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disbelief required by students to engage in and
benefit from role play, combined with the inor-
dinate amount of time and preparation it takes
to run a successful role play in the traditional
classroom (time which is becoming more and
more precious as contact hours dwindle), have
heretofore hindered its effectiveness as a tool.
MUVEs, however, provide an adequate environ-
ment to have students perform and experience the
sociocultural roles and simulations outside of the
traditional classroom context while allowing for
proper assessment and guidance.
Key in simulations is that students experi-
ence something within a MUVE using the target
language. Exploring virtual environments (or
simulations such as the travel agency), shar-
ing these experiences through “show and tell”
(think fashion show); participating in events,
etc. MUVEs offer an infinite variety of potential
scenarios and contexts which work to the benefit
of both creativity and realism. Devising scenarios
which engage learners through their realism and
relevance may, ironically, be more possible in a
virtual world than in real life. In fact, by entering a
MUVE, students are already taking on a role. This
affords the possibility of setting tasks which are
more adventurous. For example, within a virtual
hotel, students are not restricted to simulating the
most likely scenarios. They could also be set the
task of dealing with large infestation of rodents
or a collapsing roof! Learners can change their
appearance, their clothes or even their form and
which can lead to greater levels of meaningful
language transaction through role-play.
Against this it should be noted we found a ten-
sion between some of the affordances of SL and
designing tasks grounded in reality. Firstly, in the
hotel scenario, to maximise interaction opportuni-
ties it may seem very useful to have some students
adopt the role of someone working in the hotel.
Whatever proportion of students would actually
require English as a hotel guest however it is far
less likely that any of them would ever exercise
a role in hotel management. Nonetheless we felt
this was an acceptable role trade-off for a minority
within an overall probable scenario for guests.
Secondly, the potential for creating exagger-
ated or fantastical situations - very feasible in
SL - needed to be offset against the difficulty in
setting these up or the degree of removal from
reality. Though on one level less imaginative,
students often appreciated very straightforward
situations such as checking into a hotel. Many
reported feeling that in this type of scenario,
they were having a genuine, life-like 'experi-
ence' which made them nervous and raised a real
prospect of failure - an important characteristic of
real life immersive learning. Real immersion is
rarely comfortable after all. Finally, however well
constructed the situation in terms of environment
and task, it could be too far removed from either
students' real life experience or their expectations.
An example of this was a carefully constructed
“business meeting” lesson (set in a conference
room) which didn't work well initially as students
failed to adopt the “roles” and hence didn't use
language typical of a RL business meeting. They
still saw themselves as students and treated one
another thus accordingly. This enabled us to see
that surroundings, physical or virtual, don't make
“reality” without the right development, including
social identity.
Overall though, the way that this multi-user vir-
tual environment (MUVE) can deliver an authentic
environment in which a role-play can take place
at a distance is nothing short of transformative.
Only being immersed directly in the target culture
could surpass this virtual immersion into an envi-
ronment in which a student actually performs the
sociolinguistic functions they would be required
to perform in the target culture / destination.
Assessment
Our approach to assessment and evaluation bears
a strong correlation with our approach to teach-
ing; just as we consider what is possible within a
MUVE to have more in common with good prac-
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