Virtual Worlds Video

Joe Sanchez from the University of Texas at Austin (North Lamar SL) created this well-done overview of virtual worlds. It is both sensible and engaging. Thanks, Joe!

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Kathy Schrock
Joe Sanchez

On the Teen Grid!

Thanks to Westley Field, I have finally made it onto the Teen Grid! I am joining the Skoolaborate project for a few months as an observer and helper, and then, hopefully, bringing in a middle school teacher and a class after the first of the year. The Teen Grid exploration is in preparation for the purchase of Teen Grid islands by our Lighthouse Learning Island consortium.

I loaded up a box of educational tools, my favorite clothes and furniture, and set the permissions to allow anyone to use the items once I get them onto the sim.

I am still working hard on Lighthouse Learning Island to get it ready for professional development, and hope to announce some upcoming events in the next two weeks!

Hope everyone's start of the school year (at least here in the US) goes well!

Kathy

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Note from a concerned educator

I received a note from a concerned educator today who feels that "promoting Second Life to teachers to promote to students is a really bad idea" since "kids spend so much time playing console and computer games, that something like Second Life could easily overtake their first life". He (or she) felt that I had not thought this Second Life thing all the way through and felt, as a leader in ed tech, I should be more careful what I promote.

Okay, to clear a few things up-- I am not currently "promoting SL to teachers to promote to students." I am developing an online, synchronous professional development environment for teachers to engage in some meaningful professional development with colleagues from all over the globe in real-time. There are very few environments that allow such a thing for such a little investment in capital.

Secondly, I created the list of Teen Grid ideas to help those who are already going into that area to work with students. I wanted to offer my ideas and solicit some from others. On the student side of things, I feel that Second Life can become another avenue of assessment, in addition to allowing students to do some things not possible in real life. I forsee, if our district winds up utilizing the Teen Grid, that it will be during the school day and a natural part of the instructional process. However, as with all technology, it should be used when appropriate to support teaching and learning.

Off the soapbox now,
Kathy

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Design and Conquer Conference

On August 17th, I had the pleasure of virtually presenting an updated version of "Kathy Dryburgh's Guide to Second Life for K-12 Educators" for the TIES Design and Conquer: A Day of Social Simulation conference held in Minnesota.

Presenting in and with Second Life just adds another layer of complexity to the process, but TIES' own Troy Cherry and I had done mutiple tests using Skype for audio and video for the introduction piece and follow-up discussion. But who would have figured that solid, dependable Skype would go down for more than 24 hours? Troy and I went to plan B, with me utilizing the Mac side of the iMac (which I rarely use!) and using iChat for the video and audio feed. The presentation was given in SL, with Troy as my SL audience and using his mouselook as the view for the teachers in the RL audience. (Hint: I have learned to log-in early and run through all of the slides before the show, which allows them to quickly clear up when it is time to do the presentation.)

The teachers in the audience asked great questions about the use of MUVE's with students, asked me to justify why I like this engaging format, and touched on many other topics. I so appreciated the ability to present and talk to them!

Here is the updated list of links to the sites I covered in the presentation.

TEACHING AND LEARNING

NOAA
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Meteroa/177/161/27/
Online video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is8YX32GAyQ

Solar Eclipse Planetarium
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Midnight%20City/94/76/27/

Second Life Library
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island/129/208/25

Second Life Medical Library
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/178/202/25/

International Spaceflight Museum
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Spaceport%20Alpha/23/51/22
Web: http://slispaceflightmuseum.org/

Global Kids
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Cincta/89/95/23

Literature Alive
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/181/237/23

Commonspace for Progressive Organizations
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Commonwealth%20Island/193/84/315
Web: http://www.envirolink.org/

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

ISTE
http://slurl.com/secondlife/ISTE%20Island/128/128/0
Web: http://iste.org/

Terra Incognita
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Terra%20incognita/128/128/0
Web: http://profiles.slbuzz.com/decka-mah

Elven Institute
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Cybrary%20City%20II/95/188/22

New Media Consortium Campus
http://slurl.com/secondlife/NMC%20Campus/184/101/33
Web: http://www.nmc.org/campuswiki/
Online video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9VZKTT6gZ8

Angel Learning Isle
http://slurl.com/secondlife/ANGEL%20Learning%20Isle/128/128/0
Web:http://www.angellearning.com/secondlife/

Genome Island
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Genome/127/129/49

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT ON EDUISLAND II

The Blogger's Cafe
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/234/146/22

Carl F. Spackler Hall
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/128/75/37

Discovery Educator Network
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/93/93/22

ISTE Emerging Technologies Task Force
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/159/146/23

Math Playground
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/31/88/22

Podcast Central
http://slurl.com/secondife/Eduisland%20II/129/76/47

Technospud
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/128/75/37
Web: http://technospud.com

Meg Writer
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/17/16/22
Web: http://techteachers.com

Teacher Networking Center (TNC)
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/29/20/22

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT ISLAND

Lighthouse Learning Island
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Lighthouse%20Learning%20Island/
Web: http://nausetschools.org/lighthouselearning/

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Teen Grid Ideas for the content areas

I have been giving the year-two Second Life plan for our four districts some thought lately and many educators have been asking me for ideas for the use of the Teen Grid with students.

