What follows are my raw notes from this morning’s presentation in Jokaydia. I’ll return to this later to clean up the mess, including typos and formatting – but it gives at least an overview of what was discussed. If I’ve missed anything or included it in error please post additions, corrections or comments.
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Ramapo Islands: A New Dimension in Learning
Presenter: Maggie Marat a.k.a. Peggy Sheehy
Recordings being posted to jokadia blog
“Literacy has evolved”
“Reading, writing and maths is not going away”
- Once teachers realise this, don’t feel as threatened.
Helping our kids to do problem solving
Layer need to add to schools – on top of languages and social sicences add collaborative activities to enhance and develop citizenship. cultural diversity.
Fundamental Shift: Can’t say “the shift has happened, and all students now learn like this…” Can say “as a generation, our generation has shifted”
“brain science supports change in learning habits”
photo of computers in library -
- one day, kids working in secondlife; visitor stopped by on window sill (bird/pigeon)
- pigeon has hopped into room; strolling across the keyboards
- @ circulation desk of librarian – pls get camera & take a picture
- kids all had mobile phones to take pictures (natural reaction to take them out for snaps) – “pigeonal natives”
Purchasing an Island
- adults do not have free reign. For kids
- one time purchase of $700 + monthly tier fee
Ramapo security
- Superintendent needed to ensure kids were safe/secure
- “total control over estate” – kids locked in; rest of teen grid cannot see us; see or exchange content = closed wall community
- Linden Labs background clearance
- superintendent wanted second layer of security
- if open 24/7 can’t guarantee supervision will always be present “wouldn’t throw kids into the lunch room and walk away”
- island closed until supervisor logs in
- in world most nights to give creative time and not just task performance time.
- took 9 months to prepare proposal via scour internet for SL for education
- Recommended location: Educators Coffeehouse!!!
- When asked about SL, would responde “what are you doing in your classroom right now” and then come up with an educational use
- district supports class in use of SL now
- professional learning network in main grid
- Orientation island too overwhelming. “Frustrates anyone who is not technically savy”
- Instead recommends: Discovery Educators Network (DEN)
- See also, Dante’s Inferno, ISTE, NASA??? (check out)
- Emphasise searching for hobby, alma mater – find local connection/relevance
- Educators need 2 avatars – one main, and one @ramaho (private and locked)
- Full Value Program (Ramaho)
- Saftey, interaction rules, dress code (same dress code applies as real life)
- same rules as in school apply on the islands- take pledge/oath on consequences
- only banned 2 avatars out of 1,400
- Student Intro – self contained group (individual educational plans; learning or educational disibilities)
- developed self-esteem and self-confidence
- gave them title of “peer mentor”; helped other kids in the classroom
- skills carried on into the real world
- “waiting for someone to conduct reseasrch on autism or asbergers in SL”
- No student has ever used instructional displays. want to figure things out on their own
- “I brought a 19th century learning style into the virtual classroom” and quickly learned it wouldn’t work
- DECCA pods
- chat of only a few people captured in logs, can be sent to instructor
- Located at Terra Incognita – Decca’s Deck (Deckah Mah)
Science experiment
- gave them whole flore of a castle – called it “Invention Convention”
- presented inventions, attached notecard
- “Educators, don’t be afraid to extend your hand to other organisations” (don’t be afraid to ask for help)
Languages
- Island dedicated to foreign language – only island where they’ve activated voice
- need frame of reference for assessment (text can be logged, voice – no)
- foreign language, wanted immersion
- some days audio chat worked well; other days it was problematic
- Languages spoken: mandarin chinese, spanish, french, italian
- let kids build artifacts
Mathmatics
- “write down one geometric concept for each student and send them to library” e.g. vertical angles – go build it.
- one student included a note card – “if you solve this problem you get one linden dollar”
- lead to giving kids stipend – limited to island.
- learned how to budget and determine percentages
Ellis Island
- take research you learned on ellis island and build something devoted to ellis island in SL
- at first nothing different than you could do in RL; but at end of project:
- kids asked “how could we do this better”
- response “should have had an ellis island experience. some of us inmmigration officers; some immigrants – and then could experience what it was like to immigrate.
- response two – locate real world documentation and act that out (role playing); then swap roles and do it again.
- kids differentiating the instruction
- lesson = “listen to your students”
Of Mice and Men
- role play – mock trial. each student had a role
- kids were so engaged; started having lunchtime meetings
- First day, noisy and chaotic (learning how to do things)
- day of trial – only heard keyboards typing furiously
- both years trial has been incredible
Body Image Exercise
- campaignforrealbeauty.com
- discussions about how media portrays beauty and how it affects society
- Day One: kids created self-portait – exactly how they looked in RL
- discussions ensued, basic lightheared discussion
- Day Two – make yourself beautiful according to how media portrays beauty
- more discussion – guys “why do you think we like all that makeup”
- girls”why do you think we like muscles”
- Day Three – make avatar, cross-gender
- girls created beautiful male
- guys created beautiful female
- discussions – angry “we can’t all look like this”
- teacher observation: “this never happens in class”
- realised, being in SL = increasing level of discourse; every child participating. Kids jumping and having real discussions
- Day Four – Rever to avatar you’re most comfortable with.
- majority returned to original avatar
- got emotional “really happy the way I am”
- Student: “this is why half my friends are anorexic”
- Dialogue: Student 1 – “well, anyone can be beautiful in SL”
- Dialogue: Student 2 – “well, anyone can be beautiful in RL if they have enough money”
- Dialogue: Student 3 - “maybe we need to start thinking about what beauty really is.”
snapshot – body image: enhanced avatar vs real avatar
- Teenager need to have a safe place to expore opportunities without fear of consequence; found this applies to anyone regardless of age
YEAR TWO – Shift from good intentions to best practices
- Observed 6 teachers having their team leader meeting @ 9pm on a Tuesday night; some at home inPJ’s, others at library
- Principal has an avatar
The Effect of the Time Period of the Book
- kids learning scripting, reading the SL wiki; researching on their own
- had to research standardized stuff and created PPT presentation, presented in presentation
- Getting extension from classroom to outside of classroom and school
Day one for orientation – then activities range from a few days to 2 weeks.
Poinkey’s Pods
- dress up like character, meeting in pods, have discussions and ask each other’s questions
- images look like Pilgrims not revolutionary period
- students: “this was all we could find”
Entrepreneuship
- start with posters
- winners awarded land to build their poster
- students conducted job interviews; informed they had to train
- students created: amusement park; paintball pod in the sky
- students looked for ways to shoot – paintball finally approved
- students created QT movies, loaded into viewer
- Socratic Seminars – Socratic mode of discussion
Multimedia Island
- 12 or 13 different working musical instruments
- sound stage
- students figured out way to stream in music by playing into microphone
- machinema
Extension of Digital Music Class
- marcjaffee.com
- kids using advanced composition software
- individual music stores with a music vendor in it
- MP3′s for students to show/sell
- Pay LL$, download to iPod
- students learned marketing, represent music visually; design elements
“Digitales” / “Story Worlds in SecondLife”
- spends time getting down to emotional voice
- showing not telling
- met in SL, ended up working with kids from Ramapo in RL
- kid building story in iMovie, building in SecondLife; hosted in Main Grid
- The process – outlined in http://ramapoproject.wikispaces.com
Teachers struggling to incorporate reflection into their classroom – SL is good for this.
Business Proposals
- must be collaborative and good for the community
Poinkey’s Pots (spelling?)
- navigation on left of screen
- teacher hit’s up button
- saucers in different parts of the sky; up button places them far enough apart to avoid clashing audio chat.
The End Result
