Filters

[NerdLibrarian]

Is there a way to restrict my students to a few pre-selected destinations? Or is there a school-friendly setting. This site has educational potential, but I've seen some pretty inappropriate stuff so far. 

[Rolig Loon]

No, there really isn't unless your students are all under the age of 16 and therefore only allowed in SL under supervision of a sponsoring organization.  In that case, they can only log in to a specific region and are not allowed to teleport to any other locations or have access to resources or individuals outside the protected area.  Read at http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Teens_in_Second_Life . 

Residents over 16 and under the age of 18 are not allowed to access Adult regions of SL or Adult content in Marketplace or Search, but may access Moderate content.  You cannot decide for them that some Moderate content is more moderate than others.

All other residents in SL are assumed to be "adults" and therefore capable of making their own moral judgments.

[Syo Emerald]

Inappropriate stuff? You let it sound like whatever you saw shouldn't be here. I tell you its perfectly fine here. This virtual world (its not a website, so...yeah...site doesn't cut it) is a place mainly visited by adults and used for a varity of exploring and entertainment...and yes of course some of that is not meant for children.

The first question would be: How old are your students?

If they are younger than 16, they aren't even allowed to have a regular account and could only acess SL if their school provides a specific sim. I'm not really familiar with this, so you may need to do a little research on that.

If your students are 16-17 years old (and don't lie during account creation) they are automatically restricted to G rated land, which will probably provide the school-friendly setting you are looking for. (More or less of course, interactions with strangers can't be 100% controlled of course).

But if they are 18 or older there is really no way to filter content, other than using Second Life only in a classroom setting with monitoring what everyone is doing.

[Lindal Kidd]

Educators have another option besides Second Life.  You can use the free OpenSim software to set up one or more Second-Life-like regions on a dedicated computer or server, and then let your students access that.

While this prevents students from accessing SL content that may be inappropriate for a classroom setting, there are some drawbacks as well.  See my blog post, "Second Life for Educators."