T.H.E. Journal just published a brief article about this topic, covering the Ramapo Island project.

I decided share my initial ideas and to search for some traditional types of classroom activities that might transfer easily to the Teen Grid content-specific islands we will be developing for the 08-09 school year. Since the Teen Grid age is 13-17, these ideas target the grade 8 through 12 grade levels and are intended to be formative assessments to demonstrate the acquisition of content knowledge. Hopefully this brief list of ideas will provide you with a springboard to the development of your own creative lessons and units. Please add any ideas you think of to the comment section!

Science

• 3-d models of everything from working volacanoes, to trebuchets, to scientific experiments


• In-life Invention Convention or Science Fair


• Reproduction of the rainforest environment or any environmental environment

Math

• Use of the Math Playground materials from Eduisland 2 for teaching "SL Logo"


• Use of the building shapes in-life to create geometric shapes (i.e. icosahedron, etc.)


• 3-D formula study guides (i.e. area, perimeter, etc.)


• Demonstration of the mathematics concenpts of ratios, fractions, angles, etc.


• Famous mathematician "presentations"


• Any interactive lesson utilizing manipulatives


• Golden Ratio (Fibonacci number) lesson (as demo'ed in the Operations Research office on Eduisland 2)


• Conduct a Google phrase search on "math manipulative lessons" to find more
  

Social Studies

• Role-playing simulations of town, state, or local government proceedings, including creation of the buildings, etc.


• Simulation role-playing of historic events such as the Mayflower Landing, Ellis Island immigration, etc.


• Use of the American Memory Collection materials (such as America Dreams) with appropriate assessments completed within SL (Webquests often include role-playing and role-taking so take a look at a lot of them)


• Conduct a Google phrase search on "social studies simulations" to find additional material

English Language Arts and World Languages

• I love the idea of bookclubs being held in SL, which many of the public libraries in-world do, whether held during school or at alternate times


• Author visits, from real-life authors or role-playing RL authors


• Honing the presentation and communication skills of students within SL by moving some of the traditional classroom presentations into the engaging SL arena


• Re-creation of spaces from literature or geographic areas of the world (i.e. olde Salem Village, the Louvre


• Streaming of student-created movies, PSAs, etc. into SL

Drama and Music

• Acting out of scenes from plays and books is a natural use of Second Life (Angel Learning Isle's Educators Tool Gallery in SL has a free box of clothes for "classroom productions" that includes some useful period costuming items but take the time to examine the contents and get rid of some things)


• Building the period sets for these productions in-life


• The purchase of a media center in SL (I use the DCE Media Center) would allow streaming of student-produced movies (in mov format) and audio productions (in mp3 format) so one could host a media festival (I am planning on doing this on Lighthouse Learning Island this fall, so join the "K-12 Eduators" group in SL if you would like to know when it is happening)
  

Family and Consumer Science

• Creation of objects in SL with notecards and links to URLs about all aspects of family and consumer science from hand-washing to the food pyramid to babysitting tips and tricks


• Theme-based food creation with links to recipes online for healthy foods and snacks

Physical Education and Health

• Wellness activity demonstrations in-life


• Creation of content that demonstrates rules of games and physical education activities


• A health-link for teens area with notecards and outside links to supporting sites
  

Computer Education

• I used to love the giant computer at the Computer Museum in Boston, which allowed you to walk on its giant keyboard, peer inside at its parts, and rolling the giant trackball. I could see this being reproduced again and again in SL as technology changes


• Creation of in-life tutorials via notecards for applications, technology literacy skills, and SL skills and processes
  

Library and Information Literacy

• The aspects of copyrighted materials and adherence to intellectual property use within SL is an important component of teaching the Teen Grid users
  

Visual Arts

• The creation of an art gallery is easy to do in SL. With changing exhibits, visitors would come back again and again.


• Creation of 3-d models in-life would also be something that could be explored


• Students could also create original artwork and 3-d models for others to use in decorating their on-line spaces
  
  

Please add some additional ideas that you think will work well in SL to support teaching and learning in the comments!

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Introduction to SL Handout

Beth Knittle RL (Beth Kohnke SL), from Barnstable Public Schools, has written a useful introduction to Second Life handout in preparation for a training she will be doing in August. It will be very helpful for newbies as we begin our Lighthouse Learning Island journey!

Introduction to Second Life for K-12 Educators

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