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1. What are you doing with virtual worlds? (And how long have you been doing it?)

We have been active in virtual worlds since mid 2006…

As curator, I have been running the Arts Council England funded 2ND LIVE programme in Second Life, to complement my real life role as performance curator at Exeter Phoenix.

As an artist, I have been exploring walking and site-based practices in Second Life and real life (e.g. commission for ANTI Festival, Kuopio, Finland). As an educator, I’ve been teaching in Second Life as part of ‘Interdisciplinary Spatial Practices’ (level 2 UG module). And as a Knowledge Transfer possibility, I’ve been running workshops for other artists (e.g. 3-day workshop for Live Art Development Agency as part of DIY programme).

2. Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

Second Life – it was the easy (and intriguing) option when I started.

3. What support do you get in your institution in your use of virtual worlds?

None to date. There has been one other active member of the University (in European Law). There has been a little more activity very recently, through an interdisciplinary ‘Bridging the Gaps’ initiative (the impact of this is not clear yet).

4. What do you like/dislike about the virtual worlds you are using?

Plus:

• Creative possibilities (in terms of space and event) not available (for reasons of cost or practicality) in real life (‘not possible in real life’ attitude).
• Offers a side-step to examine real life methods afresh.

Minus:

• Cost – I jettisoned my island after 2.5 years and significant personal expense.
• Steep learning curve for new participants.

5. If teaching using virtual worlds, what’s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

There’s a mixed reactions from students – some fly, some don’t. Students are also often surprised by the ‘ghost town’ nature of Second Life. Experiencing the virtual world really needs more time than really able to give it.

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UEL has had a presence on Second Life since 2008 in the form of UEL Island, and more recently UEL HABitat owned by the school of Health, Sport and Bioscience. Second Life has not been widely adopted across the university, but some staff and students in healthcare and psychology have been using it quite extensively.

Health simulations

The main focus of interest on UEL HABitat is the virtual polyclinic, which continues to be used by herbal medicine and physiotherapy students, and is soon to be used by podiatry students from UEL and Plymouth University under a collaborative arrangement. Each discipline has its own area where students interact via their avatars with virtual patients and surrounding objects to practice procedures and develop their clinical reasoning skills.


Staff and student evaluations of the simulations indicate a general level of satisfaction and highlight the advantage of Second Life over paper based or role-play exercises in the classroom. However, there are ongoing challenges, not least the fact that a significant minority of students still struggle to master Second Life and the skills required by staff to operate and configure the environment beyond the core development phase. Reliance on Second Life development expertise is a further consideration in the current climate.

Psychology conferencing and tutorials

Second year Psychology students on an elective module “Psychology of physical illness’ upload posters to a designated area in their school’s conference suite on UEL island and spend a morning discussing them with staff and students from their module and beyond. Using Second Life in this way extends the reach that a physical poster display would typically have. It also removes inhibitions that students might otherwise have in face to face conversations. A few psychology staff also use Second Life for tutorials and one recently reported that students repeatedly rate Second Life higher than most other aspects of his module delivery.

Integration

UEL is in the process of changing from Blackboard to Moodle VLE, so we will be taking a closer look at SLOODLE, the main interest from academics at this stage being in linking Moodle and Second Life for assessment purposes.

Future

To date it has been relatively straightforward to cover our Second Life costs but in anticipation of a much tighter funding regime, we continue to look at OpenSim as an alternative. However, due to network configuration conflicts, we are as yet unable to carry out a thorough investigation of OpenSim, and therefore hope to retain at least one island on SL until mid 2013.

In resolving the OpenSim issues we may be able to draw on the experience of the Europe-wide Pandora project ‘Advanced Training Environment for Crisis Scenarios’ which counts UEL amongst its partners and is using OpenSim.

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1. What are you doing with virtual worlds? (And how long have you been doing it?)

We are using games technology (specifically the Source Engine and Unity) to create games for training purposes. Depending on your predilection, the products we create are either Serious Games or Persuasive Games, and we have been creating a series of products under the umbrella branding of Maritime City for internal use since late 2009/early 2010.

2. Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

We are creating our own, rather than using off the shelf worlds like Second Life. The reason for this is due to the content; currently, Maritime City is based in the training of healthcare professionals (specifically, in the current scenario set, social workers and childcare professionals) and as such we require the avatars in the world to be extremely realistic.

This means we need to have a lot of control over the facial and body animation, something that not all current virtual worlds
provide, but that is more prevalent in games engines such as Source.

3. What support do you get in your institution in your use of virtual worlds?

We have been fortunate to have an extremely supportive environment for using this type of technology from all levels of the University, from DVC level down to local School level. We have a great deal of input from all manner of areas within the University as well as outside experts, which is extremely valuable!

4. What do you like/dislike about the virtual worlds you are using?

Likes: Technical capabilities. Proven track record in use in demanding applications. Constant updates with new features.

Dislikes: Constant updates with new features (breaks existing work sometimes!). Restrictive licensing.

5. If teaching using virtual worlds, what¹s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

In the small scale testing we have completed so far, we are extremely happy with the results. The use of the game allows us to work in similar areas, educationally, to role-play without some of the drawbacks. Anecdotally the students have been extremely positive, both in terms of “wow” factor and the actual educational content of the game. A series of more in-depth analyses of how the game has been received by the students is in production and will be published in the next year.

6. Any thoughts on the integration of virtual worlds with other learning technologies?

Yes. We have done work previously on using LAMS as a means of scaffolding learning content into and out of the game experience (see http://www.ics.heacademy.ac.uk/italics/vol5iss3/flynnnewbutt.pdf) and found that the addition of learning technology to the use of games can be very positive, but requires a lot of planning and hard work to ensure it runs in the right way!

The use of games in education is getting ever more pervasive, and the connection between the different areas of technology is key to this being a useful addition to the teacher’s toolset in the future.

7. The catch-all: anything else you’d like to say?

Can’t think of anything at the moment, other than to encourage everyone working in this area to keep up the great work – there is so much potential in the use of technology in education!

We are always open to collaborative work, and putting together funding bids.

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What are you doing with virtual worlds?

MissionV Education Ltd is running a 20 school virtual world learning programme, supported by the National Centre for Technology (NCTE) in Ireland.

Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

MissionV uses the OpenSim platform and provides cloud hosting to schools and other educational establishments. As well as the NCTE MissionV is supported by Discover Science & Engineering and the Centre for Talented Youth in Ireland (at Dublin City University).

Using Opensim allows MissionV to provide a private, secure and safe environment for the 10 to 12 year olds on the programme. In addition, it allows us to tap into a huge community of expertise among Second Life developers.

If teaching using virtual worlds, what’s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

Teachers and students on the MissionV programme have provided positive feedback as regards the benefits of learning in a virtual world. For example, Anne McMorrough, a teacher at St. Martin de Porres primary school in Tallaght, Dublin, responded:

“I love to play with it.. but watching kids work is fascinating. Correcting copies will never be same again – virtual learning is so colourful”

Any thoughts on the integration of virtual worlds with other learning technologies?

MissionV sees exciting opportunities for enhancing virtual world interaction by integrating new gesture-based technologies such as the Microsoft Kinect. As such, planning is underway to develop a Kinect interface in collaboration with the Institute of Technology, Tallaght.

2012 will see the MissionV programme moving into Phase 2 with Moodle VLE and voice integration.

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1. What are you doing with virtual worlds? (And how long have you been doing it?)

We use virtual worlds for teaching Project Management and performing research on identity and other aspects of virtual worlds.

These activities are well documented under http://sl.sanfoh.com/. I supervise currently one PhD and one Master by Research on virtual world aspects.

2. Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

We have used OpenSim this year for the first time. We were using two providers: http://www.3dmetaverse.com/ and http://reactiongrid.com/. They are both fine and I can recommend them. Details about these can be found on a paper I published at ReLive’11; see http://sl.perisic.com/relive11/ for details and presentation.

The reason we moved from Second Life was because of their poor customer support. The person who maintained the avatar that owned our island decided to give up this avatar and Linden Lab was not able to transfer the island to another avatar. This is well documented in various communication I had with them. Therefore we have to decide at very short notice to switch to a different provider.

