing this development:
http://kotaku.com/gaming/second-life/sweden-sets-up-shop-in-second-life-232047.php;
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/01/27/sweden_to_be_first_c.html
etc.
General examples of Educational
implementations in Second Life
- In Montreal: "LaSalle College has become the first Canadian
school to open a campus in the virtual world of Second Life, where it will
offer long-distance training programs. Second Life is a 3D world with its own
economy that brings together 2.6 million Internet users from all over the
planet. This pavilion will be a three-dimensional meeting place for students
living across Québec and the world; from the comfort of their own homes,
they will attend their instructors’ lectures and talk to their
classmates." From the website:
http://www.ilasallecampus.com/en/Second_life.html
- Education UK: http://www.sleducationuk.net/
Examples from Science, Design, and
Technology
- As a place to experiment with design, in Core77's Design Blog --
Philips Design intends to use its presence in Second Life to gain feedback on
innovation concepts, engage residents in co-creation and gain a deeper
understanding of potential opportunities in this virtual environment. This will
allow Philips Design to find new ways of relating to end users. Having such
direct feedback can significantly enrich the design process and lead to
innovative and surprising end results. This fits with the Philips Design
philosophy that design should be based around people and grounded in research.
It also corresponds to Philips Design's firm belief that the future of design
lies in the co-creation of products.
http://www.core77.com/blog/business/philips_design_joins_second_life_5083.asp
- Posted December 5th, 2006 in New Media Consortium, NMC Teachers Buzz
- on Mon Dec 11 at 6pmSLT?? - Virtual Morocco Field Trip! reported by Corwin
Carillon (aka Nicholas Noakes) - "This is a fascinating SL student project
which involved students going to Morocco RL [ and posting Flickr photos of
students’ visit to Morocco ] and then coming back to demonstrate what they
learned about the country and the culture with a project build in SL. The build
also includes some very interesting and innovative scripted objects which could
be useful to other such student projects in SL. The students will be presenting
this formally in a week or so. For this field trip Ann Enigma will give us an
overview of the project and then 2-3 of the students will talk us through their
builds." http://www.nmc.org/sl/
- The Second Life insider reports in
http://www.secondlifeinsider.com/2006/08/18/noaa-comes-to-second-life/
- The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Earth System
Research Laboratory (ESRL) have arrived in Second Life, and they brought all
the fun and excitement you have naturally come to expect from fluid dynamics!
In case you haven't been on any submarine rides lately, the NOAA is the
governmental agency tasked with researching the oceans, climate, weather, and
anything else having to do with gigantic masses of air and water. (Full
disclosure, I was part of this project.) The NOAA's sim is called Meteroa,
which is derived from the Greek adjective meteoras which means 'suspended in
the air' (Full disclosure, I'm Greek). On this lovely island sim you can find
fully interactive educational demonstrations about the ocean and weather.
Examples include a sea life submarine ride created by The Magicians, and two
different tsnuami demos by Aimee Weber Studios and Electric Sheep Company.
Other fun stuff includes a demonstration of a real-time temperature map powered
by Yahoo, narration by Exploratorium Chief Scientist Paul Doherty, an airplane
ride into a hurricane, and a melting glacier demonstration.
- Not exactly SL, but research on a similar simulation: Maria Limniou,
David Roberts, and Nikos Papadopoulos, "Full immersive virtual environment
CAVETM in chemistry education," Computers & Education In Press, Corrected
Proof,
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6VCJ-4PDK9TC-1/2/2f30582e0c7a8163389fae92ad629b51
(accessed August 16, 2007). Abstract By comparing two-dimensional (2D)
chemical animations designed for computer's desktop with three-dimensional (3D)
chemical animations designed for the full immersive virtual reality environment
CAVETM we studied how virtual reality environments could raise student's
interest and motivation for learning. By using the 3ds maxTM, we can visualize
the chemical phenomena easily and quickly without knowing any special computer
language and export the application to files which are compatible with the
CAVETM (Object or OpenGL files). After the participation in 3D animations at
the CAVETM students comprehended the molecules' structure and their changes
during a chemical reaction better than during the 2D animations on the
computer's desktop, as the limitations of human vision had been overcome.
Furthermore, the students were enthusiastic, as they had the feeling that they
were inside the chemical reactions and they were facing the 3D molecules as if
they were real objects front of them.
Examples from Humanities
Examples from Language
Learning
Not SL exactly, but another MUVE World of Warcraft used in language
learning: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=13341
- quotes: "All my students were getting up at three o'clock in the morning,
putting on their headsets and chatting with these 12 year-olds in China. The
Chinese kids were berserk about it. The teachers were saying it was their
favorite class. It was really a win/win thing. ... Some of them were really
starting to sound like Americans. A lot of time it was more a confidence thing
than a language thing. Also, they're getting conversational English they
wouldn't get in a normal class, more authentic English, with phrases they
wouldn't get in textbooks."
More information: Second Life
in Education portal
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Page updated: August 17, 2007 |
Copyright 2007 by Vance Stevens
under Creative
Commons License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/
April 29, 2007
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