Avatars in Second Life

Avatar design is such a rich topic to discuss with students ... this avatar was spotted at a meeting on International Schools Island early in September 2009 ... for some reason the design had an impact that many others have not. Needless to say I shall not reveal the real identity ... just to say he is Hong Kong based and may be in the ESF .... brilliant design ... and even wearing a 'Shambles' free t-shirt.

"Team Building" Workshop 16April09

Just finished a workshop today with the focus on team building and collaboration; the task of each group was to build an avatar out of a given set of  individual prims.
It was really 2 professional development events ... yesterday I met with six volunteers to be the individual team facilitators and one volunteer who was to be the judge for the best build (there were definite criteria)
Our meeting yesterday ended up being over two hours of sharing of suggestions, skills, strategies and tools to consider when running today's public session.
We had around 40 avatars attend the 90 min session, after a brief intro with the whole group we then split into the six teams with it's facilitator for 45 mins and the collaboration and building began.

For the last 20 mins we all reconvened and each of the facilitators reported back on their sessions and finally Judge Louise nominated teams 1 and 4 as the joint winners.
There was so much learning that happened in these two session for me that there is just not room to list specifics here .... suffice to say that we all survived better equipped to support future teaching and learning in a virtual world environment.
I'm most grateful to all who contributed.

ISTE events are listed at: http://secondlife.iste.wikispaces.net/events

Photographs can be seen at my Flickr account

Shambles ISI MashUp (3 min video)

Transforming School Libraries Conference

The Transforming School Libraries online conference at www.yourschoollibrary.org 20 Feb to 1st March 2009

The conference was hosted mainly online at sosius.com

This session, on the last day, took place in Second Life with Dianne McKenzie (Dimac Dastardly in SL), Hong Kong teacher-librarian, presenting and leading a discussion on "Second Life - A game or an exceptional opportunity for professional growth and development?"

Moderated by yours truely Shamblesguru Voom.
We had a turn out of twenty avatars which I thought was very encouraging especially as it was held at a time when the USA was asleep.

Venue was the meeting area top of mountain top 2 on International Schools Island

Other pictures can be seen on Flickr

Workshop : Free Edu Tools on isi

I ran another workshop today for ISTE in S.L. showcasing more of the free resources hosted on International Schools Island.
This time I choose the "Library on a Stick" .. object and concept by JJ Drinkwater.
The session reconfirmed that the facilitators are often the 'Master Learners'  .. again I learnt so much myself about running workshops in virtual worlds.
The turnout was brilliant with 40 avatars from locations including Japan, Australia, Europe, USA, Hong Kong with me in Thailand.
S.L. behaved brilliantly (technically) as I expected so many avatars to cause 'lag' ... very encouraging. My preferred medium for communication was (is) voice but many avatars did not have microphones or could not use them because of their local R.L. environment ... most seemed to have loudspeakers or headsets.
I still feel uncomfortable not having real life eye contact with participants and uneasy with silences ... but am coming to accept that audio silence does not mean participants are not being active .. reading notecards, building, communicating with IM ....
This learning journey continues and I'm grateful again for the constructive feedback from participants ...and the privilege to be able to work with such a professional group of educators.

Bloom's Taxonomy Model in the Holodeck

I was kindly given a 3D interactive model of Bloom's Taxonomy by the creator Thursday Xu ... I've now put this in the International Schools Island Holodeck ... in fact when you rez it up you get three copies so a large group of avatars can split up.

SL Education Support Faire Jan 25th-30th 2009

Education Support Faire January 25th-30th 2009

Details at

http://forums.secondlife.com/showthread.php?t=301727&page=1&pp=15

International Schools Island is one of the exhibitors

... hope you can visit

... even if just for some freebies ;-)

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Faire/92/140/35

Data Visualisation part 2 (more 3D graphing boards)

As a result of some feedback and requests I've built some additional 3D graphing boards ... one even 40m x 40m x 40m so you need a lot of air space for it to float in.

 

Data Visualisation & free 3D Graphing Tool

I've been to several talks over the past few months about Data Visualisation (DV) in SL ... so decided to build a DV display/exhibition in Int.Schs.Island.

