Week Three - Collaborative Learning

This was by far my favorite class meeting in the course as we were split into groups and moved throughout the Second Life grid as teams. The assignment was given to us in the form of a notecard:

The Task

You are journalists on assignment. Your editor (me) was to have a brief - containing the goals of your assignment and some background info - waiting for you at the airport. It did not arrive. Your team is made up of a project manager, a communicator/fact finder, a photographer and a writer. There is a story to write, but you don't know what it is. As a group you must determine how to divvy up responsibilities. You only have 10 minutes in each location...

Project Manager - Keep track of your team, the assignment and the time. Your job is to make sure the work gets done.

Communicator/fact finder - find people and ask questions. If no one is around or info is unreliable see if you can find out anything by searching google (name of island and "second life" as keywords)

Writer - create a notecard and record what the team learns about each sim. It doesn't need to be good writing, just clear enough for others and me to make sense of. The note card should contain the first name of each member of your team.

Photographer - take photos of the environs, something special about the place, something to show others about this sim, your colleagues in action...

Try to find out what is unique about the place, does it have any educational potential, why do you think I sent you here?

We were group 2 and assigned 5 locations - only 3 of which we had time to explore:

NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association)
Virtual Starry Night
Sistine Chapel
Svarga
College of Scripting Music

NOAA:

At the NOAA location we visited the island of Meteora (http://slurl.com/secondlife/Meteora/177/161/27/) where we saw 3d real-time weather reporting and could take a hurricane tour! They also have the island of Okeanos available for learning about the Ocean (http://slurl.com/secondlife/Okeanos/64/217/30/)

SISTINE CHAPEL:

A reproduction of the Sistine Chapel has been created an lives on Vassar's SL island. It was created by a professsor using public domain photographs and is to scale and simply stunning.

Welcome to the Vassar College Re-Creation of the Sistine Chapel.

We have re-created the Sistine Chapel as a proof-of-concept for how the technology of virtual worlds can augment or enhance a traditional liberal arts education.

TO VISIT THE SISTINE CHAPEL ON VASSAR ISLAND, YOU MUST AGREE TO THE FOLLOWING "CODE OF CONDUCT." You will only be asked to do this once.

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CODE OF CONDUCT

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Visiting the Sistine Chapel creates a deeply moving experience for many people for a variety of reasons, including religious, artistic and educational.

To preserve this same experience for those visiting the Sistine Chapel in Second Life, we expect all visitors to conduct themselves here as they would in real life: with respect for the environment as well as for those visiting the environment. Further, the Sistine Chapel was created for non-profit, educational use. You may not use it, or images of it, for any commercial purpose.

Any misconduct will result in banishment from Vassar Island as well as in a report to Linden Labs. Please contact Bret Rydell or Stan Frangible to report any such misconduct.

YOU MUST AGREE TO CONDUCT YOURSELF BY THIS CODE OF CONDUCT IN ORDER TO CONTINUE.

If you elect to disagree, you will be removed from the Sistine Chapel area of our island. However, you will still be free to visit other parts of our island. Note: the system that is used to remove you from the Sistine Chapel is one built-in to Second Life ("eject from parcel"). It is not the most graceful system, and we apologize in advance for the way that it may "drop" you on another part of the island.

Please use the blue menu on the upper right side of the screen to indicate your agreement with our Code of Conduct.

Virtual Starry Night:

Our last stop was the Vincent Van Gogh tribute in SL which you can get a taste of in this YouTube video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfruH02RD9M

Images are used with permission.

The "Code of Conduct" agreement system was developed by Kenn Nilsson of NDE Enterprises.

Hi,

Welcome to Virtual Starry Night, the Second Life Van Gogh exhibit. Here's some info to help you find your way:

> Cross the bridge to enter the museum with 70 Van Gogh masterpieces from all around the world. Along the routes you will find several 3D rendered paintings; you can use the '3D route' as a shortcut, just click on the paintings near the 3D objects

> At the central square you see the Yellow House with a mini-expo on Gaugain, who lived for while with Van Gogh in Arles (France).

> The mini-expo 'Vincent's Flowers' at the back of the square shows a selection of Van Gogh's flower paintings as well as some 3D'ed ones. Right next to it is the entrance of the 3D version of The Courtyard of the Hospital in Arles.

> A small shop is located on the first floor of the Yellow Cafe.

Keeping the area's default Night View on is highly recommended for the best viewing experience

Hope you'll enjoy your stay here!