Second Life: Guidelines for Educators
From SimTeach
This is a first draft of this page... please add contributions...
Getting Started
Q. I am not sure what to do here. I am a first time user and looking into this for educational purposes.
A. Probably the best thing to do is explore Second Life, visit existing areas set aside for educational projects and talk to other educators. There are numerous additional resources such as this wiki, many blogs, papers from the Second Life Education Workshops (2006 and 2007) and the education mailing list (very high volume, but you can get posts sent to a gmail account or search the archives).
Places to Visit:
Videos on the Web:
Groups to Join in Second Life:
In Second Life, click the "Search" button at the bottom of your screen, and under the "Groups" tab, search for
- Real Life Education in Second Life
- ISTE: Educational Technology Assoc
- NMC Guests
- jokaydia New and Info
Q. Now I have land, how do I create my classroom?
A. Again, think about what you need and want from your land in Second Life - chances are that you don't need anything that looks like a traditional classroom. to be continued...
Q. How can I find other educators in Second Life?
A. You could subscribe to Second Life Educators mailings list. This mailing list has a lot of traffic, and is good way to meet people. Be warned though, make sure you filter the traffic to store or tag it, because it can flood your inbox.
There is also a group in Second Life named 'Real Life Education in Second Life' which is also comprised of people who are interested in the educational possibilities of Second Life. If you'd like to keep in touch with other educators inworld, please feel free to join this Group (click the Find button and search under Groups for 'Education'). The group is open for anyone to join, and it's another great way to find colleagues and collaborators to help you with your education work in Second Life.
Q. Where can I find examples of teaching in Second Life?
In the spring of 2007, the Second Life Best Practices in Education 2007 International Conference brought together educators who were already teaching in Second Life to discuss their experiences. Visit the main website for the conference here or view the SL Best Practices in Education Conference 2007 Video Archive to learn more.
Q. Has there been any research on the effectiveness of Second Life in supporting teaching?
The University of Cincinnati Second Life Learning community has been collecting a repository of research, white papers, and reports related to education in Second Life specifically, and virtual worlds in general - in addition to other research related to technology in education. Visit the White Papers, Reports, and Peer Reviewed Articles section of the University of Cincinnati Second Life Wiki for more information.
Teaching and Curriculum
Q. Are there curriculum tools or examples I can start with?
Q. Is this the best M.U.V.E. platform to teach in?
Q. Is there research on learning outcomes in M.U.V.E.s?
Q. How can I gather assignments inside the environment?
Q. How is teaching in SL different from teaching in a regular classroom?
Q. Where can I find interactive objects that will help in my teaching?
Q. This environment is very addictive. Will my students spend too much time in here and not enough on the tasks and outcomes of my class?
Q. How can I learn enough about this environment to manage a classroom?
Technical essentials
Q. Why can't we use our own names in Second Life?
A. That is basicly a limit that Linden Lab has created to make sure that every name is unique. There is a option to buy a lastname for your institution though, and create avatars with that lastname.
Q. Can I speak with a microphone so students will hear me?
A. Yes, there are 2 options. Second Life has build in voice chat capabilities, both for talking out in the open or in private.
Secondly you can host a audio stream yourself, and have that broadcasted into Second Life. This could be used to interview someone who is not in Second Life. A Other reason to use this is that you can be the only speaker, and don't have someone talking over you.
Q. I have some videos I want to show in Second Life, what are the steps to this?
Q. How can I build the skills needed to construct a campus by myself?
Q. I want to do simulations of physical phenomena. Is the Second Life physics engine accurate?
The physics in Second Life can be affected by network lag and server load, and is not particularly accurate. It will be accurate enough to run many qualitative experiments, and should be able to cope with simple mechanics experiments - if you allow for some decrease in accuracy.
Q. My research application requires response times down to the X miliseconds. Can Second Life give me that response time consistently?
No.
Business & Logistics
Q. How do I get land for my classroom?
A. First, do you really NEED a classroom? Many educators have taught classes in Second Life without using one, or by sharing space owned by others. Once you've decided that you do need your own land, you can get this by
- Registering for the Campus:Second_Life program for some free land for one semester (limited availability)
- Purchasing land on the Second Life mainland
- Purchasing your own Private Island
- Renting land from one of a number of education oriented organizations - some of these have programs dedicated to providing space and support to educators working in Second Life. For example:
Q. What kind of grant funding has SL attracted?
In the UK, the Eduserv Foundation awarded four significant grants for Second Life projects in 2007. These were for Sloodle, Theatron, Modelling4All and for the 'Learning from Online Worlds; Teaching in Second Life' project. More details.
Also in the UK, JISC has awarded a number of grants to Second Life related projects through its 'Users & Innovation' program. These include the PREVIEW, Habitat, M3 and MOOSE projects.
In the USA, The MacArthur Foundation has supported a number of Global Kids projects related to Second Life.
