Virtual Pioneers Online History Conference!

Come and join in the 3D immersive fun and learn while you do it!

 Second Life and OpenSimulator, two important artifacts of future history, are continually providing new ways to see, hear, and personally experience the past. Other 3D platforms are doing so as well, and in the course of these presentations over a two day period, as you drop in when your own schedule allows, you will see what all this can mean for learning and teaching over the next generation. Read the press release for the conference.

Andrew Wheelock (Spiff Whitfield) has facilitated into being a group of around 200 educators interested in exploring history in virtual worlds. The Virtual Worlds Pioneers has been going strong for years now, having started out in a Ning and migrating to grou.ps (as did so many other communities) when Ning dumped their free-for-education policy. The new address is at http://grou.ps/virtualpioneers/home and I heartily encourage you to join.

Why? Because VWP consistently offers events in virtual worlds where educators can share a passion for history. In doing so, they build friendships that can last a lifetime. Two lifetimes, even...

If you don't have a Second Life avatar, now's the time. Simply visit Secondlife.com and get one for free. Play around with it for half an hour prior to the conference so you will be able to sit or walk without sitting on someone's head (considered rude in any historical period or culture) or bumping into others embarrassingly. 

This is the first ever VWP online history conference, but it won't be the last. Themed "Re-Create, Educate, Illuminate--Learning History Virtually," it runs Friday and Saturday, October 29 and 30, coming up in just under two weeks. I'll be wrapping up the conference with a closing keynote on Saturday, 4 pm SL (Pacific) time, to be followed by a "Closing Celebration- Socializing, dancing, prizes, and music!" The entire schedule is available online at the conference website and it looks to be a doozy! 

Heck, I'll save you a click or two:

Saturday, October 29:

Date	Time (SL time)	Session	SLURL
10/29/10	1-2pm	Kimmer Jameson from PBS Eight will inspire us with her blend of great teacher resources that can adapt to Virtual Environment history.	Virtual Pioneer Headquarters
10/29/10	2-4pm	Csteph Submariner will lead us on a tour of this unbelievably detailed and historically accurate sim that highlights the trials and poetry of this era in world history.	Western Front
10/29/10	4-5pm	Jacon Cortes will take us on a tour of Antiquity Texas, an 1800's role playing sim in the Antiquty Community of Victorian Sims and ruled under the gracious hand of the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess of Antiqutiy. Jacon has a superior knowledge of this time period as well as tremendous skill as a Second Life designer and builder. Please join us on this fantastic tour.	Antiquity Texas
10/29/10	5-6pm	Eureka Dejavu- Understanding Islam in Virtual Worlds	Virtual Pioneer Headquarters
10/29/10	6-7pm	Tamsin Barzane- The Yoruba Light Project (still under construction) connects the past and present of the West African Yoruba people to Salvador da Bahia in Brazil and to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.	Yoruba Light

Saturday, October 30:

Date	Time (SL)	Description	SLURL
10/30/10	10-11am	BigD Flanagan- Join BigDin a discussion of team teaching Social Studies in the secondary setting.  BigD has 17 years of History teaching experience to bring to this topic.  The subject lends itself to a wide array of teaching approaches and practices.	VP SKYBOX
10/30/10	11-12pm	Shenlei Flasheart-Overview of the 1:1 simulation of the Gettysburg Battlefield being developed in the openSim-based ScienceSim grid. Discuss how educators can become involved in this large-scale, big picture project to fully simulate the critical, 3 day Battle of Gettyburg.	Virtual Pioneer Headquarters
10/30/10	12-1pm	Norma Underwood -Historical Building by Students. Come see the Lincoln Memorial and a Holocaust Memorial built on a Second Life Teen Estate and moved to the Reaction Grid. If you are interested in re-enactments or role-playing, this shows what 13 and 14 yr olds are capable of doing.	Virtual Pioneer  Headquarters Reaction Grid
10/30/10	1-2pm	DrM Magic- Connections Through Cultural Dynamics DrM & Students will present a cultural quilt of history and familial dynamics that bring educators and students together through a historic poster presentation blanketing their comforting past, gingerly gifting it to 21st Century learners!	Virtual Pioneer Headquarters

10/30/10	2-3pm	Ydnar Seljan-A Walk Through History with Language	Professional Development Cruise
10/30/10	3-4pm	Nany Kayo- Dias de Los Muertos-The Day of the Dead -Exploring this unique Mexican holiday.	Smithsonian Museum of Latino Music
10/30/10	4-5pm	Closing Speaker- Scott MerrickOh- Will wrap up our conference as only Scott can, by inspiring us with the future of virtual environments and education.	Virtual Pioneer Headquarters
10/30/10	5-6pm	Closing Celebration- Socializing, dancing, prizes, and music!	Olive's Bistro

Cross-posted from Oh!VirtualLearning!