3. What support do you get in your institution in your use of virtual worlds?

Virtual worlds are now an integrated part of our teaching and are therefore funded as part of the usual expenses, similar as this is the case e.g. for software licences. In particular, OpenSim based solutions are much cheaper in setup and maintenance fee.

4. What do you like/dislike about the virtual worlds you are using?

OpenSim is OK, but it is not Second Life i.e. the context and immersion Second Life offers does not seem to happen in the OpenSim; see the Relive’11 paper for a lot of reflection about this.

5. If teaching using virtual worlds, what’s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

The students are doing it, but I don’t think they are particularly excited about this.

6. Any thoughts on the integration of virtual worlds with other learning technologies?

Ask the Sloodle people; they know better than I do . It’s certainly bound to be happen somehow (providers of these Learning Environment are under pressure to ‘add value’ to their systems, and doing virtual worlds is an obvious extension). But I wouldn’t be able to predict how it will happen exactly.

7. The catch-all: anything else you’d like to say?

Yes, indeed.
First: John you are doing a tremendous job to put this all together. Excellent work.
Second: we are trying to explore the utilisation of Open Sim vs. Second Life a bit further as part of a research project. Anyone volunteering to be interviewed in that matter is very much welcome to contact me (marc.conrad@beds.ac.uk).

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1. What are you doing with virtual worlds? (And how long have you been doing it?)

Maintaining a university-owned island since 2007, which has recently been completely redesigned to better fit our needs.
Developing and evaluating learning scenarios with various organisations for a multitude of disciplines such as project management, health and social care management, child nursing, adult nursing (Coventry University), medical simulations and medical training (North Western Medical Deanery).

Development and evaluation of a virtual medical simulation replicated from a paediatric scenario at the Smart Hospital based at University of Texas Arlington.

Teaching employability skills to students using the virtual world Second Life.

We are currently nearing completion of one four-year research project (CURLIEW), which looks at the socio-political impact of virtual world use in higher education. The three PhD students on the project will be finishing theses on pedagogical design in virtual worlds, student perspectives of virtual worlds and the impact of using virtual worlds on learner identity. A further output from the CURLIEW project will be a synthesis of data across all three projects.

2. Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

We are using Second Life, due to ease of access and the flexibility it offers in terms of developing our own learning scenarios. As a learning and teaching environment, it provides greater flexibility in terms of learning space design and islands/areas for students to explore.

3. What support do you get in your institution in your use of virtual worlds?

Our IT department has installed Second Life onto the university server so that it can be accessed from any computer on campus, and we receive funding to keep the university island maintained monthly. The department is currently exploring the possibility of updating Second Life to the newer viewer.

4. What do you like/dislike about the virtual worlds you are using?

There is a steep learning curve in terms of development. The learning curve is not quite so steep with general use of Second Life (especially since the new viewer) but still requires at least several hours of orientation for new students and staff to feel comfortable in-world.

One of its main advantages from a research perspective is also its popularity, meaning that there are several research seminars and conferences available in-world. Unless there is a mass move to another virtual world, Second Life provides an opportunity to engage in a research community in a way that few other virtual worlds do.

5. If teaching using virtual worlds, what’s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

Cathy: I haven’t done any teaching using virtual worlds, but several testing and orientation sessions. I’ve noticed there are some people that instantly connect with Second Life and find it fascinating, and are enthusiastic to explore and learn. Then there are others that find it very difficult to feel comfortable, and need heavy encouragement. It’s very difficult beforehand to establish who is going to adjust quickly to Second Life and who is going to struggle.

Gemma: The experience of teaching in Second Life, for me, has varied according to the technological capabilities of the campus-based computers. Since I teach on a voluntary module, most students are at least open to the potential of using Second Life as a learning environment. With a smaller class, it’s easier to manage differences in student Second Life abilities and encourage students to support one another. Students engage enthusiastically with the content of the module and clearly enjoy using Second Life as a learning environment, primarily because of the diversity of islands available, allowing them to explore areas related to their disciplines and personal interests, as well as engaging in multi-disciplinary work. However, students can very quickly become frustrated and discouraged by technological problems, such as computers crashing.

