Group items tagged

Virtual Med School? Ok, maybe not quite yet, although this blog post by Clare Linden shares an interview with Dave Taylor from Imperial College London regarding the use of SL as a tool for teaching medical procedures before trying them out on actual patients. Apparently Dave Taylor also built the NPL pavilion for the International Spaceflight Museum in SL as well. The virtual hospital, Second Health, was developed to provide lower-cost simulations of medical devices and help decrease incidents of errors in clinical settings. There are day surgery centers, a "keeping healthy showcase," and a really cool teleporter, reminiscent of Star Trek so you don't have to walk/fly to find things. Some areas are off limits, but there are plenty of things for the public to see. I'm interested in creating something along these lines for health care in a different setting. Blog site: http://blogs.secondlife.com/community/workinginworld/blog/2009/06/01/the-future-of-healthcare-3-questions-for-dave-taylor-of-imperial-college-london SLURL: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Second%20Health%20London/131/223/25

Numbakulla: The Pot Healer Adventure Second Life Innovative Learning Environment SLurl: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Numbkulla/215/18/22 This is the kind of place that I imagined I would visit when I first signed up for Second Life. While Second Life itself may not be a game, it has massive potential to be a place where educational games can be embedded and hosted. The Pot-Healer Adventure is not an educational game per se, but a highly interactive quest that gets the player to explore and solve puzzles. However, it is one of the few environments I've found so far that has key elements that couldn't easily be reproduced as an Adobe Flash video. The game starts with a shipwreck, which has left debris strewn over land and floating in the sea. It's an intriguing beginning, and a nice device to allow the player to interact with nearly everything visible. At the start you can pick up a notebook, which keeps track of things you pick up in the game, and gives you hints about what to do. A notecard at the beginning tells players that they are to find out about a mysterious old civilization that a previous explorer is no longer able to investigate. I'm not sure how this environment itself could be used for educational purposes, but the way it has been designed could and should be adapted for other purposes. I imagine the explore-and-interact puzzle format to lend itself to teaching history, and anthropology. It would be a particularly good way to teach how historians gather evidence, and what they can learn from old diaries, work reports, and other documents. I am glad that I found this interesting environment, and hope to return and explore it some more. I think that it could serve as inspiration to others looking to create more interactive quest-type lessons.

Again, I was alone here, but I found a helpful old-fashioned British phone box with information, including a calendar of events that take place here. I also noticed that genealogy publishers, such as Heritage Books, have a presence here, so that might make it easier for folks to find specific resources to buy or look for at their local libraries.

Their calendar is tied into Google Calendar, so if you want, you can add an event to your own Google Calendar(s) and get reminders. Nice feature.

Diane, have you checked out the Mormon island? I did, and you can access old censuses (sp?) and stuff. http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Adam%20ondi%20Ahman/183/51/25

Port Charles is one island among many in the region of Jabberwock in SecondLife. The islands are set in the 1700's in British colonial Jamaica, where the Royal Navy is battling with pirates. This island is British territory, but others are trading outposts controlled by pirates or smugglers dens that reminded me of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland. This is a role playing environment with fairly strict rules for battle, speech, and dress. After spending some time here I learned about the politics between the British and pirates, and how people dressed.

What originally piqued my interest in this site was the "Training for Traffic" that I read on the SL Work Success Stories site (http://work.secondlife.com/en-US/successstories/case/tuvnord/). No small wonder that that topic caught my eye, what with my 15 year old constantly begging me to let her drive. TUV NORD created several traffic situations that they turned into interactive driving tasks. I vaguely remember being in driver's ed and watching a movie in a "simulator" when I was 15. Once I found out that I could spin the steering wheel in any direction and it made no difference, I went on to what was, at the time, my next priority: sleeping. Parenthood brings new perspectives; I shudder at the thought that my child might do the same during her own driver's training class. This sim sounds realistic enough to not only keep a kid awake at the wheel, but give them experience before they get behind the wheel of a deadly weapon. Unfortunately, the sim was not up and running when I visited. This island also has some other interesting items of educational value. You can learn how to use ground penetrating radar (GPR) to find tree roots and underground electrical lines that you might not want to cut through. There is also a huge interactive fuel cell that you can fly through to investigate the inner workings of the thing, which would be useful in a discussion of chemistry, even at the grade levels that I teach (4th & 5th). The only drawback is that most of the notecards you get are in German. Most of the signs do have a translation tool, though (click on the British flag for English). SLURL: http://work.secondlife.com/en-US/successstories/case/tuvnord/

Great virtualworlds/secondlife/opensim blog to follow.   Points to free megaregion terrain file :)  (4 regions) and how to install. See also "Opensim on a USB key"

Excellent immersive experience recreating a slave's experience of the Middle Passage.   Note NEW correct location:  secondlife://SolipCISM/217/246/22

Experience the exhibit as an journalist investigating Kristallnacht, listening to eyewitness accounts, touring the destruction in town, seeing photos and reading the stories of people that were killed...A very media rich and sobering environment. Plan on taking your time to experience it.

An installation of Guantanamo Bay Prison in SL. I have to be honest, I have yet to be able to explore it after repeated tries over the past week. I've read about it and am intrigued, but my avatar is unable to collect the prison uniform necessary for the experience. I'm going to keep trying because it looks fascinating. Below is a link to a machinima produced about it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QT7p231Cfxk

An interesting exhibit built by RAWA (Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan) providing a glimpse into the geography, music, art and culture of Afghanistan.

This site is an example of a way to combine storytelling and/or reading comprehension with a more interactive environment. You go to the magical town of Brigadoon and learn the story of some of its inhabitants. Along the way you get quizzed on what you've read. Kits are available for those interested in designing their own quests. I wish they had made the environment more interactive, so that one could explore the places referenced in the story.

Sun Microsystems has done a lot of work in Second Life, and I visited part of their island. It was very interesting, because it showed their approach to moving portions of their business into a virtual world. They have a mix of customer-facing exhibits that include videos and product information, and resources for employees to meet together. Overall, I think they could take advantage of the interactive features of Second Life, but it's good to see companies using virtual worlds in interesting ways. Sun Microsystems was recently purchased by Oracle. It will be interesting to see how it affects Sun's presence in Second Life.

I was excited to see that The Tech, a wonderful museum in San Jose, CA, has a virtual exhibit. I found it interesting that they have very few traditional exhibits on display. Instead, they share free materials and teach visitors how to make virtual exhibits and display some user-generated exhibits - and there is the possibility that your user-generated exhibit could be displayed in museums in flatland. It's an interesting approach to a virtual museum, and I enjoyed the visit.

Jokaydia sleducation wiki secondlife resources .. Excellent page Links to tutorials guides .. a lot of pedagogical resources

I've never been able to find anyone here yet, but I did discover that nearby land included a nudist beach of some kind. One display had Ancestry.com's German homepage up it seemed. Also, there is an adorable gazebo here I'd love to have in my own yard in RL. Waiting to see if this place ends up being a useful resource in genealogy research.

Second Life Viewer 2.0 (now the default viewer for Second Life users) allows new capabilities to share and embed many types of online media. This blog post explains and points to some beginning examples of this powerful feature.