Jess’ E-Learning Blog

I’m just going through the orientation to Second Life, which I’m planning to evaluate in terms of its e-learning experience. Flying is interesting on my laptop; the page up and page down buttons control vertical movement. I have to hold down the Fn button to access my page up and down buttons. The problem occurs when I hold down the Fn button and then the up or down arrows … and wonder why my screen is suddenly really bright or really dark!!! Because the page up and down buttons aren’t on the up or down arrow buttons (where I think it would make more sense) – the screen brightness is! ^_^

Another negative aspect I am noticing is that my download speed doesn’t seem to be fast enough. My visual is coming in images, rather than a flow of movement, which made it hard for me to control my flying and driving in the movement tutorial.

Nope, my real life officially is not busy enough, so I’m joining Second Life to complicate my life to a satisfactory level ^_^ Okay, I’m really joining Second Life as a part of my E-Learning assignment. I’m not sure if I’ll stay or regularly visit Second Life after my assignment is complete – it depends on how hooked I get (too much online activity is baaaaaaaad and I might have to resort to cold turkey in order to ‘cure’ myself).

So far, I’ve only completed the preliminary registration for Second Life. I’m waiting to download the software until I have free downloads tonight – my brother and I are reaching our limit early this month *blushes*.

But, while I wait, just a quick note on the registration. They ask a few personal questions which need to answered in order for you to join. Questions like full name, date of birth and country of birth. I understand that the date of birth is required to prevent people over 17 from accessing the teen area of Second Life. I fully agree with that as a safety precaution, but I’m not very happy with providing personal details on the Internet. Call me neurotic, but I have a thing for protecting my real identity and keeping it at least slightly separate from my avatars. I don’t feel comfortable having my details on the Internet, ready to be hacked and carted away. That’s just me.

I just finished a learning preference questionnaire called VARK, which stands for the four different types of learning measured: Visual, Aural, Read/Write and Kinaesthetic. The questionnaire said I had a preference for aural, with a mark of 8, with visual and read/write at 6 and kinaesthetic at 5. I had done something similar to this at the beginning of last year and I was very visual, and my aural was low, so I was surprised by the results this time. I guess it goes to show that preferences change as we are exposed to more and different types of learning.

I decided that I’ll base assignment three on Second Life, mainly because I do not know much about virtual worlds or online gaming as a tool for learning and because I think that it could be a really interesting way of structuring learning. So, in preparation for joining Second Life, I was reading the FAQ page when I found two points that really formed the crux of why I was interested in Second Life: creativity and ownership.

I think that both of these factors are important in facilitating motivation and interest in online activities. A problem with e-learning that I have experienced is that there is so little ‘real’ interaction which demotivates me.

But Second Life has the opportunity for learners to have so much control over their environment, actions and learning. Individuals can create their own avatars, but also create their own environments and can direct their own experiences. Individuals can also own their own plot of cyber-space (for a fee) and can create their own environments. Individuals in Second Life are greatly empowered. It is this empowerment which interests me and which I believe can motivate individuals to learn.