ISTE Speaker Series Session Coming Up!

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As promised, here’s the details of the event I’m doing for ISTE in Second Life next week. Hopefully lots of our jokaydia Community Members will be able to attend! Check your local time here.

Education on the Islands of jokaydia in Second Life with jokay Wollongong

Tuesday, January 29, 6 PM SLT, ISTE Speaker Series Session

Jo Kay aka jokay Wollongong will share information about the various projects she is involved with in Second Life, including the Islands of jokaydia, where she is supporting a growing community of educators and artists in Second Life who are exploring various strategies for the use of virtual worlds in their practice. She will also talk about the incredibly comprehensive SLeducation Wiki which documents educational uses of Second Life and is recognized as one of the most valuable resources available for educators exploring virtual worlds.

The event will commence at 6pm SLT on 1/29 at the ISTE Beach/Campfire Ring area where Jo Kay will facilitate a brief introduction and a question and answer session. This will be followed by a field trip to the Islands of jokaydia where participants will have the opportunity to explore the Islands and also meet some of the jokaydia Community members who are working there.

For more information about ISTE events in Second Life visit their wiki.

NMC TeacherBuzz in Wasp!

Sean and I just had the pleasure of hosting a session for the NMC’s TeacherBuzz meetup this evening, and had the opportunity to share our work with a group of educators also working in and exploring Second Life.

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The NMC TeacherBuzz is a…“regularly scheduled, informal discussion session for practicing teachers using Second Life, or those just plain interested in the idea or process of using SL for a class. Not a series of lectures or presentations, we envision more of a relaxed coffee hour to share the “buzz”.”

For more info on their activities, check out the TeacherBuzz Category on the NMC Campus Observer.

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We took the participants on a tour of our Virtual Meeting Space in Wasp, showcasing our newbies’ resources, our Educational Uses of Second Life resource and the other support materials we have developed to assist teachers who are checking out Second Life for the first time. Of course - all the info is on our Second Life in Education Wiki.

We finished the tour with a visit to our virtual hairdressing salon - which is an example of how Second Life photostories and roleplays can be used in vocational training.

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Thanks to all who attended, and to CDB and Corwin for inviting us to host the event! ;)

Next TeacherBuzz Session: Aug 20 6pm SLT/PDT - “Student Built” Project: Timeline of the History of Earth and Life on Earth Walking Exhibit, created at University of Arizona.

Definitely well worth attending if you’re interested in meeting other educators in SL and learning more about the work the educational community is doing.

(Thanks to Sean FitzGerald for the images from the event!)

Busy in Real Life & Second Life!

It’s been a busy month, both in Second Life and in the real world… but I haven’t forgotten this blog! ;) Time to catch up on a few things - including some stuff that I really should have linked to weeks ago!

eNetworks and the Australasian Second Life Showcase

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We delivered 2 presentations presentations for the Australian Flexible Learning Framework’s E-Learning Network’s e-Trends Online Conference. Check out the proceedings and recordings on the conference website - including Sean’s fantastic presentation on Virtual Worlds which you can listen to here (recorded Elluminate session).

We also presented an In-world Event: Showcasing Australasian Educational Projects in Second Life - which was a hoot. Representatives from a range of educational projects came and shared their ideas and expertise and we have a great crowd of educators with us at the event. Sean’s written a great blog post about the event here, and also done a great job of putting together the event documentation. View the slides from the event below:

The slides can also be viewed in-world at Jo and Sean’s Virtual Meeting Space: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Wasp/74/31/86/

The generosity of our presenters was amazing and I think the crowd enjoyed hearing about the projects they are working on. It was certainly a thrill to ‘max out our sim’ with 40 participants at our space in Wasp for much of the event. A great learning curve for us too - which has given me lots of ideas about how we can explore running mixed-reality events and conferences in Second Life.

Relaxing at the Learnscope Lounge

Yesterday we held the first of two workshops for NSW LearnScope - focussed on helping people find their feet and get started in Second Life.

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The sessions went well I think, and we managed to move a group of 15 newbies around to a few spaces in Second Life including our space in Second Life - Jo and Sean’s Virtual Meeting Space, Terra Incognita (SLurl) - Decka Mah’s fantastic action learning Island, the Heart Murmur Sim (SLurl) - where we saw a great example fo training in Second Life and Prim Hearts Amusement Park (SLurl) - which has some fantastic rides.

As part of supporting these events, I’ve established the LearnScope Lounge in-world.

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It provides a base for the participants from our workshops to use during their explorations. The Lounge is an example of how easy it is to setup a simple space the group to use as a meeting point, and includes a bunch of tools and resources including notecards for newbies, our slides and resources and some examples of cool tools including Angrybeth’s Whiteboards, a Podcaster and free virtual Learnscope t-shirts (Virtual Schwag!)

All NSW LearnScope particpants are welcome to visit and use the resources. I’ll be maintaining the space until the end of August. Visit @ http://slurl.com/secondlife/Wasp/10/90/89.

An Island?…..

In the last month or so we’ve been busily working on some new plans in-world…. including exploring options for purchasing and establishing our very own virtual Island. I can’t decide what to call it though….. Suggestions in the comments greatly appreciated! ;)

I’ll reveal more in the very near future, and am excited by the prospect of a new challenge in Second Life - planning and implementing my very own Island is an exciting prospect! I’m especially interested in developing some more extensive orientation resources for our participants in-world, as well as spaces for arts, community and educational projects.

Coming Up…

The next few weeks are likely to be busy too - with Session 2 of our Getting Started in Second Life workshops for NSW Learnscope Team Members, a session for the NMC TeacherBuzz group, an eNetworks 2007 Tour, a Knowledge Tree podcast and the kick-off of the Sydney Institute’s Second Life project…… so I better get back to work! ;)

Checking Out Virtual Books!

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Pandora Kurrajong came to visit me in Second Life today for a tour. She and Gnu Curry joined me as we visited some interesting spaces including the Island of Svarga (SLurl) and the ICT Library (SLurl) on Info Island.

Here we are checking out some virtual books at our Virtual Meeting Space in Wasp (SLurl).

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