SL-NET's First Professional Development Session

On Friday, SL-NET held its first professional development activity. Shaun and the other committee members did a great job pulling it together. CDB Barkley and Max Chatnoir talked about what educators are currently doing in Secondlife. At one point, we had about 35 "people" present.

There are more pictures available at the SL-NET website.

Blog vs. Wiki

Since last January, I've been using a blog for my classes at Red Rocks Community College. I post what we've done in class, so the students don't have to try to get in touch with me if they miss class or forget. I also have links for each class.

It finally occurred to me this week that a wiki might suit my needs better, so I've started one at PBwiki, though I don't have anything in it yet.

I guess it seemed logical to use a blog because I was making regular chronological posts about the classes. However, the students aren't commenting on the posts--at least no one has to date--so I don't really need that feature. Another problem with the blog is that during times when I'm not teaching a particular I can't save the related links in the sidebar except by leaving that element on the page. In the wiki, I can just hide (or not link to) a page I don't need during a semester, but the content is still there. With the wiki, I can also embed a widget from Box.net for the folder with the files for the class rather than just linking to the page.

Too Little Too Late for Wikipedia

I just read in a post on the Socialtext blog about an article in the Telegraph, which states that Wikipedia "is to stop people from editing entries after a series of questionable updates cast a shadow over its accuracy and reliability." Does anyone really believe that Wikipedia has ever been accurate and reliable? This is certainly a case of too little too late. I won't let my students cite an article from Wikipedia in any papers they submit. I know of some faculty members who require their students to use Wikipedia but only to demonstrate how inaccuate and unreliable it is.

Citizendium, an encyclopedia project that aims "at credibility and quality, not just quantity," and Scholarpedia, a "free peer reviewed encyclopedia written by scholars from all around the world" are already traveling on the path that Wikipedia seems to want to take.

Article on Naming of Ship

This week's issue of the Metaverse Messenger has an article (starting on p. 22) about the christening of the Gloriana on Renaissance Island on August 18. I was mentioned and pictured in the article because I submitted the name that was chosen for the ship in the contest.

More on Ning

As I mentioned before, I'm using a Ning social network for my hybrid technical writing class at Red Rocks. Each week the students have to do an online assignment, most of which will be in site, where they can post in forums or on their own blogs.

Their first assignment was to join the site, post an introduction, and respond two at least two other people's instroductions.

In class yesterday, we talked about tools for technical writing, primarily rhetoric and technology. Here is their second assignment, to be done this week:

On the web, find a free or trial version of a software program or web-based service that may be used for creating documents, communicating, and/or collaborating (as discussed in Chapter 3 of the textbook). Test the program or service. On your "My Page" create a blog entry in which you tell where you found it (be sure to include a working link to the website), explain what it does, and discuss its strengths and weaknesses. Use the name of the program or service as the title of your blog post.

I've also joined another Ning social network. This one is called College 2.0, and it's for people in higher ed who are interested in online education and Web 2.0.

This Is SOOOO Cool!

TouchGraph Google Browser (also available for Amazon.com and Facebook) shows connections between websites listed in Google's database. You can graph connections based on URLs or keywords. Here's part of the graph I got when I put in "instructional technology" with the quotation marks. I focused on the section with CU-Denver bcause that's where I'm taking an instructional technology class.

I read about it on TechCrunch.

Also posted at Issues and Trends in IDT.

Sad but True

According to an article linked at Ray Schroeder's Educational Technology News blog, "University students may be encouraged to be critical but they don't seem to question Google's ranking system, according to a recent study published in the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication."

This is disheartening but hardly surprising considering that people are using the word google as a verb to mean "using a search engine to search the web." I cringe every time I hear someone use it that way.

As I understand it, Google ranks results based on popularity: how many people click on the link and how many other pages link to it. Popularity does not equal relevance.

Also posted at Issues and Trends in IDT.

Top 100 Tools for Learning?

The Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies has prepared a list of the "Top 100 Tools for Learning" based on responses from 109 "learning professionals." I ran across the list while I was searching for references to AECT and Second Life together and got a hit that took me to the Centre's page for Second Life. I was excited until I looked at it more carefully.

It's hard to take the list seriously when Tool #4 with 37 mentions is Google's search engine. The next "search engine" listed is Dogpile (#98), which is a metasearch engine or metacrawler not a regular search engine, anyway.

Ask.com and Exalead are much better search engines than Google, but I always advise my students to use metacrawlers (like Dogpile, Kartoo, Clusty, and Ixquick) or directories instead. They get much more relevant results that way.

Also posted at Issues and Trends in IDT.

Controversy Close to Home

One of the first people I met in Second Life was Jeff Corbin (his name in real life), a research associate in physics and astronomy at DU. He has built the Science School in Second Life, which DU will be using for classes.

Andy Guess, in an article titled "In Second Life, There's No Fallout" at InsideHigherEd.com, describes Jeff's Island: "Science School is nestled behind a three-dimensional, real-time weather map with pixellated clouds hovering above the ground, near a telescope that can be used to view constellations during the winter, when its real-life counterpart at the University of Denver is inaccessible due to snow-covered mountain roads."

With grant money from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Robert C. Amme, a professor of physics at DU, and some colleagues are going to build a nuclear reactor in Second Life as part of a master's program "in applied science with an emphasis on environmental impact assessment that will feature classes held in Second Life."

The comments on the article indicate what we face in using this technology (Second Life and other MUVEs) for educational purposes.

Educational Uses of Second Life

I saw this video at http://elearndev.blogspot.com/ and thought it did a good job of presenting Second Life's educational potential. It also showed the Globe Theatre on Renaissance Island, where I "live" in SL.

Ning in Education

I've been really impressed with Ning social networks since I started using one for Sloan-C SL-NET. The primary advantages over Blackboard or Moodle are its public visibility, the ability of members to start forums and form groups, and the accessibility of RSS feeds. I'm using a Ning site for a hybrid technical writing class I'm teaching this fall. (It's private for the obvious reasons.) I've also joined a social network for educators who are using Ning in education.

New Blog for IT 6750

For the class I'm taking, IT 6750, each student has to have a blog (or a blog page) dedicated to the class. I've created one titled Issues and Trends in IDT (i.e., instructional design and technology) at http://itidt.blogspot.com/. My plan is to copy any interesting posts to this blog, too.

Gloriana

The ship on Renaissance Island has been completed. The managers held a contest to name it. I submitted three entries, and one of them was the winner: Gloriana. The other two names I suggested were Ariel and The Golden Dragon.

Sloan-C SL-NET First Activity

SL-NET had our first activity Friday night, a dance party at the Sloan-C site in Second Life. The picture gives a good idea of the set up and shows one of the avatars the chair of the Social Networking Committee wore during the evening.

IT 6750

I've registered for IT 6750, Current Trends and Issues in Instructional Technology, at CU-Denver this fall. It will be taught as a hybrid class. Here's the description: "Seminar examining definitions, history and current trends and issues in the practice of instructional technology. (Topics vary.)"

I'm looking forward to it. It's starts this Tuesday evening, which is coming up fast.

Progress with Sloan-C SL-NET

After the meeting on Aug. 3, it was clear that some people were interested in organizing groups based on topics of mutual interest in addition to committees for organizing events.

It seemed logical, then, to divide groups within SL-NET into two categories: committees, which are responsible for organizing and facilitating the group and its activities, and research or study groups, which people can set up to pursue their interests.

We have three committees already:

• Social Networking--to plan and organize strictly social activities
• Professional Development--to plan and organize discussions, classes, etc., related to the use of technology in higher education
• SL Skills Workshops (name TBD)--to plan and organize workshops to train members in SL skills like building, scripting, and so on

I'd like to have one more committee that would be responsible for communication, outreach, scheduling, etc.