6. Any thoughts on the integration of virtual worlds with other learning technologies?

I think it is a very good idea to integrate virtual worlds with learning management systems such as MOODLE, both in terms of assessment for staff and as back-up if there are technical problems!

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What are you doing with virtual worlds? And how long have you been doing it?

We are starting the second year in developing an adaptive 3D virtual environment called Project IVY (Interpreters in Virtual Reality). Project IVY is designed to address the needs of future interpreters and users of interpreters in higher education, vocational training and adult learning contexts. Our project uses 3D virtual environment technology to create an innovative virtual educational space that supports the acquisition and application of skills required in interpreter-mediated communication.

Our aim is that the project will provide a learning environment which uses the potential of 3D technology to enable learners from different contexts and different educational sectors and to meet and interact, learn with customized digital content and apply their knowledge; this fosters experiential and autonomous learning in a virtual setting, and supports collaborative learning through simulation and live interaction. Project IVY is adaptable to other educational contexts.

The project partners are the University of Surrey (UK, co-ordinator), University of Bangor (UK), University of Cyprus (Cyprus), University of Poznan (Poland), University of Tübingen (Germany), Steinbeis GmbH & Co. KG für Technologietransfer (Germany), and Bar Ilan University (Israel).

Full trials of the system will commence early 2012; results will be published during 2012. The project is funded by the EU Lifelong Learning Programme.

Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

We are provisionally using Second Life, and exploring OpenSim for future projects. Second Life is public facing and reasonably accessible by students, lecturers and other participating institutions

What support do you get in your institution in your use of virtual worlds?

We have the use of two islands in Second Life – Bangor University and Surrey University, partly funded by the project.

What do you like/dislike about the virtual worlds you are using?

Second Life is very restrictive and difficult to adapt to the demands of our project. Developing good text display systems are particularly difficult.vManipulating audio and synchronized media would be much easier using other platforms. Only the public facing attributes of Second Life help to drive the project.

If teaching using virtual worlds, what’s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

Some provisional interpreter student meetings have been conducted in Second Life (see the picture).

Any thoughts on the integration of virtual worlds with other learning technologies?

The project will explore integration with other technologies – particularly augmented reality and the use of robotics.

This is for snapshot #10, which is currently being compiled. There’s a window of opportunity for people who haven’t yet submitted to get something in, but it’s just a few days.

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1. What are you doing with virtual worlds? (And how long have you been doing it?)

I am one of a group of Design lecturers at the Open University who are partners in a European Lifelong Learning project, ARCHI21. ARCHI21 is looking at learning language in the context of design and architectural teaching. Work began a year ago, but my group has used virtual worlds previously for some experimental design teaching.

2. Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

We have been using Second Life, though on reflection OpenSim might have been a better choice. However, using OpenSim would mean someone looking after a server, which could be a challenge too far.

3. What support do you get in your institution in your use of virtual worlds?

The Second Life islands we are using were set up by one of our partners, plus the OU has had its own island for some while. The reasons for this are lost in the midst of time, but probably because this was seen as the most popular virtual world. My institution supports virtual world development; it even hosts a conference on the subject of learning in virtual worlds (ReLive), though we are a long way from virtual worlds being a mainstream activity.

4. What do you like/dislike about the virtual worlds you are using?

The great thing about working in-world is engaging with students in a different way. Our project centres on design and building and the building tools in Second Life let everyone experiment collaboratively in a way that is not easily achieved in other media. The in-world experience also lets students portray themselves in a way that both anonymises and expresses at the same time. The avatar names tell everyone lots about how people want to be seen rather than assumptions being made on the basis of real-world physical characteristics; Cyrano de Begerac might be set in a virtual world if it were written today. Our students enjoyed the informality and playfulness of the virtual world, whilst at the same time seeing it as a place to which they could return to collaborate and build their ideas. The virtual world has also proved to be a good place for assisting the development of language; the informality of the setting seems to foster constructive interaction around this aspect of learning.

