[Air-L] Benefits & Drawbacks of teaching in Second Life

AJ Kelton ajk407 at nyu.edu
Wed Feb 1 14:14:31 PST 2012


CarrieLynn,

Good luck with your presentation.  There is a wealthy of literature out
there, including peer reviewed journals that have a nice variety of
articles.  You can also find countless videos on YouTube and slide decks on
SlideShare from folks who have done similar presentation.  I know all of
mine are opensource, I know a lot of other folks post their that way as
well (meaning, feel free to download).

I think one of the greatest benefits of using virtual worlds, whether it be
Second Life, OpenSim, or one of the others virtual worlds out there now, is
the ability to do things that we cannot do, or do easily, in the actual
world.  One example is sending language learning students to a sim that is
run by people who speak the target language, and having them converse in
either text or voice with native speakers who live in the target language
country.  That is something that can be done, via travel abroad, but its
not easy or cheap.  It can be arranged via web conference, but there is
a spontaneity to doing it in a virtual world and less scheduling headaches.
 Another examples would be to build a replicate of the human heart (which
has been done in Second Life, although I'm not sure if it still exists) and
then take a walk through the replica. One more example might be hazmat
training, which would be expensive and dangerous.

Just some thoughts.

best,
aj



On Wed, Feb 1, 2012 at 4:58 PM, CarrieLynn Reinhard <ijedi7 at yahoo.com>wrote:

> I'm putting together a presentation for my university next week on the use
> of virtual worlds as virtual classrooms.  One thing I want to touch upon
> are the drawbacks and benefits of using Second Life for teaching.  I have
> the following, and I would like to know if you think there are others I
> should discuss.
>
> Benefits: audio visual & kinetic learning styles, collaboration, anonymity
> encourages experimentation, geographics no longer restrict participation,
> new ways to experience old knowledge.
>
> Drawbacks: interface learning curve, anonymity encourages disengagement,
> technological divides and issues, reduction of socializing, applicability
> of knowledge gained.
>
> CarrieLynn D. Reinhard, PhD
> Dominican University
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-- 
-----

AJ Kelton
Director of Emerging Instructional Technology
     College of Humanities and Social Sciences - Montclair State University
Doctoral Student
     Educational Communication and Technology - New York University
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