Students

Last Wednesday and this evening we started teaching a group of music tech students Second Life. They all seem very enthusiastic! So far, they have created and designed the look of their own character, gone through induction on Orientation Island and have learned how to teleport. They are full of questions and pick up everything we show them very quickly. Some have expressed in interest in continuing learning about Second Life, if there is a possibility for them to be involved in streaming live sound and music into it.

300 Universities using Second Life as a Teaching Aid

This is an interesting article. Seems many educational establishments are finding considerable educational value in SL.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2007-08-01-second-life_N.htm

My First gig!

Late on Wednesday night I attended my first gig in Second Life at Jade’s Jazz Lounge. On first impressions, I thought the turn out was quite good as there was around 20-30 Avatars there. There were two things that were annoying though. The first was a constant haze of names buzzing around amongst a sea of ball gowns and tuxedoes which made it hard to see the singer! (Flying was against policy) The second was the live stream that was very intermittent until I turned the speaker icon off and on again which seemed to sort it out, This was fine until someone spoke to me and I was back to square one again. This could have been down to my broadband connection, so I’ll try it again on a collage system when I get the chance.

Students

We have introduced Second Life to some game Music students. At the moment it’s just a few but so far so good. The students instantly loved the way it works and the idea of exploration and meeting new people. They picked up the controls very quickly and soon got to work on their appearances, quite extravagant of course. When we asked the question “what do you think” one student replied “addictive” we thought this was quite positive.
The session went quite well and the students were keen to come back and have another go. The question is: will they take to it when it comes down to real work???

More building

Following encouragement by some members of senior management, we have decided to develop our college presence in SL a little more. Darren is, as I type, engaged in building a reception area. We are also currently debating the best way to lable areas of the building i.e what kind of fonts to use for doorways, room, etc and how to position them. I have been trying to build a reception desk.

Proposal for Continuation of Project

We have now written our proposal for the continuation of the Second Life project. Satwant (Director of Academic Planning and Cirriculum Technology),has asked us to submit our proposal in person at a meeting next Wednesday morning and break down for hewr what we have acheived so far. Hopefully, this we will meet with appproval and we will then back on track. Our avatars have their fingers crossed.

New Project Proposal

We are currently writing a proposal for an extension to the project. This is following some very positive feeddback from both other teachers and senior management alike.