If you were a teacher how would you use SL?

[Bree Giffen]

If you were a high school teacher or maybe a college professor, what kind of project would you have students perform in SL? What kind of project would make good use of the virtual world? I'm asking because it seems educators don't know as much about SL as the residents. Would it be sending students into the world by themselves or perhaps setting up a social experiment that a group of students participate in? Let's hear your ideas.🧐

[Arduenn Schwartzman]

Number one would be Newtonian physics, imho. Physics prims are an excellent visual aid. They would help develop a better understanding of the relation between inertia and mass, applying forces, linear and angular momentum and potential and kinetic energy. Add a little llSetBuoyancy(1); to those prims and they can simulate floating stuff in zero gravity.

Astrophysics and cosmology would probably be another great one. Ad hoc rezzing heavenly bodies in SL for size and distance comparison seems more fun than boring Powerpoint slides, and clumsily handling oranges and paper mache props IRL. Although, I'm definitely not against letting students craft stuff IRL.

As far as teaching social subjects is concerned: it would be interesting to compare virtual social interactions with real-life ones. To me, it seems interactions escalate more often in flame wars online than that they do IRL, due to the lack of non-verbal communication and the tendency of online-communities to harbor a larger proportion of people lacking social skills.

Edited February 13, 2019 by Arduenn Schwartzman

[Ethan Paslong]

my question would be "what has SL to offer to teachers/students as it is now?

Not based on any study or other investigation, i'd say: not really a lot, most things won't have a additional value doing it in SL instead of RL. Think most institutes discovered that during their time here and gives one of the reasons why they left.
There are several other visualising programs to be of better help.

Edited February 13, 2019 by Ethan Paslong

[rasterscan]

23 minutes ago, Arduenn Schwartzman said:

...Number one would be Newtonian physics, imho. Physics prims are an excellent visual aid. They would help develop a better understanding of the relation between inertia and mass, applying forces, linear and angular momentum and potential and kinetic energy. Add a little llSetBuoyancy(1); to those prims and they can simulate floating stuff in zero gravity....

Excellent. Can't wait to play now. Dam rl for conjuring up a workday just when my interests been triggered.

[Wulfie Reanimator]

Game development involves a very wide range of talents and has a lot of visual feedback which is perfect for "quick rewards."

With that in mind, I would introduce the class to SL and let them pick what's most interesting to them, be it making assets (prims, textures, sounds, whatever) or scripting, group the students so that every group has artists and programmers, and have each group come up with some kind of simple game or other project idea that they can work together on.

Second Life is a great platform for this because LSL is simple, everything "just works" unlike trying to make something in an editor + IDE (like Unity + Visual Studio). The students don't have to figure out how to implement something as boiler-plate as moving or being able to click on things.

[Gabriele Graves]

To add to what has been previously said, scripting in general but particularly around object movement and physics.  3D Transformations and particularly quaternions are a good primer for 3D stuff in the future.

[Rolig Loon]

Scripting anything is a lesson in logic (and humility). 😎

[Pamela Galli]

I would not use it because it would take too much time to teach How to Use SL, and teachers are always under a tight time limit,  but if I did, it would be to replicate historical artifacts or architecture. (See my authentic Chippendale, Windsor, Queen Anne, and Louis XVI chairs, or porcelain vases.)

[Madelaine McMasters]

Were a high school teacher, I'd tell the students to step away from the keyboard and go outside.

Were a college professor, I'd tell the students to step away from the keyboard and mentor a high school student, who they'd hopefully find... outside.

SL's steep learning curve works against its use as a teaching tool, other than as a demonstration of how virtual world learning curves are too steep to use as teaching tools. Physics demonstration are best done in the flesh, where that flesh can be pinched, burned, and feel things like stiction that are difficult to convey in simulation and, once learnt, can be recognized nearly ever day in RL.

For a cosmology demonstration, I recommend building a scale model of the solar system somewhere on the school grounds, and having the students navigate it at the scale speed of light. You know the students are getting a glimpse of the scale of astronomical numbers when they have to slowly shuffle, for eight minutes, the distance from the Sun to Earth.

Fill a school bus with helium balloons for the drive home and watch the students learn how buoyancy works, as the balloons rush across the aisle opposite of their leans when the bus turns. If I were going to use SL to teach, it would be along the lines Arduenn proposes, but I have seen purpose built physics simulators that put SL to shame and require no setup by either the educators or students. They can just jump in and start building simulations.

I also agree with Arduenn that SL can teach about the vagaries of virtual social interaction, but I think the students are already getting those lessons via Facebook and other social networks.

Rather than using SL as a mechanism to teach other things, I think SL is best used as an example of what virtual worlds can, and cannot do. Just as I had no syllabus when I stepped through the door here, I'd not provide one to anyone else.

 

[Madelaine McMasters]

5 minutes ago, Pamela Galli said:

I would not use it because it would take too much time to teach How to Use SL, and teachers are always under a tight time limit,  but if I did, it would be to replicate historical artifacts or architecture. (See my authentic Chippendale, Windsor, Queen Anne, and Louis XVI chairs, or porcelain vases.)

And I would get a 3D printer for the classroom, and have students replicate there.

There is a magic to SL which you and I understand and that really does take more time to discover than any class schedule permits.

I have an RL skill set that allows me to build a dining table faster in wood than in SL. It's messier and costs more, but 100 years from now, that table still be holding up boxes of things someone should have unpacked 10 years earlier. There is something to be said for object permanence.

That said, I have seen your work and there isn't a day I don't wish my RL house was virtual. I'd be a regular customer.

[Pamela Galli]

29 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

And I would get a 3D printer for the classroom, 

We are talking about schoolteachers, Maddy.

[Pamela Galli]

32 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

That said, I have seen your work and there isn't a day I don't wish my RL house was virtual. I'd be a regular customer

Well thank you! I make that stuff because I lust after it but could never afford it.

[Blush Bravin]

I'm a retired teacher, but before I retired I contemplated how could I engage my students using Second Life. As an art teacher and world cultures teacher, I wanted to find a way for my students to engage "face to face" with students from other cultures and perhaps work together to build virtual art projects in SL.

Unfortunately, my administration wouldn't even consider it because of the adult content found in SL. I even explained that as a school you can limit what students can be exposed to in SL. But that wasn't a good enough argument for them, because they felt that giving students access to something that they could eventually find on their own outside of the school setting was opening a door the administrators were not willing to open.

[Pamela Galli]

49 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

There is something to be said for object permanence

Yes sometimes I look over my store and think of the time it took to make and marvel that in the flick of a switch someday it will all be gone!

But my work as a teacher will in some small way live on. 

Edited February 13, 2019 by Pamela Galli

[RachelWales]

If students were fluent in the use of Second Life and if I were a teacher, perhaps it would be fun to do a play. They design the Sim, avatars and act in the play.

I'm not a teacher but as a parent, I would have loved to slip into some cuddly avatar and read stories to my little girls. I think we all would have gotten a kick out of it :-)

 

[RachelWales]

12 minutes ago, Blush Bravin said:

I'm a retired teacher, but before I retired I contemplated how could I engage my students using Second Life. As an art teacher and world cultures teacher, I wanted to find a way for my students to engage "face to face" with students from other cultures and perhaps work together to build virtual art projects in SL.

Unfortunately, my administration wouldn't even consider it because of the adult content found in SL. I even explained that as a school you can limit what students can be exposed to in SL. But that wasn't a good enough argument for them, because they felt that giving students access to something that they could eventually find on their own outside of the school setting was opening a door the administrators were not willing to open.

I find it a shame that "adult" content dominates to the degree it does in Second Life. I can think of a number of creative things that could be done for children of all ages. I'm not knocking the communities that engage in the various "adult" content but was appalled at someone demanding to know how old I was and actually brow beating an individual on voice because they sounded too young.

It's not a very good balance in my opinion and I think there are a lot of creative things that are being discouraged as a result. I can see a "proof of age" system being useful for "adult" Sims but it would be nice if the rest was more PG. My opinion.

[Madelaine McMasters]

33 minutes ago, Pamela Galli said:

We are talking about schoolteachers, Maddy.

Our high school has a couple 3D printers and a 3D woodworking machine (they may have more stuff since I last heard). The machines are located in the tech-ed department, where they teach classic wood, metal, and shop classes. They print and carve parts for robotics competitions. The Cedarburg (not too far away) public library has a 3D printer and volunteer led evening classes. There are hundreds of public libraries around the US with public access 3D printers.

With the shift of object creation out-world to tools like Blender, SL itself offers far less benefit as a building platform. The "Maker" movement is large and growing. Predesigned models are readily available for printing, and some young girls (one of my neighbors, at least) are finding 3D printing to be a wonderful way to make dollhouse furniture. She finds items she likes out on the internet, then downloads the files into the Cedarburg printer and comes home with a diamond in the rough. With a little sanding and painting, she's got something new for her mansion. She does wall and floor coverings on the family's laser printer. Long gone are the days of hoping a catalog will have a plan view of a rug you can cut out for your mouse house.

Even if students don't delve into the nitty-gritty of 3D design, they're gaining valuable experience with modern manufacturing ideas and making things they can show their children. There is no worry (as you express) that a flip of a switch will obliterate all evidence you were magnificently creative. I hope (and suspect) that you value the journey, so this doesn't keep you up at night.

[Selene Gregoire]

I'm with Maddy on this.

SL is "old" tech, as in 15 years old and with all the adult content, it is not an appropriate learning environment. It's easy enough to figure out how to circumvent the barriers to other areas of SL for those who are determined.

Had LL done something like have a separate adult grid to begin with (think Teen Grid)... but... they did the opposite.

 

[Pamela Galli]

30 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

Our high school has a couple 3D printers and a 3D woodworking machine (they may have more stuff since I last heard). The machines are located in the tech-ed department,

At the time I left high school teaching, there was one regular printer per hallway. (I did eventually arrange for that one printer to be moved to my classroom because Important Special Work.)  I spent a lot of time just scrounging for whiteboard markers.

[Madelaine McMasters]

1 hour ago, RachelWales said:

If students were fluent in the use of Second Life and if I were a teacher, perhaps it would be fun to do a play. They design the Sim, avatars and act in the play.

I'm not a teacher but as a parent, I would have loved to slip into some cuddly avatar and read stories to my little girls. I think we all would have gotten a kick out of it 🙂

Build a puppet theater! I had one when young, and it was great fun to inhabit the pretend characters on my hands, while Mom and Dad did the same. At the very least, get a storytelling hand puppet and have her read the stories to your little girls. I do think they'll love it. You don't need SL to wildly express your imagination.

[Selene Gregoire]

1 minute ago, Pamela Galli said:

At the time I left high school teaching, there was one regular printer per hallway. (I did eventually arrange for that one printer to be moved to my classroom because Important Special Work.)  I spent a lot of time just scrounging for whiteboard markers.

Chalk is cheaper. lol

Although blackboards may be more expensive than whiteboards by now, blackboards do last longer.

[Madelaine McMasters]

1 minute ago, Pamela Galli said:

At the time I left high school teaching, there was one regular printer per hallway. (I did eventually arrange for that one printer to be moved to my classroom because Important Special Work.)  I spent a lot of time just scrounging for whiteboard markers.

I'm in a fairly affluent semi-rural area. Budgets are tight, but the schools are reasonably well equipped. I wish the same were true for all schools. This disparity will likely exacerbate the wealth gap going forward.

[Pamela Galli]

2 minutes ago, Selene Gregoire said:

Chalk is cheaper. lol

Aka dust sticks

[Madelaine McMasters]

1 minute ago, Selene Gregoire said:

Chalk is cheaper. lol

Although blackboards may be more expensive than whiteboards by now, blackboards do last longer.

And there can be magic in drawing on a blackboard. I learned this technique from an engineering school professor, who'd learned it from the master himself...

 

[Pamela Galli]

14 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

I'm in a fairly affluent semi-rural area. Budgets are tight, but the schools are reasonably well equipped. I wish the same were true for all schools. This disparity will likely exacerbate the wealth gap going forward.

 

12 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

And there can be magic in drawing on a blackboard. I learned this technique from an engineering school professor, who'd learned it from the master himself...

 

That’s what yellow markers are for.

And I bet he doesn’t have to clean his own chalkboards.