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Welcome to Episode 9 of e-learning insights.

There are those who hail Second Life as a brave new world of possibilities. Others see just another multiplayer game, and others still, see a haven for those who really need a first life.

However, over the past few years there is a growing list of educators and librarians who have seen Second Life as a tool for bridging distances in ways that forums and online conferences just can't deliver.

In this episode we will talk to two of those educators. Lindy McKeown, otherwise known as Decka Mah in Second Life, is a PhD candidate and educator. Lindy created Decka, and her island Terra Incognita, as a way to to extend her face to face work in action learning to a distance learning audience.

Lindy: Kerry I have been using computers in education for about 26 years, and for much of that time, conduction teacher professional development in the use of IT.

I have done that either as a volunteer through professional organisations, or mostly as my day job.
I have worked with everyone from local teachers to international audiences.

What I have found was one of the most effective methods for changing peoples' practice was the use of a program called action learning. This was a method of teaching that was extended over time. I started using that in face to face, but I do a lot of work online. When I started using the internet in 1994 I realised that this was the time to take some of the professional development I had been doing face to face online, because people who were connected to the internet could get access, where they couldn't get access in the past to face to face things.

Kerry: What is action learning exactly? Is it what it sounds like? You just basically dive in and experiment?

Lindy: Its a specific teaching methodology that uses a cyclic process of exploration, then making a plan of action that relates to your own workplace, implementing that plan and then reflecting on it, and working through that cycle.

It happens over a long period of time usually. Action learning programs are usually 3 to 6 months in duration, and that's why its effective in changing peoples' practice. As they implement technology, they get time to learn the new skills, time to practice them, time to make informed decisions on how to get it to work in their own context. They put it into practice and reflect on it in a social group with their colleagues. So that process lets you really embed technology into your practice, rather than sending people off to one off training that they rarely implement.

Kerry: What made you decide to go with Second Life for your project?

Lindy: I had to get a program that would allow me to rapidly prototype an environment and then also to change it underneath us as we were using it because of the methodology I was using which is a design based participatory action learning model in itself.
So I looked at the various game engines and looked at my budget and Second Life would let me develop it myself on a very low budget but still had the kind of power that you would find in a sophisticated game engine.

Kerry: So Second Life isn't the focus of your study as much as it is a reasonable a platform for action learning then.

Lindy: Absolutely. The focus of the study is What are the social and technical possibilities of using a 3d environment for action learning. So the study is about the methodology of action learning in an online mode, and how you can use 3d environments to enhance that, because action learning is a very social learning experience.
It needs good social presence for the participants to develop deep relationships where they can share their failures as well as their successes.
I tried various learning management systems and web2 tools but was always disappointed with the level of relationship and the depth of learning that people were getting and high dropout rate.

Kerry: So how many people are involved in your study and what can you tell us about them?

Lindy: Well currently we have a cohort of people going through that vary in their expertise in the use of 3d
and also are a very diverse group from all sorts of different organisations. But I have also done a previous study in another environment called Active World. Where we had a group of post graduate university students at Applachia?? State University and we specifically built it for action learning as well.

But the current group includes academics at universities, classroom teachers in secondary schools, professional association representatives who are looking at how they could use this environment to provide better services to members and to enhance meetings across their spread chapter groups across their State, we've got the people from education.au. So its a very diverse group and that's another powerful quality of action learning. People in quite different contexts can work together on the same topic and they can help each other learn.

Kerry: What sorts of acticities are people getting involved in?

Each person has to select a workplace project and we then run our content delivery which we call core learnings or electives to support the learning that relates to that project. So our theme is Using 3d in education so we have had people explore second life looking through the search engines to find educational tools, locations, buildings and organisations and going out and finding the facts about how they are used in Second Life and bringing back photographs. And what we have done with the photographs and the notes people have made is we have made an education gallery that then becomes a resource for other people to explore Second Life education uses.

So we have used the activity to build a resource that's a physical building. In doing that the group has immersed in education in Second Life as participants. So its not a delivery strategy, I did not run a session where I said this is how education happens in Second Life, they had to actively seek it using the tools in Second Life and then produce the materials that became a 3d object.