This project went a little further than I anticipated ... I've also built a 3D graphing tool ... which I suspect may also have other teaching/learning uses rather than just DV ... it is free for you to take.
All in the lobby of the Technology Tower...

http://slurl.com/secondlife/International%20Schools/26/84/25

Feedback always welcome.

3rd Speakers Series : Size isn't everything

Tonight we had the final of our mini Int.Schs.Island (Pilot) Speaker Series ... with the topic "k-12 Recruitment".
The turnout was not large but the quality of the discussion reminded me that size isn't everything ... 
Thanks Jeff and Jon for sharing and others from Bangkok, Laos and Australia .. I personally learnt a lot.

The technology did kick me out once and also made it difficult for Jon from China but that was  a reminder that we really are pioneers at the cutting edge ... and it's OK to bleed a little.

P.S. health warning ... never accept a drink from Utes Torok in world .. I crashed immediately after accepting one ... I suspect it was spiked ;-) ... have fun.

Speakers Series : 19 Nov ... (part 2)

Many thanks to Dianne and Doug ... larger audience this week ... and lots of participation and sharing ... the only problem for me was that Dianne stayed as 'Casper the Ghost" for the whole hour for me ;-)

Next session ... Wed. 26th Nov. same time ... topic is "Recruitment" .. see the Google doc for full details.

International Schools Island (Animoto)

Speaker Series .... 19 Nov08 Libraries and Info Literacy (k-12)

The second in the International Schools "Live in Second Life" (Speaker Series) is happening on Wednesday 19th November 
4:00a.m. S.L. time ... 12:00 lunchtime (London) ... 7:00pm (Thailand) ... 8:00pm (Hong Kong) ... 9:00pm (Tokyo) ... 11:00pm (Sydney)

Venue: International Schools Island Mountain Top 2

SLURL : http://slurl.com/secondlife/International%20Schools%202/96/158/54

The session this week has a 'Libraries' and 'Information Literacy' (k-12) theme

... and on the sofa will be 

• Dianne McKenzie (Dimac Dastardly) Teacher Librarian, Discovery College, Hong Kong
  
• Doug Johnson (BlueSkunk Johnson) Director of Media and Technology, Mankato Area Public Schools Blue Skunk Blog: http://doug-johnson.squarespace.com  

The session will also continue with the focus on teaching in an international community.

I hope you can attend as I continue with the "Larry King Live" format.

Full details at http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=ddf7p68s_414hnb749cm

Speaker Series .... 12 Nov08 Fire Centaur

International Schools "Live in Second Life" (Speaker Series) .. the first of a 3 part 'pilot' series.Fire Centaur (Paul Preibisch) owner of the  English Village SIM and teacher in South Korea was the very first to be welcomed to the sofa by myself pretending I could do a "Larry King Live".
Fire did a brilliant job sharing his experiences working in South Korea and offering advice to those considering working there ... then giving the fully Monty about the establishment and development of his SIM.Finally he demostrated a game he has built  which used Zombies to motivate English Language learning, and finally he introduced his "bot" .. a dinosaur he had built and programmed which kept muttering "I smell avatars" as he moved around.Fire is an educator that also has design and programming skills, a sense of humour and a strong interest in Virtual Worlds ..... many thanks.

Presentation Video : SL & VWs

When I do real life presentations at conference/workshops about SL / VWs I often show a 17 min video that I talk to (stops me rambling) then we get into discussions.
I've just put the video inworld on Int.Schs.Island at http://slurl.com/secondlife/International%20Schools%202/70/180/57

This is version 1 ... I plan to modify. (aren't we always)

No soundtrack as I usually talk to it live ... but may be of interest.
It is streaming into this location from www.blip.tv 

More Presenting in S.L.

Learn 2.008 : Shanghai Pre-Conference Meetings

A (education/technology/k-12) conference is about to happen in Shanghai, visit Ning at Learning 2.008 for specifics.

The three Sundays before the real life meeting sees three pre-conference sessions being hosted on International Schools Island. Two of those sessions have been completed, for images search Fickr for the TAG learn2cn.  

Specifics of these sessions can be seen on Google docs.

Educators from several continents attended including some of those invited to present at the real life conference, David Warlick, Alan Levine and Ewan McIntosh. 

These have been brilliant events ... Second Life has performed technically well and allowed discussions using voice and text chat (phew)  ... many of these discussions focussed on questions being raised at the main conference and I certainly found them interesting,relevant and stimulating ... especially when being shared across the world in real time.