At the meeting a lot of people were interested in a group to research effective practices. I expect to see some interesting things come from them.

As a result of the meeting, it was also evident that we needed some way of facilitating our organization and discussion in real life beyond the mailing list. It was suggested that we use Moodle forums on the Sloan-C web site, but another member of the group recommended that we look at a Ning social network. The Ning network has advantages over Moodle because it's publicly visible, and members can create their own groups and forums as well as customizing individual pages.

Because a couple of people had trouble with the SL-NET social network the day I set it up, we're doing a "beta test" by anyone who is interested to see if it there are any problems using it. So far, it seems to be okay.

As of this morning, we have 30 people in the Ning-based social network, 44 in the SL-NET group in SL, and 67 in the mailing list. I expect that we will be using the social network, and I'd like to move all discussions to it, leaving the mailing list for announcing events and any urgent situations like the one Friday where a member of the group was doing a presentation on SL and education to a group of legislators in the afternoon and requested suggestions for sites in SL to show them.

SL-NET Communication

To facilitate communication within SL-NET and with people outside it, I set up a mailing list hosted by FreeLists, started an SL-NET group in Second Life, and created a Google calendar for scheduling our events.

Anyone can subscribe to the mailing list by sending an email to sl-net-request@freelists.org with 'subscribe' in the Subject field.

Someone can join the SL-NET group in Second Life by using the Search function to find the group, and then clicking on the Join button.

The Google calendar is public. Anyone interested in our events may open it in a browser or subscribe to the feed.

We're also looking into ways to provide forums for RL discussion.

SL-NET Meetings

I think both meetings of SL-NET (Second Life - Networking Education and Technology) this last week went pretty well. I took the snapshot at the brainstorming session Wednesday night. People had a chance to meet and discuss topics of interest. One thing that came out of the meetings was an enthusiastic group of members interested in effective practices using SL and other technology. I hope to see some interesting things come from them.

Nearly twice as many people as I expected showed up for the organizing committee meeting on Friday. I think we got a lot done, but it's really hit home how different holding a meeting is in SL compared to RL. I'm waiting for reports from some of the committee chairs before I send out a report.

I wasn't able to take any snapshots at the meeting Friday. However, Topher Zwiers did, and he's posted about the meeting on his blog. There's a link to more pictures near the end of his post.

Sloan-C SL Activities: Committee Meeting Date and Time

Based on the responses I received, I’ve decided to hold the organizing committee meeting on Fri., Aug. 3, and a preliminary brainstorming session on Wed., Aug. 1.

Location

Both sessions will be held at the Sloan-C SL site (Teaching 48, 213, 22). Here’s the SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Teaching/48/213/22 .

Committee Meeting

The committee meeting will be held on Fri., Aug. 3, at 12 noon SLT/PDT (1 p.m. MDT, 2 p.m. CDT, 3 p.m. EDT). I plan to end the meeting after one hour.

At this meeting, I hope we can determine what type(s) of events to hold and when to hold them, schedule the first one or two events, and plan for others. If enough people are willing to help with the organizing and there is enough interest in different types of activities, we may form subcommittees to streamline the organizing process. We will also schedule the next committee meeting(s).

Brainstorming Session

People who can’t (or can) attend the committee meeting on Fri., can stop by to see me, and anyone else who’s there, to discuss any ideas on Wed., Aug.1 between 6 p.m. SLT/PDT (7 p.m. MDT, 8 p.m. CDT, 9 p.m. EDT) and 7 p.m. If enough people come, we can hold an informal brainstorming session.

Voice Chat in SL

As he related in his own blog, KJ Hax and I spent some time play with the newly enabled voice chat last night at ISTE HQ in SL. It worked quite well. I had assumed that there would be a 20-meter limit, but after some experimentation, we discovered that we could hear each other 80 meters away.

I also gave KJ some voice gestures that I originally got from Milos Lundquist of Sloan-C.

It is nice to hear other people's real voices, but this will make it harder to eat when in SL. ;)