What I don’t like about working in-world are technical problems that are hard to figure out; microphones not working; viewers that don’t correspond to expectations or instructions and trying to sort those things out at a distance for a minority of students whilst keeping the majority engaged. I am also not very good at moving around. Fortunately if you are with a bunch of novices no-one minds if you bump into them. Working in-world on a dedicated island feels quite safe but I have been scared off random tours in the wider world by avatars who appear to have Tourettes syndrome. The experience of landing in the Second Life general induction area, into a circle of avatars perched on the fence like evil crows ready to pick the bones of new arrivals, was quickly decided against when we trialled it before our students came in.

5. If teaching using virtual worlds, what’s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

Our students are very enthusiastic about the experience that they had in-world. Interestingly, none of them really knew about virtual worlds before we invited them to join our experiment. Our students are all mature, so maybe that ignorance is to be expected, but our European partners tell us that the young students that they work with need to be convinced about virtual worlds. Those who take most naturally to the environment are gamers, but gamers are a small minority and their coolness is, apparently, questionable. The challenge is how to break down the perceptual barriers to in-world participation.

6. The catch-all: anything else you’d like to say?

In my opinion, the virtual world should be used for the things that it offers that can’t be done elsewhere. I know from experience that it is possible to use other means to deliver lectures with some interactivity in other interfaces (I use Elluminate for that a lot). It is also possible to use VOIP interfaces for online meetings and to work on Google apps at the same time. What the virtual world offers is the chance for a playful experience, for building and role-playing and for interacting in a different way. It is these affordances that we should be developing and celebrating so that students come to the virtual world for learning and leave with enthusiasm as well as knowledge, understanding and skills.

And, yes, you still have a few days (not weeks) to get any last submissions of what you are doing with virtual worlds in for inclusion in snapshot #10.

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1. What are you doing with virtual worlds? (And how long have you been doing it?)

The SWIFT project, run by GENIE (based within the Department of Genetics at the University of Leicester) and funded by the Higher Education Academy, is a 3-year research project which is investigating the effectiveness of using Second Life for genetics education. We are running 3 different scenarios/experiments with first and second year biological science and medical students. In these we have progressed from a fairly simple health and safety lab with some interactive items, to a self-directed training area and individual working where students get to grips with performing a genetic screen for inherited conditions, to a scenario where students work in groups to develop a medically important protein. In two cases we have used the PIVOTE system along with Second Life to provide interactive exercises for the students.

We are 2 and a half years into the 3 year research project, which is due to end in August 2012.

2. Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

We are using Second Life, primarily because of our links with the Beyond Distance Research Alliance (BDRA) which is based at the University of Leicester. The BDRA under the former directorship of Gilly Salmon already had an island in Second Life which they were using for their Moose Project, and for this reason, we used the technology with which we were most familiar and in which we had already invested quite a lot of resources.

3. What support do you get in your institution in your use of virtual worlds?

It is getting better. We still don’t have free and unlimited access for students to Second Life across campus, but things are changing slowly. IT is very helpful when we need access, it is granted and they are very good at getting new viewers installed on the computer system and in upgrading computers in named areas where we are planning to use Second Life. Of course, the ideal solution would be for students to have free and unrestricted access, and I feel that this is a real possibility in the future.

With regard to support from teaching staff, this is variable. Some are very interested in it and are keen to see how they can use the technology for elements of their course, but there are others who think it is some kind of slippery slope into hell from which the students will return without having learned anything at all.

4. What do you like/dislike about the virtual worlds you are using?

I dislike the costs and the loss of the education discount in Second Life, but I do like the way it works, the flexibility it offers and the fact that there is a support system out there (somewhere) if you are in dire straits.

5. If teaching using virtual worlds, what’s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

I have taught using Second Life and for the most part, the experience has been a positive one for both myself and for the students. Naturally, some students dislike it – but for the most part, they not only enjoy it, but seem to like the fact that the university is trying out new things. I find teaching in smaller groups is much better. Recently I took a class of 35 students into Second Life, and although they were doing the work in smaller groups and on their own, it was very difficult to support them properly and to keep track of who was doing what and where.

