Danny - Week 3 Article Review

A Grid-Development for the Learning and Teaching Practice in Second Life

This article examines Second Life as an immersive educational tool in various areas. It aims to help users avoid the probable misuse of SL as an educational technology (Rappa et al, 2008), encouraging and sparking their own ideas. Ten case studies are selected to help users utilize SL more effectively and properly, each of which includes a pedagogical approaches along with a concept explanation, an example, and implementation suggestions.

Qualitative methods are applied, in which case studies are based on the forms of participative inquiries, personal observations, formal and informal interviews, and documenting the perceptions of teachers and students using SL as an educational tool. However, the validation of key assertions is abated as most of the research is collected in online blogs and informal publications.

Based on this research, further exploration of ideas and empirical evidence are welcome. Educators and students who have not yet participated in SL are encouraged to be in-world. It is believed that virtual worlds will earn their places in mainstream education. Validation and assessment of SL-based learning remain open-ended to more methodologies. Questions remain as to how best to integrate a wide range of different media and cyber technologies to strengthen the advantages of learning in immersive worlds. Guidelines still need to be proposed to support practitioners and learners.

After reading this article, I begin to ponder whether there are research methods which are more reliable on SL-based education than interviews, blogs, and personal observations. I am casting doubt on it. Since as an emerging tool in pedagogical field, teachers involved in this cutting-edged experimental research discipline are more likely to have high expectations in the performance of students participating in virtual worlds, which would perhaps constrain their expression of suggestions, frustrations, dissatisfaction towards SL.

In this regard, evaluation process is suggested to be improved. The ‘before and after’ performances of utilizing SL as a learning tool should be observed and compared so that a more objective and convincing conclusion can be obtained.

Rappa, N., Yip, D. & Baey, S. (2008). The role of teacher, student and ICT in enhancing student engagement in muve. BJET, DOI 10.1111/j.1467-8535.2007.00798.x. Revieved on 11 December 2010. http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/117984068/home