SL Continues

This past week I worked on the following:

• Created notecards on the following: Taking a Snapshot, Camera Control, Communicating with Chat, Chat History, and Instant Message. I dropped these into Zaia's eOwens' inventory. I used Rezed.org's curriculum guides, which I learned about at the SL Convention. I personalized them for our purposes. I also created one on Inviting Friends, but I haven't dropped this one yet.
• Talked with Mark about the YouTube videos for Owens' ads. He will work with AC on converting these files so we can work with them in SL.
• Purchased a YouTube video viewer, but I'm having difficulty with it. One problem is that I don't have rights (or permissions) on our Island, and that seems to be a problem with using this viewer.
• Continued to teleport to various islands to learn what is available.
• Continued to read daily the SLED Educators Digest and the Slrl Digest (research). Oftentimes, these have some valuable information and resources. Thanks to Delicious, I can tag any of these resources and access them from any computer. This is a great program.
• Ordered and received the following books, which I learned about from attending the SL Convention: The Wisdom of Crowds, Here Comes Everybody, and The Tipping Point.
• Attended the GTAC-ASTD monthly meeting on the "10 M's of Engagement." Interesting information was shared. Plus, I was interested in learning if any of the members have used Second Life and while I didn't talk with everyone, those I did seemed to know about SL but not using it. Since ASTD has an island, I thought some would know about it. Additionally, there were quite a few trainers at the SL Convention so I wondered if anything was being done with SL in our area.
• Continued to perfect my SL PowerPoint Presentation "A Second Life Primer."
  

This week I plan to attend some workshops in SL. Still looking for a good one on role playing. Plus, I have a lot of research to do.

Second Life (SL) Continues

This past week I sorted through my notes from the SL convention. Trying to organize so they will be useful later.

• In Second Life, I visited the Manpower Island and talked with a staff member and a coordinator. At this time, they don't have any opportunities for administrative assistants, but they believe this will change. They have a nice orientation overview--easy to read and navigate but little hands-on. I believe it would be effective for students to review. Plus, they have laptops with stools, and the avatar sits on a stool and learns about topics such as Positions in SL, Interviewing in SL, and I think this would be valuable for students to review in the OAD260 class.

• I teleported to Microsoft's Island, but it's not always available to outsiders. What I do like is the workshop/training sessions the Microsoft Users Group conducts in SL. For example, this past week it was on MailMerge in Word. Again, a good training session for students in OAD260.
  

• I teleported to Mill Pond and talked with a colleague from another two-year Ohio school. We've been friends for awhile. He plans to use SL for his economics class, but the only problem is his college doesn't have an island. SL is a great tool for economics with the LindeX and trading.

• I attended a Basic Scripting workshop this week at the Human Resource Island. While I am not a programmer, at least I understand some of what has to happen to make SL work.

• I met with Ruth, and she provided an overview of our College's Island and its future as far as she knows. The College is planning an SL Island Open House sometime in November, and she asked if I would participate. Of course, I will. I'm working on some content for orientation. This upcoming week I'll work on "taking a snapshot." I'll create a notecard and put it in her inventory. Will contribute another topic, but I'm not sure what topic yet.
  

• Flying. I perfected this skill this past week.
  

• I also contacted our Public Relations Dept. to acquire the fall advertisements. We thought these videos would be great to include in our Island. These ads will be updated this month, and then we'll use the udpated ones. In the meantime, Ruth can work with what she receives to see how they can best be incorporated on our Island.

• Finally, I started a PowerPoint presentation. I think I'll call it "A Second Life Primer." When I tell people I'm working in Second Life, they all ask the same questions? What is it? How long has it been around? Who owns it? So I'm including this information in my PPT.

As time progresses, I see more application in OAD260, Administrative Office Management, and OAD270, Presentation Management. Not so sure about internship opportunities especially since "internship" usually designates "no pay," and our students are paid in their cooperative experience course. I've contacted one individual who, I understand, has a successful internship program in SL. I haven't heard back from her yet.

Looking forward to the upcoming League's CIT conference as there are quite a few SL presentations. Also, I hope to connect with someone at OBTA who might want to collaborate in SL.

Another week forges ahead!

SL Convention in Tampa - Update

This past week my activities included attending the Second Life Convention in Tampa, FL, along with participating in a Sloan workshop entitled “Introduction to Second Life.” The best thing about the SL convention is I didn’t have to explain what “second life” is to anyone. It was difficult to get use to introducing myself by my avatar’s name, Susie, Felisimo, which was on my nametag. Some eye openers:

• A lot of corporate trainers attended who are involved in SL. IBM has 48 islands.
• I networked with one individual about internship opportunities. I have some work to do here.
• Some colleges and libraries are doing some awesome education in SL.
• It’s very profound and on the cutting edge.
• Not your typical business education type conference.
• I saw one walking around with a furry tail who was probably replicating his “furry” avatar.
• So many new businesses have begun as a result of SL such as Avatrian, a Second Life development shop and metaverse consulting firm.
• Saw some of my Ohio friends and attended some of their presentations.
• Attendees represented all generations. This surprised me as I didn’t think I would see many Baby Boomers, but there were a lot of us. Probably a fair split on gender.
• Enjoyed hearing Philip Rosedale (Philip Linden), the founder of Linden Labs. He gave a keynote presentation.
• Enjoyed Intellagirl’s keynote on The Promise based on Clay Shirkey’s Here Comes Everybody. Intellagirl presented at the Stark State workshop I attended this past January. I plan to read this book.
• Attended two presentations about two new virtual colleges offering training and education: Rockcliffe University and Insight Virtual College.
• I didn’t meet anyone in the field of office administration. I’m sure I was the “loner.” Many were in the arts and sciences area, health area, and some in computer science. I did connect with an individual from Florida teaching in the computer information area.
• An SL Certification program is in the development stages.
• At Teachers College of Columbia University, they provide cubical spaces for students on their island and use the following: in-world discussions, group and individual visits, guided tours, group work, and assigned individual and group work. They ask their students to take a snapshot of their Avatar and RL person, scale them, make a frame, apply to a texture, mount it on the wall—Class of 09! I like this idea.
• The importance of ethical digital citizenship was addressed in many sessions along with Terms of Service, and Code of Conduct. It was recommended that College’s should revise their Student Code of Conduct to include Second Life.
  

Then I spent time participating in the in Sloan Workshop. I completed a lot of the forums prior to leaving for the SL convention. I was able to attend the final in-world session on Thursday, but I really didn’t find it that valuable. I think it’s because I did this in the four-week class I took. This course really was for “noobs.” I’m a little beyond that. I do like the information the facilitators provided regarding scavenger hunts along with how they ran the course. We used Moodle, which I’d never used before. I don’t think it’s as user-friendly as Blackboard.

This week, I’m back to attending some workshops in SL and typing my convention notes along with researching websites and other information I received at the convention.

Intro to SL - Begins Today

I have a lot going on in the SL world. Today I started “Introduction to Second Life for Educators, a course conducted through The Sloan Consortium and offered to us "free" through OLN. It runs through September 12. The CMS is Moodle so that's a new tool for me to use. I've started responding to the forums and teleporting to some of the slurls and taking my photo at these places. It looks like there are some great resources available, and the facilitators have been involved in SL for a few years. Unfortunately, since I'm attending the SL Convention and staying in Florida a little longer, I won't be able to attend all the live sessions. Taking an online course is time consuming. I've spent about three hours today on this course so far. I'm also meeting some new AVs through this course.

More Free SL Workshops and Other Activities

This week (through Saturday) I continued attending free workshops in Second Life. I attended the following:

• NCI’s Prim Skirt Class, and I made a skirt. I was more interested in learning how to build, and I learned terms such as flex prim, root prim, etc.
• Building Basics Class where I continued to learn about building, rezzing, etc.
• Building for Beginners just another variation of building.
• Animation Override Class where I was unsuccessful in creating my overrides. I may need to attend this class again.
• ASTD Member’s Discussion on the ASTD Island. I entered into a discussion with other ASTD members about Second Life. I learned quite a bit about organizations that have a virtual presence in SL, and some of the members are involved in training. I can see that in OAD260, this could be a great site for the training and orientation topics.
• Interactive Role Playing, and in this class I learned about three types in SL: Interactive, Narrative, Expressive. We discussed the importance of gestures and learned how to create gestures. This information was very valuable. We did not actually role play.
• NCI Skills Starting a Business in SL, and I didn't find this class as valuable as I thought I would. More discussion was on the properties of items you might sell. To start a busines in SL, you need to do the same things you would do in RL: need a business plan. I did learn about www.gimp.org and www.paint.net as alternative free programs for Photoshop.
  
• GQ Communications in SL. This class was excellent because we talked about the various communiation tools: text chat, IM, voice chat and all the associated settings for these. Our instructor said we should use the name of the person we are talking to--especially in a crowd. IM is used for "out of character" communication and it is limited to 1023 characters. Plus, only 100 offine IMs can be recorded. IM is good to us when AVs are outside of the immediate area. Also, she mentioned the importance of reading any notecards for items because these notecards tell us how to communicate with the item.

Some of these classes move very, very quickly, and they use text chat so you are reading quickly and trying to open windows and do the activities at the same time. I consider myself to be a “quick” learner, but sometimes I find them challenging. At least with text chat, there is a written log for reference.

I really like attending the classes because the instructors do give notecards, objects, etc. that we can use later. Sometimes they are just freebies. In return, I tip these instructors in Linden Dollars. Oftentimes, there is a tip jar “appreciated but not necessary.” I also like attending them because I learn other things. I’m gradually learning the shortcut language for text chat such as afk, ty, np, tp, lmd. I do have difficulty using these instead of writing out the entire word since I am an old “English” major. When I don't know what they are saying, I ask!