Time is also an issue when using Second Life – everything takes much longer and that is a factor that we are only just beginning to realise the full implications of when trying to adapt some of the teaching materials for Second Life. It all takes so much more time – and perhaps because the students find it more fun, they don’t take it as seriously and also spend time “playing” with their avatars rather than performing the tasks. As the students I teach only get a very small amount of time in Second Life, this novelty factor does not wear off, and so has to be worked around.

6. Any thoughts on the integration of virtual worlds with other learning technologies?

It would be wonderful if work could be set for students to complete in Second Life, but that this could be monitored or marked somehow using some other learning technology – perhaps some sort of integration with BlackBoard would prove to be of use? I am not really sure about this one.

7. The catch-all: anything else you’d like to say?

I have heard people say that no-one is interested in Second Life as an educational tool any more – but I think that they are wrong. There is a lot still to learn about how these virtual environments can be used in education.

There is very little real research out there as to the effects, benefits, downsides and results of using virtual worlds in education. It seems like many are simply saying it doesn’t work because of lack of evidence. Where was the evidence that said that the internet would be a useful tool in education? Where was the evidence that says that interactive white boards are useful tools in education?

Like most things, virtual worlds are there, they can be used in wonderful ways by educators to enhance teaching and learning, and just because the evidence is not there yet, I don’t feel that they should be dismissed just yet.

Today’s featured submission is from Liz Falconer, the director of the Education Innovation Centre at the University of the West of England. Tomorrow it’s Michael Callaghan from the University of Ulster.

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1. What are you doing with virtual worlds? (And how long have you been doing it?)

We’ve been active in virtual worlds since 2007 and our main focus at the University of the West of England is on using virtual worlds for simulations of experiences it would otherwise be difficult, impractical, unethical or just dangerous for our students to experience pre-qualification. Subjects now being covered include environmental health, nursing, emergency response training, sociology, counseling in psychology and business ethics. We’re planning to develop midwifery, animal training and automotive engineering scenarios in the coming year.

Next year our biggest development will be the MA Education in Virtual Worlds, which will run entirely in virtual worlds. It will be based in Second Life, but will also explore a range of other types of virtual world. It goes to validation in March 2012 with a planned Sept 2012 start (see http://www.uwe.ac.uk/elearning/virtualWorldsMA/index.shtml).

2. Which virtual worlds are you using? Why those in particular?

We’ve used Second Life exclusively for our developments so far, as it is easy to access, one of the better and more intuitive virtual worlds for development, and is where most HEIs are active, so the opportunity for collaboration is greatest there.

3. What support do you get in your institution in your use of virtual worlds?

A lot now. We have three islands in Second Life and a great deal of interest and support, both practical (fees, innovation funding etc) and ideological (e.g. support for the curriculum development of the MA in Education in Virtual Worlds). We seem to be moving into a phase where virtual worlds are taken very seriously as potential environments for learning which means, as an institution, we don’t waste time trying to repeatedly convince ourselves any more.

4. What do you like/dislike about the virtual worlds you are using?

We like the accessibility and collaboration aspects of Second Life, but it could be more robust. It still has a tendency to shut down regions with little warning, which is an issue for scheduled teaching.

5. If teaching using virtual worlds, what’s the experience been like, for you and/or the students?

We now have lots of data on teaching and learning experiences from the evaluations we have done of various projects. Overall, it is like any form of teaching and learning experience. If the experience has been well thought-out and enthusiastically driven by the teaching staff, it is successful. If not, it isn’t.

The overwhelming outcome of evaluations so far has been positive, both from the point of view of the students learning in a way that gives them the chance to have new experiences, and from the tutors being able to see their students learn in a physical sense.

6. Any thoughts on the integration of virtual worlds with other learning technologies?

I guess it depends on what you mean by integration? With the web-on-a-prim facilities in Second Life now, we can give the impression of integration fairly well. To be honest, I can’t see a reason for a virtual world to be “part” of a virtual learning environment for example, and in any case that’s not what virtual worlds are for. They are open, collaborative spaces, rather than controlled spaces for private student-tutor transactions.