Q. What is a reasonable price for hiring building and scripting consultants?
A. The prices can vary dramatically. For the top end professional contractors, the costs can reach over US$15,000 per sim ('island') for the building and scripting. For other projects you may be able to recruit volunteers (use the SLED mailing list to ask around) or use cheaper amateur developers. Some amateur developers can be very talented - and some may be looking for showcase projects to help launch a professional career. With volunteer or amateur developers you may not be able to set tight deadlines for the development time.
Q. I want to buy items and land but my university needs an invoice and PO.
Q. Do I have other options besides committing to an entire island?
Q. How long does it take to build a campus presence?
Finding peers
Q. How can I network with professors who have already taught in SL?
Q. Is anyone in my discipline teaching in here?
Q. How can I describe SL to my colleagues so that it makes sense?
Q. My colleagues think I'm wasting my time on video games, how can I convince them there is merit working with students in M.U.V.E.s?
A. The University of Cincinnati Second Life Learning community has been collecting a repository of research, white papers, and reports related to education in Second Life specifically, and virtual worlds in general - in addition to other research related to technology in education. Visit the White Papers, Reports, and Peer Reviewed Articles section of the University of Cincinnati Second Life Wiki for more information.
Q. Who are the top researchers in this field?
Q. What universities are using the platform?
A. See the Institutions and Organizations in SL page on this wiki for more information.
Q. Is anyone at my university already involved with M.U.V.E. settings?
Estates and Private islands
Q. I need information about managing my island but the concierge service is sluggish.
Q. I want to build things in SL but I don't want anyone to disrupt my setting or see my progress.
Q. Are there best practices for campuses built in SL?
A. There is great variety to the look and feel of many campuses and educational locations in Second Life, but some consistent features are beginning to emerge across builds. Chris Collins (SL: Fleep Tuque) and Dr. Nancy Jennings (SL: Sweetpea Sunnyside) conducted an extensive observational survey of publicly accessible educational builds in Second Life from April to May 2007. A poster and white paper document of their initial findings were included in the Second Life Community Convention 2007 - Education Track proceedings, and can be found on the SLCC07 Poster Page section of the University of Cincinnati Second Life Wiki.
Events and Publicity
Q. How do I promote my in-world event to the general population?
Q. I want to run an event but I want to limit access to reduce the possibility of "griefers" disrupting the event.
Q. How can I add a Metaverse component to a regular in-world event?
Sex and age issues
Q. I've seen some racy material in SL. Will this affect my classroom?
Q. I teach middle school. Is Second Life appropriate?
The answer is truly yes and no. There are many wonderful educational places in Second Life. They can be very beneficial in teaching students. There are science, history, geography, literature, and many more subject area sites that can be very helpful in planning a lesson. Further, you can display any thing in Second life up on a screen, even let students ask a question through the microphone. HOWEVER, you CAN NOT let students move the avatar. That is a violation of the Terms of Service. Also, there is a very important reason that you should not do that. You need to keep your hand on the avatar in case something untoward begins to happen. Then you just push escape and you and your students are out of there. Actually, I push the button on the projector so I can still see what is happening on my screen. Then if it is only a momentary problem or even one that I just suspected might be a problem, poof, I can turn the projector back on and we are back in business. The point is, if you are taking kids around, be vigilant. Also, know where you are going, what you want to see. This is an excellent chance to allow "discovery" lessons to occur. As you move around an area, let your students discover information. But, always remember, this is an ADULT sim. It is not created for kids. So be aware of the rating of the area that you are in. Some landowners are open to locking their land for a field trip. You can contact them if you are interested in this option. But realize they may not be interested and/or may not be able to for other reasons. Please be kind.
Publish or perish
Q. What opportunities do I have writing and presentations about MUVEs?
Q. What press coverage has there been on education in Second Life?
Q. The SLED mailing list is too active. How can I get information without being buried in extraneous mail?
A. * See this very handy web index of all posts since Oct 05: https://lists.secondlife.com/pipermail/educators
- Set your messages to digest mode by sending an email to
- educators-request at lists.secondlife.com
- Subject = "set digest plain" (without quotes)
- To see all commands use "set help"
- On vacation? "set delivery off"
- Use an email filter. Your email client moves "SLED" emails to a separate folder. See:
- Outlook: Tools > Rules and Alerts > New Rule
- http://itns.ifas.ufl.edu/email-help/Rules.htm
- Yahoo Mail: Options > Filters
- GMail: http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=6579&topic=1539 (Note: GMail also puts all emails into 'threads', which can make it easy to scan a large list of discussions by topic, allowing you to easily pick out the topics of interest to you)
- Follow your specific interest on another list
- https://lists.secondlife.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo
- http://list.academ-x.com/listinfo.cgi/slrl-academ-x.com
- Participate in the SLED forums: http://www.simteach.com/forum
- Leave the list by following these instructions:
