Monday, April 4, 2011

Second Life

            I played around a lot with Second Life and found Vassar Island. Vassar Island is meant for a liberal arts environment. It’s educational and people can use it to communicate as well. The island and environment is very user friendly and welcoming. I talked to a few people while I was there on the island and in the museum, and they were all pretty friendly. Some people were just playing for fun while others were using it for assignments like me. Some people had little pieces of advice and information to use in the future, while others were pretty clueless.  
           I found the Sistine Chapel and it's so awesome! I would use this environment for professional development by communicating with other teachers here at the museum. I would have the other teachers that I was planning with meet me at the museum so we could observe the Island and talk about what we could take from it and incorporate into our lesson planning. Second Life at the Sistine Chapel Museum is very informative and helpful for lesson planning. You can learn a lot about the inside of the museum and the many different paintings inside by exploring with Second Life. You can also talk to many people for more information and facts.
             I can envision a huge project for a sixth grade history class after using Second Life to communicate with other teachers there. The project would involve the sixth graders to use art supplies and a lot of research to create their very own Sistine Chapel. We would spend a few weeks researching the Sistine Chapel with our students after meeting as collaborative teachers on Second Life. The teachers would get together online to collaborate and plan what aspects of the Sistine Chapel they want to incorporate into their lesson plans based on what Second Life has to offer.

Here's a pic of me at Selmo Park. 

10 comments:

  1. After seeing how this could be used as a classroom or as a meeting place for teachers, I was pleasantly surprised by the possibilities. The first time that I looked at Second Life, I didn't realize all the potential. You had some really good ideas.

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  2. I love that Second Life provides a meeting place (in this case an island) where professionals in the same field can meet and collaborate. I will definately check out Vassar Island. Thanks for the post.

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  3. I think that collaboration in real time is a great value of Second Life. I like the use of virtual places/museums and monuments for educational purposes.

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  4. Th Sistine Chapel was amazing! I cans ee where middle school and high schooler's may get a kick out of Second Life, my concern is how do you keep them safe. I bumped into some pretty "risque" folks that were chatting about thing's that would be deemed inappropriate for kid's. Although, I guess it is no different, than the thing's being said on e-mails, texts, etc. Maybe I am being overly critical.

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  5. I am going to back in and take a look at the islands you mentioned! Thank you ;-)

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  6. You are lucky. Pretty much anytime I have been on Second Life I did not see anyone to talk to. Maybe it is because I log on during the day. I don't know. Great ideas though.

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  7. I think professional development, especially when being inspired by art and collaborating with others is a great way to utilize SL. Great idea!!

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  8. I love the idea of creating/entering a professional development community. Communicating with other teachers about classroom practices and procedures on a "teacher island" sounds like an exciting and free way to conduct professional development.
    Great idea!

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  9. I much prefer to use a microphone than chatting with text, but not everyone uses a mic. Plus you have to plug in your mic before you open the SL app for it to recognize the mic. I have had good experiences and really learned a lot at a couple of seminars I attended and I have had some not so pleasant experiences when exploring on my own.

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  10. Ok, I have never heard of that place and I thought I'd at least have knowledge of all the cool educational places on SL. I will have to check this place out! Great post!

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