Virtual Worlds "Second Coming" Article

Web Watch writer Tim Ferguson has penned an analysis of the current and future states of virtual enterprise in an insightful article at silicon.com. In it, he forwards the notion that the initial failure of enterprise to capitalize on the technological advantages VE can offer was due to a hasty misread of the tools' capabilities and potentials, the very same sentiment I heard at SLEDcc08 from our pal Sarah Robbins. At that Tampa, Florida conference, she said that "corporations should stop whining that there's no potential just because they didn't do it right." That's the quote to the best of my memory, and that's pretty much what Ferguson has to say today. His is a fascinating summary and well worth a read. From the article:

Organisations are discovering myriad ways to benefit from virtual worlds.

The first and perhaps most obvious is collaboration. This includes holding real-time meetings in the worlds with each member participating via an avatar. It can be a big cost saver, as it removes the need to fly workers around the globe.

Virtual worlds can also help teams spread across several locations work together and co-ordinate projects.

The virtual world Qwaq, for example, allows users to create rooms that can store documents relating to a project, and where team members can meet up to share those documents and discuss the project using their avatars, IM and even VoIP.

I took a quick look at Qwaq, and it looks like a solution for companies to isolate their involvement in the 3Dinternet to collaborational meetings (which is certainly a nice market niche, but not necessarily one that will enable broadly innovative uses of virtual environments). It's also pricey, imho, when with a little flexibility an existing platform like Second Life can be used for similar purposes. I'll investigate more fully and report out. Perhaps a Qwaq-er could comment here in response and elucidate further?

Virtual Teaching and Learning Starts with Quest Atlantis

I'm going to begin journaling my personal experiences with Quest Atlantis here in order that I might pull out perhaps publishable bits for print later on. So stay tuned here (and I may cross-post at Oh! Virtual Learning) for that. This is an exciting time for me and I hope to share it prodigiously.

It's been interesting this past year, learning about and experiencing the powerful way that immersion into a 3 dimensional internet experience (3Di) can lead to engaged learning. Most notably, I think of Peggy Sheehy's powerful presentation at the Second Life Educational Community Conference in Tampa, a gathering about which I've already blogged, and I'd also send you to Fleep Tuque's marvelous roundup at her blog, Fleep's Deep Thoughts. Funny, I use Second Life names and "rl" (real life) names interchangeably. Fleep is Chris Collins "irl" (in real life) and Peggy is Maggie Marat. I noticed in Tampa that folks tended to lean toward addressing one another using avatar names. There's a Masters thesis in there somewhere, ya'll--the whole issue of identity extension into digital realms. Thankfully, I don't have to write it here.

Peggy is THE pioneer in leading young students into immersive learning experiences via 3Di in the Second Life Teen Grid. This is a realm I have never visited, since I've as of yet failed to hook myself into a project, a required criteria for approval for adult entry into the TG. I hope to progress into the TG, and after listening to some of the success stories at the SLEDCC, I have every faith that I will. Meanwhile, I'm beginning my foray into VE with Quest Atlantis. The journey looks promising.

Quest Atlantis is a 3Di environment that has been working with students and teachers on a global scale since 2004. The extensive website that supports the teaching and learning states "Over the last four years, more than 10,000 children on five continents have participated in the project." I was introduced to it years ago and never got around to really digging in, that is until my relatively new friend Jeff Agamenoni, a teacher of special needs middle schoolers in Great Falls, Montana, needled me to investigate it.

Jeff's another story altogether. I met Jeff in Second Life, when he sought me out to add his new blog, "From Mr. A to Mr. Z" to the ISTE Island Blogger's Hut, a facility I maintain for the International Society for Technology in Education in Second Life. His avatar, Henny Zimer (that's "zymer," with a long "y," for those audial learners in the readership). We became friends. We Skype occasionally, twitter back and forth, and generally co-explore new technologies, especially social ones, together. We share a fascination with the new ways technologies are flattening the globe, and I respect his opinions, fresh as they are with the eyes of a newcomer to the field.

