The Affordances of Second Life for Education - Teaching through Multi-User Virtual Environments - page 102

tem). Voice can also be used for one-on-one IMs,
Friends conferences, and group IMs, although the
auditory information about relative location and
the wave graphic are missing in these situations.
Increasingly, Voice is being used for formal pre-
sentations in SL. It is much easier to communicate
large amounts of information, or for long periods
of time, in voice rather than in text, and easier to
process for the audience. However, during large
group presentations, audience members need to
be warned to “mute” their microphones, to avoid
too many distracting background noises. It is
common practice during Voice presentations for
participants to ask questions and remark using
text chat. The speaker can review the chat when
appropriate and respond as needed. (A “back
channel” discussion among audience members in
text chat allows for many people to participate at
once, something that is much harder to achieve
in a First Life classroom.)
Using voice in Friends conferences is a great
way for small-group work in SL, and, since it works
no matter where the members of the conference
are located in SL, this allows for groups to keep in
touch with each other even as they explore different
parts of the world, perhaps in search of diverse
information for a group project. Note, however,
that if someone is in a Voice IM conversation or
Friends conference, they do not hear the Voices
of avatars who are immediately nearby. Text IM
conversations, on the other hand, do not interfere
with text or voice chat, and so might be preferable
in some situations. It should be noted that some
people are uncomfortable with using Voice in
SL, especially when they are first learning about
the environment or new to a particular location.
It is considered polite in some circumstances to
offer a text IM or make a text chat greeting before
using voice with a stranger. Also, while Voice is
usually a faster method of communicating than
text, the two produce somewhat different styles of
thinking, and it is much more difficult to create a
log of what happens when using voice. Teachers
would do well to experiment with Voice and text

to determine which work best in which situations
and for which students.
Another very interesting capability for com-
munication and collaboration in SL is the use of
Notecards. A Notecard is simply an inventory item
that contains text, as well as links to landmarks,
textures (images), sounds, scripts, objects (includ-
ing clothing) or other Notecards. Notecards are
used for all sorts of purposes, including provid-
ing, for announcements of events, and simply to
communicate asynchronously at length about any
topic. They can be used more or less as email mes-
sages or attachments and are sent to any number
of users by dropping them onto avatars or onto a
special section of their profiles. Teachers can create
“worksheets” or visual organizers via Notecards,
or give instructions that include landmarks to
relevant locations in SL. Students can use No-
tecards as a way to “turn in” assignments, or for
sharing ideas or drafts with each other. Notecards
can also be embedded in objects so that when an
avatar touches the object the text is delivered to
only that avatar via Instant Message.
To create a Notecard, open your Inventory
(lower right of the screen), and choose “New Note”
from the Create menu. Or, right-click anywhere
in the Inventory and choose “New Note” from
the pop-up menu. The New Note will open, and it
will be listed under its default name “New Note”
under the Notecards folder in your Inventory. Now
is the time to change the name (since it is high-
lighted; you can also later rename any Notecard
by right-clicking it in the Inventory and choosing
Rename). Then, start typing text (or pasting text).
To add other items, simply drag them from your
Inventory onto the Notecard. (The other items
must be transferable.) Notecards can hold up to
64000 characters, or about 8000 words.
Images are another important avenue for com-
munication in Second Life. SL is built with an
enormous capacity to handle images, snapshots,
and textures (which are more or less equivalent).
The Second Life “camera” allows a user to pan,
zoom, or rotate around any object or event, and