Kerry: So how long will your study run and what will happen to your island once your study is finished.

Lindy: The study is a 3 year project although the Second Life component of it only started in December. We actually built the entire island in just 4 weeks.
I did that with the help of a volunteer who someone I just happened to meet at a tutorial, and he wanted to learn how to build. I needed a builder and had the island and so we became a team. And that philosophy of collaborative construction of Terra has continued on. And I mentioned that I might have to decommission the island while I wrote my thesis and the big community that is now the Terra Incognita community were in uproar and immediately banded together to work out ways that we could make money to keep the island going. But now, I have spent more time and I have had so much interest from organisations like IBM and Xerox and international groups who are interested in using learning spaces for their organisations. I realise that I think that Terra will continue and become a business full time for me.

Kerry: Meanwhile on another island, just to the left of the huge pink flamingo, another educator is busy getting her section of Second Life in order.

Meet Jo Kay Wollongong. Jo Kay in first life. Jo is a resource development officer both at TAFE in the Illawarra and in Second Life. A professional designer and developer, she and partner Sean Fitzgerald conduct educational tours of Second Life for teachers and trainers.

The day prior to our interview, I got to experience one of those tours, along with a 6 foot tall blue cat.
I started our interview by asking Jo what advantage she thought Second Life had over other online collaborative tools such as learning management systems or online conferencing software.

Jo: The first thing I'll say is that every tool has its place. I do think that Second Life is fantastic, but I'm not disregarding all those tools. Second Life offers us the opportunity to have a very rich shared experience, to be able to join together and meet with them and share ideas and discuss and explore together in a way that you can't in a text based or even a voice based 2d chatroom.

And as you and I found yesterday when we were playing drums in Second Life there is a real sense of presence, and much more of a sense of connection.

So think as a starting point it definitely has possibilities for addressing some of the needs that distance learners express in terms of not necessarily feeling so connected to their learning communities.

But on top of that there's a whole range of other opportunities in terms of experiential learning, so being able to get out there into the world in Second Life and actually put your learning into practice.

A great example of that is the Gipps Place? project where they had students doing both interior design and hospitality projects where they were developing workplace communications skills and in terms of the interior design projects, they were looking at developing client relationship skills. They are just a couple of the possibilities.

Of course there's all sorts of opportunities for exploring identity, for developing very immersive resources, and educational experiences for students to engage in, roleplaying, the list goes on.

Kerry: Jo I found Second Life really resource intensive.
How realistic is it for educators to consider Second Life as a educational tool when there are issues like hardware and bandwidth to deal with.

Jo: Yeh I think thats definitely a limitation and its a real consideration for educators when they are looking at Second Life. We believe at the moment that one of the key things that needs to be happening is that educators need to be exploring it, and starting to look at the ways that it can be implemented. There are ways of working around some of those limitations. For example I know that Gipps had a lot of their students working remotely and the students were happy with that and that solved their bandwidth problems on campus.

I think the other thing that will help with that is the increasing mobility that we have. We all have our own internet connections on mobile phones and things like that. Yes its a limitation and an important policy consideration whe you're looking at Second Life, but I don't think its a hard and fast barrier.

Kerry: I know for me, one of the most difficult things to master in Second Life initially was to get my avatar setup and get it moving around, and really get comfortable with the environment. I thought how long does it take for people to get their avatars set up and to feel comfortable with navigating through Second Life.

Jo: Yeh I think youve identified the two that are the hardest. Setting up your avatar is something that a lot of people spend a lot of time on and I think that's partially because its wrapping your head around how you do that from a technical perspective, but also it takes a while to figure out who you want to be and to actually create a sense of connection with your avatar.
Thats something that people spend a lot of time with, although I think in some ways, thats not necessarily a struggle its a pleasure, and I know some people have a lot of fun doing that as well. So thats one thing that takes a lot of time. And I know in the first few weeks
a lot of people have spent quite a lot of time and have almost an addiction as they go through that process of establishing their 'self' in Second Life.

I think you're right the other key skill that people
will need to develop early on in the piece is the ability to move around and to be able to navigate, and to see things, and to be able to zoom in and zoom out.

