Exploring the potential of virtual worlds for learning and teaching
e-Learning online conference 09 programme
Presentation and associated materials
Abstract
What is it about 3D Virtual Worlds that have captured our interest so much? The educational community is all a-buzz with these things, possibly more so than any technology we've encountered before, even the humble iPod... but perhaps this provides us with a clue?
VWs, such as Second Life, are not just one technology - they are infinite yet initially empty spaces, provided with tool kits that are full of developing & evolving technologies that can make up an entire world, bulging with possibilities as yet unexplored. Or at least they can be if, we are told, we have the imagination.
Over the last couple of years Glasgow Caledonian University has been exploring, developing, and teaching in Second Life. This session will present the background of the work plus demonstrations of some of the projects. With the help of the teachers, and maybe one or two learners (if we can catch them for a moment in their busy lives), we will show a range of subject disciplines and consider some of the findings from these projects.
As you will see GCU has been, like many others in H.E., piloting ideas and building on those, but the rhetoric in our educational communities suggests that we should already have moved on from these early stages of development. But how, and what?
Have we, perhaps, been conned by the speed of 'change' on the Internet into rushing to judgment about the role of new platforms? How much do we really understand at this point, and how much more will evolve over the next few years?
Perhaps we should consider how we can avoid repeating what we already do in the physical world, and, instead of building 500 seat virtual lecture theatres, embrace pedagogies beyond our traditional models? Or what about the broader issues around social cultural boundaries and internationalisation? And can we make use of all of this to extend the use of VWs to better support our students who increasingly reside online?
Presenter
Kathryn Trinder
Kathryn is a Research Fellow & Educational development advisor (e-learning), with a particular remit on Emerging Technologies. She works with the team in the Academy responsible for academic professional development across the University.
Kathryn's background is in learning technology and she has been at GCU for over 20 years. She's worked in the fields of Visual Communications, development of teaching & learning materials and learning technologies, lecturing (e-learning), and staff development.
Initially self employed with a media production company, she later went on to join the Glasgow Colleges of Nursing & Midwifery (NMCH) in 1989 and moved with the colleges to GCU in 1996, where she was closely involved with projects such as the creation of a networked Problem Based Learning Intensive Care Unit simulation lab.
She moved from NMCH to join GCU's central e-Learning Innovation Support Unit as an e-learning developer and advisor in 2001. After gaining her Masters in Open & Distance Learning with the UK OU, she become a lecturer, module leader & developer on the ESF funded DeELTA (Designing & Evaluating e-Learning & Teaching Approaches) post-graduate e-learning modules, and joined the research team on the JISC funded LEX research study which explored the learner perspective on e-learning across the post-16 sectors in the UK.
Over the last couple of years her particular enthusiasms, staff development activity, and research activities have shifted focus from the use of Web 2.0 tools to the exploration of Web 3.D - Virtual and Immersive Worlds. GCU is currently developing its presence in Second Life, developing pilot teaching projects, and researching these new environments as teaching and learning spaces.
Facilitator
David White
David has worked in the crossover area between education and online development for over 12 years consulting on and developing new forms of online educational media and interaction for the BBC, Channel 4 and Oxford University. He was a Senior Lecturer in the communication and media field at the University of the West of England specialising in interactive narrative.
David has been the co-manager of Technology-Assisted Lifelong Learning (TALL) for three years and in that time he has helped to develop and run TALL's suite of online distance courses and has been the principal investigator on a number of JISC-funded elearning projects which have studied issues such as formal and informal sharing online and the culture of online course development. His current research interests include studying the potential of massively multiplayer 3D online environments to support communities of practice and the general culture of participation and social networking on the web.