Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
choice. A review conducted by the New Media
Consortium determined there were over 1,200
educational focused islands created in Second Life
during 2007 alone (Johnson, 2008). Collectively,
academia has designed and developed a range of
materials within Second Life, covering topics such
as computer programming, writing, Art history,
philosophy, game design, psychology, medicine,
construction, genetics and much more. And given
its past history, the academic use of Second Life
shows no signs of slowing down.
What has not been demonstrated as of yet is
the educational use of Second Life by corporate
training and development programs. While there
has been some scattered use within this commu-
nity of practitioners, on the whole the corporate
community has been slow to adopt Second Life.
This may come as a surprise to some. Why does
one user community rush to adopt a new tool
and the other seemly sit and watch? It goes to
reason that the same principles of learning in
both the educational and corporate training and
development communities are applicable so one
would expect to see the same rates of adoption
of Second Life in both communities. However,
this is certainly not the case.
Between September of 2008 and April of 2009
I conducted an eight month evaluation of Second
Life, its residents, tools that lend themselves to
educational practice and various locations already
developed for use by educators, both in corporate
and academic settings. As a participant-observer,
I explored Second Life and all that it offers; I met
various other residents, attended lectures, visited
workshops and even participated in my first
virtual conference. I found a technology filled
with promise and well-structured to only benefit
corporate training programs. Because of the visual
nature of Second Life, as shown in Figure 1, the
platform lends itself very well to education when
working with issues that requires 3D visualization,
movement and/or interaction and environments
too costly, if not impossible, to replicate in real-life
(Werner, 2008; Taylor & Chyung, 2008). Second
Life is also a social platform and allows residents,
the term users of Second Life call themselves when
in-world, to interact with each other. So besides
the obvious student/teacher interaction that can
occur, Second Life can also be used for activities
such as, role-play exercises, artistic expression
and team meetings.
Within this chapter I hope to show that while
the corporate training use of Second Life may not
be as prolific as the academic use, it is occurring.
I will first briefly introduce the world of Second
Life, discuss some of the main advantages and
hesitation that surround its use by the corporate
community, and also present examples of activi-
ties and exercises within Second Life currently
being conducted by the corporate training and
development community. It is my desire that by
the end of the chapter readers will have a funda-
mental understanding of Second Life and what it
has to offer as a development tool. In discussing
some of advantages and resistances surrounding
Second Life, readers should find not only a tool
full of promise but also realize that just like every
other tool it has pros and cons. Finally, the use of
real world examples should provide inspiration
for personal projects and demonstrate what is
currently possible by establishing a Second Life
presence.
Second Life
Second Life, run by Linden Lab, was opened to
the public in 2003 and over the last three years
has become the educational flagship of virtual
worlds. It is freely available and accessible almost
anywhere there is an Internet connection. Once
logged in, residents customize their avatar, go
through orientation and begin to interact with the
environment and each other. Communication in
Second Life is conducted through either text-based
Instant Messaging or Voice over IP. These tools
allow for residents to interact just as they would
in the real-world.
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