• Considering using virtual worlds for teaching and want to know where to start?
• Curious about how others are using virtual spaces for teaching?
• Interested in learning how the future of undergraduate education will be shaped by immersive technologies?

The workshop has an International line-up of speakers from the UK and Ireland and will offer a series of insightful talks examining the theoretical and practical aspects of teaching using virtual worlds such as Second Life, Opensim and Metaplace.

Speakers include John Kirriemuir of Virtual Worlds Watch, Daniel Livingstone (SLOODLE); University of West Scotland, David Burden (PIVOTE); Daden Limited, Michael Callaghan and Kerri McCusker of the University of Ulster, Tim Savage and Carina Girvan of Trinity College Dublin and Barry McAdam and Anna O’Donovan of INTEL.

The objective of the event is to raise awareness of the benefits and possible pitfalls of using virtual and immersive worlds in an educational context and will provide practical advice and demonstrations from leading educators and industrial experts in this area.

It will highlight funding opportunities available in this field and offer tips on how to focus your research to maximise your chances of succeeding with applications.

The workshop is organised by the Serious Games and Virtual Worlds Research Team and the School of Computing & Intelligent Systems, Faculty of Computing and Engineering and co-sponsored by the University of Ulster, Office of Innovation Knowledge Club Program.

To register and for further information please go to the workshop website.

http://www.learninginvirtualworlds.com/

To book your place visit the JISC RSC West Midlands website.

Agenda

9.30am Coffee and Registration

10.00am Welcome and introductions – Jane Edwards, RSC West Midands

10.10am Host: Christa Appleton, e-Learning Development Specalist

10:15am Karl Royle, Curriculum Innovation and Knowledge Transfer, Centre for Applied Research and Development in Education, University of Wolverhampton

11.00am Coffee break

11.15am Presentations from the floor

12.30pm Lunch and networking

1.30pm Luke Bracegirdle, IT Development Director, School of Pharmacy, Keele University

2.15pm Christa Appleton

3.00pm Round up and next forum

3.30pm Close

Dear colleague (apologies for any cross-postings),
 
The RSC-WM invite you to take part in the next Virtual Worlds Forum taking place in Worcester on Thursday 16th July 2009, 10:00 -15:30.
 
This free forum provides a good opportunity to share experience, information and good practice of using a virtual world in a teaching context and to share projects in which you may be involved in using a virtual world (eg Second Life®), your thoughts and ideas on using virtual worlds for education.
 
The forum is open to people from across all post-16 sectors in the West Midlands including HE, FE, ACL, Specialist Colleges, WBL and Offender Learning.
 
Bookings are now being taken via the RSC-WM website : http://info.rsc-wm.ac.uk/events/event_details.asp?eid=451
 
We hope you can join us!!

March 17th: Wolverhampton. Virtual Worlds in Education Forum. Organised by JISC RSc West Midlands.

March 31st: Cambridge. The Reality of Virtual Worlds. Organised by JISC RSc Eastern.

April 21st: Sunderland. Virtual Worlds Conference 2009. Organised by JISC RSc Northern.

If you are interested in VWW speaking at your event, about some aspect of the use of virtual worlds in UK teaching and learning, then please get in touch.

This is an all-day event, organised by the JISC Regional Support Centre for the West Midlands. There is no charge to attend the event.

Contact Jane Edwards – @lady_jane on Twitter – for further information.

If you are thinking “Oh no, I’ve just missed the deadline!” then it is okay to get something in in the next few days. The response rate has been good, and therefore VWW is ploughing through a collection of replies.

We (myself and Andy Powell) look forward to meeting some respondants and other UK academics at the CETIS / Eduserv Foundation workshop on Virtual Worlds on Friday January 16th. I will be there for the whole day and evening, and also some of the day and evening before. If you want to meet up, then please get in touch.

Thanks again,
Virtual World Watch

• Internet Librarian, Monterey, California. October 20th to 22nd. Note that there is a dine-around at this conference dedicated to Second Life; I’ll be there.
• ALA TechSource Gaming, Learning, and Libraries Symposium, Chicago, Illinois. November 2nd to 4th (election day!).
• (Provisional) University of Austin, Texas. November 10th.

These cards are for giving out at “Real World” (how that phrase grates after a while) events, the next one of which is the JISC Services Skills event in Oxford on Thursday 25th September. Andy will be talking about how virtual worlds such as Second Life can be used to support events.

He plans to do the whole talk in-world, to give the RL audience a better feel for what is possible. It starts at 15.30 (UK time – UTC+1) and runs for about an hour. In Second Life, he’ll be in the Virtual Congress Centre on Eduserv Island – drop in and ask questions during the talk.