There are ways to pick up those skills. Linden Labs have recently been doing a major improvement on their orientation experience. So its actually much better and you can develop the ability to chat, the ability to pick up an object, the ability to unpack a box, all these basic skills that are part of being able to get around in Second Life.

Just as when we work in a 2d environment.
In elluminate we need to learn how to put our hands up and how to say yes and no, and which box to chat in, and where the screens that the powerpoint slides might show up in, there are all those base skills.
In terms if time I think it really varies.
Some people pick it up very easily, particularly those who have done any gaming, and young people in particular are very confident in these kinds of environments. In my experience they have spent so much time on play station and have played online games before that its very natural for them to move into those environments.
So its an individual thing. For me I picked it up very quickly but at the same time I've worked with people who have taken two or three weeks to really feel confident in moving around. Theres a whole range of Second Life skills that build on top of that. And the learning really continues and continues. I am learning how to script in Second Life at the moment. So spending a lot of time looking at how to actually make objects that I am building more interactive.

Kerry: After new Second Lifers find their feet and learn how to move around a bit, you and your partner Sean Fitzgerald teach them a few more skills and you give them tours of Second Life. Tell us a little about that.

Jo: Yeh we have established a space in Second Life that's open for people to come and visit. We have created a range of spaces and tools that can be explored there. So we use that as our base in Second Life for a number of different activities. We are connected to a bunch of projects that are just about to kick off but in the past 12 months we have been doing sopme tours for the eNet networks project, and a couple of other educational organisations. Just allowing teachers to get into the space and to develop skills and to check out educational spaces.

We went on a tour yesterday. We looked at the island of Fala ..? which is a biological experiment where you can see virtual plants and animals interacting with each other. We also went to the ICT Library which is a space thats designed for teachers to pick up resources, scripts, and free teaching tools they can use in Second Life. It is also a bit of a community Hub.

What we are trying to do is create a fun experience that allows teachers to see the really positive possibilities rather than focusing on some of that negative stuff that we have seen in some of the press coverage. So far that has been a pretty successful experience. We have had some relatively big groups in and they have managed to make their way around spaces and pick up basic skills like how to zoom in and out with the camera or how to pick up an object or how to read a sign more effectively.

Kerry: We will end our story on Second Life back on the island of Terra Incognita. As an educator with 26 years of experience using computers and training in education,
and someone who has watched the internet evolve from a file transfer tool, to the world wide web, to what's happening now, I had to ask Lindy/Decka this final question. Is Second Life or virtual worlds like it the feature of the internet and education?

Lindy: My hopeful answer is yes. I think they'll add a really powerful richness and I know that because have a daughter who is a gamer and I see the wonderful social relationships that she develops around her gaming experience. If we could use the wonderful principles That James ? has instilled from the quality of games and their success, if we could capture those and it would be wonderful. My cynical answer to that question is that unfortunately teachers are not given the basic tools of their profession on their desktop. Every teacher I believe should own their own computer. Either purchased by themselves and balanced by tax, or provided by their employer. Every teacher should be experiencing these environments that their students experience. Unfortunately too few teachers have a computer on their desk, and too few of them are experiencing the 3d environments their students are experiencing every day.

One of our participants has a 2 year old and she often sits on her mum's knee while she is doing her work inside Second Life as part of this course, and she always waves to me when she sees me. She recognises me by name, she calls me Lindy Avatar.

Kerry: Not Decka Mah?

Lindy: No she doesn't call me Decka she calls me my real name, and she calls me Lindy Avatar. She will always say to her mother, "There is Lindy Avatar" Waves to Lindy and she'll wave to me in real life. Now these are the kids who will be in our schools. Kids who have had as part of their life from their birth right through their schooling. And if we don't take account of that, if we don't use the tools, then school will become irrelevant to these children.

Kerry Johnson
eLearning Insights
http://podcasts.edna.edu.au

See also : Generation Myspace Seminar
August 6 - Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre
August 8 - Melbourne RACV Club, 17th Floor 501 Bourke Street Melbourne.
http://groups.edna.edu.au/danahboyd
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