First Steps
I visited the QA website. I clicked on the "Educators" tab. I checked out the Professional Development (PD) schedule, and was appalled to see that qualifying for QA participation requires teachers to spend a month learning about the platform. PD sessions run weekly, about 2 hours a week, in the evening. I immediately set about trying to perform the equivalent of "testing out" of the training, sending an email to the website managers stating my prior experience with the 3Di, my various statuses as blogger (SL blog, contributor to the "official" Second Life Education blog), and my newly hatched LLC, MUVErs, dedicated to helping education and the 3Di "play well" together.

I received a prompt and polite response that I had to do the PD.

A little huffy, I thought to myself, well, I don't have time for that. My Google calendar, by the way, is pretty much a nightmare. My lovely wife, Lee Ann, and I have weekly meetings to make sure we're on the same page about our commitments, personal, familial, and professional; and it doesn't help that process much that I have two paying jobs--one as Lower School Technology Coordinator at University School of Nashville and one as "Teacher-in-residence" at the Vanderbilt Center for Science Outreach--and a start-up company that's currently knee-deep into high stakes negotiations with a large Mid-west America university system to help provide 3Di simulations for online learning. "NO WAY," was my thought.

Then one day last week I was inspired by an online conversation with Jeff to go look at the schedule again. I spent a bit more time at the QA website and complained to him that I'd missed the first in the September training sessions. He encouraged me to register for the rest, saying that he'd missed the first of his sessions but since it was basically introduction to VE, he was sure I could do the same. Here comes the nail in the coffin (perhaps an analogy with undue negative connotations, but such a graphic one I can't help but resort to it). I twittered a question:

Who wants to partner with me in Quest Atlantis training? 2 hours each Wed. Oops, there goes my audience, LOL

I did not expect any reply.

I went about my work irl. In a few minutes, I checked my tweets. The usual suspects had posted random, often helpful and informative thoughts, including this one.

@scottmerrick I do I do I do! 08:54 AM September 16, 2008 from web in reply to scottmerrick

It was from Peggy Sheehy, MaggieMarat on twitter, and my dear friend. Maggie, btw, was one of my 8 co-presenters in last summer's "SLedupotential: Educational Potentials of Second Life and Virtual Environments" at NECC2008 in San Antonio. Like quite a few friends I've met in Second Life and grown to know irl, Maggie/Peggy feels to me like a childhood friend never lost. What did I call her, a "dear friend?" I mean that. Later, friend Malinda McCormick (Joie Despres in Second Life) replied with a query about which session I was registering for. I hope that means that she'll join us! Malinda and I are "pagemates," a joking reference to our sharing a page in ISTE's "Leading and Learning with Technology" print and online publication this past summer as featured members of that 85,000 member international organization.

This may be time for a little aside. This is another Masters thesis topic, the strong bonds created by individuals who first meet "virtually," or "online," and then get to know one another personally and professionally and form amazingly strong relationships in both domains, maybe many domains. I will hypothesize here that the relationships are forged by common interests and predelections, not a half-bad way to start relationships, and further that these beginnings would never have happened at all without the mediating technology of the 3Di. Educational sage David Warlick and I have become friends for the very same reason, as he noted in a Skype chat with my teacher participants in 2007's Web2.0forUS! workshop: "Scott and I are not friends because of our geographical proximity. We are friends because of our ideas." I have never had so much as a cup of coffee with David. But when we meet irl he greets me like an old friend. I feel greeted and I return that greeting. I feel priveliged to know him, as well as to be known by him. That's what friendship is, or at least what supports it. It's powerful.

I must get back to my little journal.

Okay, well, tonight at 7 pm my time I will login to Quest Atlantis, using a new username, MisterMerrick, and my password that I set when I confirmed my participation in the teacher PD program, and I'll fire up Skype and get a voice connection with Bronwyn Stuckey, a teacher who leads QA PD from her home in Australia. The journey begins.

More later :)

Google's Lively "Surprisingly Lifeless"

In an an online article from the print version of The Economist, the editors lampoon Google's efforts to create a novel, browser-based 3-dimensional virtual world. It's a good, quick read with a quote by friend Kathy Schrock, and it makes some very good points, especially about there basically being "nothing to do in Lively unless you're talking to someone." The article's lead-line says it all: "Lively, Google’s virtual world, has been a flop..."

Is there hope for Lively? I'm not sure, and my crystal ball is not responding today, but if you want to learn more about it go visit the Lively website and download the application to play with. My own little Lively build is here. But you have to call a friend to ask them to join you there, unless you are happy just dangling your feet off the dock...

Read more...

Cheers,
Scott