Chris (SL: Topher Zwiers)’s most recent blog post.. Podcast Episode 3: Legal Issues in Second Life

1. Communication – of all kinds, including text chat, IMs, group chat, group notices, voice chat, voice IMs, video, audio, textures (images), presentations, notecards, etc. etc. If communication is the essence of education, then SL provides many many media for education.

2. Representation and simulation – the hurricane is a good example…..there are others…a tidal wave, a model of the Globe Theatre, the city of Amsterdam (okay, most of these are on the Main Grid – not open to K-12 students, but they provide examples that might be followed on the Teen Grid), plus the capacity for the students themselves to build models…and an awesome, powerful scripting language that affords the possibility of learning object-oriented programming while representing complex processes or events.

3. Scaffolds – all kinds of ways to support learning as it occurs, not the least of which is the capacity to build “Head-Up Displayes” (HUDs) which can provide real-time access to glossaries, maps, instructions, tables, data, etc. as students do their work. These require planning, of course, but many scaffolds are already built or can be easily adapted to specific learning tasks.

4. Teacher professional development – I actually think this is the primary utility of Second Life for K-12 education these days, due to the obstacles mentioned above, but also because right now, it’s the teachers, for the most part, that need to learn about the possibilities of virtual reality, social networking, and cutting-edge technologies….what’s important to remember is that most teachers will not come in on their own to learn this type of technology…but in supported groups, with a professional development goal in mind, or by joining with groups such as DEN or the ELVEN Institute (http://elveninstitute.org), there is a whole new world of discovery awaiting teachers, igniting their passion for teaching while opening them up to transformation both in themselves and in their students.

So, what’s the “point”? Teachers learning; learning teachers. Those skeptical district tech coordinators might want to remind themselves that it IS about learning, after all….not just predictability and control.

Craig A. Cunningham’s most recent blog post.. ELVEN Communication Workshop Held Today

Lisa Parisi’s most recent blog post.. The Successful Inclusion Program

1. having role-plays in virtual environments like a restaurant, a hospital, etc. we cannot have in the language classroom. The furthest we can get in a F2F session is “Use your imagination”.
2. “speaking” can be done through text chat and audio by means of avatars flying, dancing, sitting, walking. You cannot do that through MSN or Yahoo messenger. That is in terms of communcation it provides a sense of closeness or nearness to someone else traditional chat software cannot provide.
3. contacting natives or fluent non-native English speakers to talk to your students in a close to real life environment (or any other language).
4. learning in a different way. Have you ever imagined listening to someone reading the Raven in an immersive presentation where you can experience the settings and emotions of this literary classic?

Miguel Mendoza’s most recent blog post.. Buzzword

Robert Rowe’s most recent blog post.. GeekTripping

Gord has a long post about using Tech in the Classroom that is well worth the read. Gord's post talks about how some things are used primarily for flash and impress, but in my opinion students will know when something is being done to impress them…

I’ve been a fan of Second Life for over two years now. Just for starters, what I find it adds to the e-learning mix is the “sense of place” – we’re so used (in real life) to this and it’s missing in all other forms of e-learning.

I find walking around SL with an avatar and spending time with people more “human” than attending an event in a virtual classroom (even with webcams) or any other type of synchronous event.

It took me a while to get this, but I finally did one day when sitting on a park bench in SL chatting to a virtual colleague while a Four Stooges movie was playing in the background and watching a fabulous sunset – you just don’t get that “added richness” using other online tools for my money.

Graham Stanley’s most recent blog post.. SLanguages 2008

Beth Knittle’s most recent blog post.. End of One Year and Planning the Next

It also allows teachers to learn many new things. Some may not have anything to do with their classroom but it is in fact valuable and exciting learning. There is the creative part too whether you are building a vase or just redecorating a space.

The connections that can be made and the environment make for a valuable part of my personal learning network. Which BTW the DEN in SL leadership council will be presenting on at NECC.
http://center.uoregon.edu/ISTE/NECC2008/program/search_results_details.php?sessionid=42130125&selection_id=42670454&rownumber=4&max=11&gopage=

Riptide Furse’s most recent blog post.. Twitter Updates for 2008-06-15