One of the principal learning experiences for me was that for the second meeting we were joined by two anonymous "griefers" ... griefers are avatars who wonder virtual worlds determined to be disruptive ... and this was the first time I'd been involved in an event that had become their focus ... possibly attracted by our large attendance.

I should have guessed an attack was underway when someone kept changing the slide presentations or when the Daleks  appeared.  Only after weird materials started to rain down from the sky did I realise this was for real (or should that be "for virtual'?) ... switching off the ability to run scripts stopped most of the distractions .. and then I ejected the griefers from the venue ... which land owners have the ability to do.
I also accidently ejected a USA teacher ... but a polite request in the text chat from their colleague let me know and I opened their permissions to come back in (I'm still slightly embarrassed about this) ... classroom management has taken on a whole new perspective for me even after all these years of experience ... with new tools and strategies to be learnt or invented.

If you are attending in Shanghai and meet Ewan McIntosh ... then please do not mention the naked female streaker that broke his concentration ... I do suspect he's still recovering.

Virtual Worlds in Education ... the future is going to be fun ;-)

Venue International Schools Island

http://slurl.com/secondlife/International%20Schools%202/96/158/54

Media Players in S.L.

Media Players in S.L. seem to be evolving almost daily ... I just purchased the NHC Media Center - Q308 for L$500 (US$2.50) to experiment with ... attracted by the boast of being able to play YouTube videos directly from YouTube.
... and it works brilliantly although I did need a little help from creator Sylvio Runo
It plays | Movies in Sequence | Direct YouTube Search & Play | Slide Show with Your Photos and Textures | Audio Music Parcel Manager | Radio Stations | plus ....
Support to lots of media types with auto adjust of the correct mime-type: php, asp, htm, html, mov, sdp, mp4, mv4, mpg, mpe, mpa, jpg, gif, txt, tiff, mpeg, 3gpp, and pict.
If you want to play with this one then just tp to isi at http://slurl.com/secondlife/International%20Schools%202/121/94/26
More details of this particular player can be seen at SLEX http://tinyurl.com/6babwo
Of course ... playing media in S.L. works best on a high spec computer with a good connection.

Clothing (inc. isi t-shirts) ... all free

Free Clothing ... an area on "Mountain Top 2" has lot of free clothes .. the difference from the norm here is that we have put them in topic boxes to make it easier to find items... i.e. there is a box of 'gloves', another of skirts, another of formal tuxes etc.
There is also one large collection box for you to donate free clothing which we will then put in the relevant topic box.
I've also set up a vendor which gives out free t-shirts made on isi ... I needed to spend time evaluating at a number of different vendors (free and for sale) ... I ended up going with "Cool Vendor v1.5" buying it online at SLXchange for L$600 (a little over US$2) ... recommended and excellent value.
The package contains several different vendor models, including one which materialises 3D images of objects for sale .... instructions for using the vendors was straight forward.
Of course all the t-shirts in this vendor can be purchased for zero Linden Dollars ... a gifts from Int.Schs.Island.

While setting up the vendor I was joined by a visitor, Milinneta Babii, to the Island who was casually exploring ... it really warms my heart to see the facilities, and especially the growing S.L. index in the towers, being used and making the lives of other educators in S.L. a little easier.
The specific location of these freebies is
http://slurl.com/secondlife/International%20Schools%202/129/148/47

I love my "Scrubber"

Putting a script into objects in S.L. can result in all sorts of actions happening ... giving stuff away, changing colours, shapes, locations, gathering data ... too many to mention here.
You can write your own scripts but builders in S.L. are more likely to use scripts that others have already written ... there are thousands available for free.
On International Schools Island we are collating free scripts into topic boxes ... which any avatar can come and take for free.
Also there is a 'drop box' should others have scripts they are willing to give and share.
Building this collection was initially very frustrating because when scripts were put into the boxes they would often try and do something to the box ... that's what scripts do ... you cannot blame them (unless they are told not to run .. but too late if they are already in the box).
But then I was introduced to "The Scrubber"... which basically neutralises the box .... I love the Scrubber ... it has made this project do-able.
We will be working on these boxes for some time to come, you can find them on the 1st floor of the Info.Tower.
Click on the image for a larger version.