Plus, I meet new AVs, and we become "friends." These people can become valuable resources. That means we can contact one another in SL. I met Parrot, a virtual entrepreneur, who talked with me about how she is looking for SL interns in web design and marketing. We talked about how I might investigate opportunities for students in SL as interns. The only problem is these would be “non-paid” positions. She suggested I begin contacting the CEO’s at the SL organizations such as IBM, Manpower, Sun Microsystems, Circuit City, etc. So I believe I will investigate these.

Along with these activities, on a daily basis I review the OLN Resource of the Day, and the Educator’s Digest, which is a compilation of the SLED Listserv.

I also purchased Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson (1992), which is really one of the first novels about the Metaverse. I plan to begin reading this book.

I’m looking forward to the upcoming Second Life convention in Tampa.

Managing a Class in Second Life - Final Class

My final class was Monday, and I am really glad I registered for this class. I’ve formed some SL friendships and have a great resource in Brian, our instructor.

We reviewed and teleported to the Music Academy Online where we listened to a guest speaker, Stacey Fox from KU, who is a classically trained musician and techie. Plus, they were tapping a live show for SLCN-TV with composer Amen Bhatia. Yes, Google him, and you will learn he is well received in SL and RL. The interview format was conducted by the CEO of Music Academy Online. Music Academy Online is associated with KU. Stacey provided these tips for acceptance of SL especially with higher administration at your institution. Next to each tip, I’ve provided my ideas for using SL in the OAD program.

• Show quality and promotional use of SL: OAD recruitment piece available for potential students and employers
• Show international component: OAD140 has an international project. OAD260 could address the international component because we discuss the global environment.
• Emphasize the presence of Reuters news: OAD260 current events
• Have a virtual party at end of semester: I like this idea for any class using SL
• Leave activities for students to accomplish between classes: this is just homework but I believe it must be focused.
• Do you take attendance? Stacey states she conducts a couple classes face-to-face and listens to the sound of their voices. Then when she does an audio roll call, this dissuades anyone from having someone else log in for them.
• Conduct interviews because many organizations have a presence in SL: OAD260 portfolio project could find these organizations such as Manpower, IBM, Best Buy, etc.
• Have a usage policy for SL that students sign: Most likely current student code of conduct and computer Acceptable Use Policy would apply. However, there is a session at the upcoming SL conference about the syllabus, etc. Verbiage needs to be included about SL in the class syllabus.

Brian's suggestions:

• He shared the Salamander HUD with us and recommended sloog.org. This helps to tag locations. He gives this to his students.
• Survey: Brian distributes a short survey to all his students and then after they complete it he gives them their first allowance. We received $50 Lindens. I think this is a good idea. The survey is similar to the one-minute assessments from Angelo and Cross. Some additional tips from Brian who stated SL is like “organized chaos” at times.
• After students create their Avatar, Brian asks them to write why they made the choices regarding their Avatar, has them take a photo and send to him.
• Next, he assigns an exploration activity in SL.
• Students create a personal blog during the course. Brian communicates a lot using the blog—giving assignments and milestone activities. He mentioned that you can add reference tags on the course blog that will open the students’ blogs. This makes it easier to review the students’ blogs without keying individual urls.
• Backup plan when SL down. There are many free video conferencing options (Brian will share). His college uses Adobe Connect (there is a fee for this one). I attended a session at the League’s CIT last November on Adobe Connect, and I recall it’s expensive. He informs his students when they can’t get into SL to check their e-mail because he will notify them and post an announcement. Not that this happens a lot, but one needs a backup plan when class meets one day a week.

Brian said we are welcome to observe his classes this semester: 8:00 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. T H (Central) and 6:00 p.m. and 8:45 p.m. (Central) T. The evening class won’t be in SL until a couple weeks yet. I plan to do this. Plus, our class blog will continue as long as people are contributing. There are some great ideas and slurls provided in this blog that I plan to use. Great class for $150!

More Workshops in SL - Free!

I’m continuing my education in SL for my sabbatical leave. Today I attended two free workshops in Second Life each 1 hour long: How to Skydive in SL & Inventory Control—both conducted with text chat. The advantage of text chat is having the text log for reference. You can copy/paste into a Word document. However, I do like interacting with Voice—of course, if you know me you know why that is true!

Below are the descriptions:

How to Skydive: Want to learn how to skydive in SL? It’s the most fun you can have with your clothes on! Skydiving is one of SL resident's choice past times! Come join me and learn how to read altitude in SL, operate a free parachute for you to keep, operate skypods, target basics and some FUN places in SL to skydive!

Inventory Control: Almost everybody in Second Life has an out of control inventory. Join us for some advice and a look at some of the products available to help you tame the inventory beast.

One of the best things about attending these free workshops is meeting new Avatars and offering friendships. They are very friendly, and the instructors give you freebies. I now have a parachute for skydiving. Why skydive? To get somewhere quickly or just for the fun of it. I would never try it in RL. I learned a lot of valuable information about inventory control. I decided I should tip these instructors since they don’t charge for the classes. I gave them each 5 Lindens.

Wow! I just can’t believe all that is offered in SL. Until another day of learning. . .