Visited EdTech and Caledon Oxbridge this week. Caledon was very immersive, but I didn’t land in a good spot at first. Then, I realized that I was probably linked over to the village for a reason … it was just nice to look at, but no objectives to speak of.

Does the space have an identifiable instructional design?

In EdTech, we definitely found instructional design, but it was limited. There was definitely an air of mystery to the whole learning aspect. Teleporting in, there was a Non-Player Charact (NPC), or bot, there that would greet you, and if you engaged her, she would give you some instructions. The NPCs intelligence was limited, and after grabbing my welcome bag we departed for some self-guided discovery.

In Caledon Oxbridge Village, we dropped into a tree and randomly made our way over to a house that an NPC was constructing. The NPC had some conversational skills, and directed us over to the University; she offered a teleport, but we opted to walk.

What helps or hinders communication of what they want the users to understand, learn, or do?

The NPCs’ ability to engage in conversation helped. However, I’m not new to MMOs, and the generic welcome messages of an NPC aren’t enough to grab my attention. So, when I was greeted, I didn’t run up to the NPC and start having a conversation with it like my group members. Arguably, I’m well-trained to filter out these seemingly meaningless conversations that are started by an NPC. Being new to Second Life, it took me a minute to realize that, especially in these training worlds, I might want to converse with the NPCs.

Even when I conversed with the NPC, I felt like the conversational skills were very limited. Additionally, there were no visual cues to help drive the conversation forward. With both of the issues, the conversation went stale rather quickly.

When we explored Caledon Oxbridge, we found a walkthrough tutorial with arrows along the floor and placards to read. This was very clear about what needed to happen to learn. This was far superior to the other areas where we so much time and effort trying to figure out what to do. If there’s is any content, we were just not getting it. The game controls are a bit clunky, and not much like any of the other MMOs that I’ve played.

What tools do learners and designers use in the system that is effective? Ineffective?

One of my group members felt that vanishing chat was a hindrance. I liked it because it acted like a notification, and you could always go to the main chat window to see the chat history. To each their own, I guess. Focusing more on the design layouts, I feel like I already discussed this above, but I’ll address it here more directly.

I felt that the use of arrows to guide the learner through a path with placards to read was very clear; albeit not very technologically advanced. Sometimes we need to go for simplicity; especially when the conversational skills of the NPC were lacking. Additionally, if you’re going to use keywords to guide a user through a conversation, at least give a visual cue. For example, one MMO would have an NPC say, “Let’s go to the [pirate ship] in the bay.” This lets you know that to proceed in the conversation, your next question should contain pirate ship, like so: “What pirate ship?”

Does the 3D contribute to learning according to what you know from psychology or pedagogical practice?

Personally, I remember the environment and the interactions with the environment really well. In EdTech, we went to a mosk and read some about the Arabic cultures and the numbers one through ten. I don’t remember the numbers, as there was nothing to really reinforce that for me, however, I do remember some of the cultural points; such as:

If you are given a gift, do not open the gift in front of the giver. The gift is more about you than the gift itself.
Always shake hands with your right hand. If your right hand is full, shift what you’re carrying to your left hand to shake hands properly.
If greeting and shaking hands with Arab men and women, do not offer your hand to the women. An Arab woman should initiate the offer, offering her hand to you.

Why did I bring these points up? I’m, respectfully, not interested in learning about the Arab culture. However, just briefly skimming the signs on the wall of the mosk in this 3D environment seemed to have a more lasting and immersive effect. I believe that this is due to the fact that more of my senses were involved. Because of this, I relate it to constructivism and social constructivism. Although, I felt like there was a lot of cognitive overloads; likely in part because we had trouble finding instructional content.

I would argue that most children are easily distracted, so you would need a way to reign in your class. For example, a teacher might call students back to class for discussion and a student or two may be off playing around. The teacher would want the ability to summon them to their virtual seats to join in the discussion. Additionally, there would need to be a lot better direction.

Could you link this to some form of e-learning instructional design?

My last post briefly touched on my opinion on this matter. However, I do believe it could be useful for the right company or group of learners. One of my group members did a genetic exercise in Second Life where they would breed flowers, and predict the offspring colors. I felt that was a perfect use case and very immersive; assuming the results were accurate. I believe other viable use-cases would be for mechanical engineering, mock-ups, 3D renderings from CAD drawings, etc.

Does the immersive experience contribute to the learning for you or the members of the group? Are you the intended audience? Would it work for another audience?

The immersive experience did contribute to learning, but I’m left with the question, “What was I supposed to learn?” As I’ve discussed, the experience was rememberable, but a clear direction needs to be given. Additionally, the controls need to be a lot less clunky. Perhaps, the idea is good, but Second Life may be the incorrect medium.

With some serious thought and work, an effective course could be created. I believe that it would be a great investment of time if the funds were lacking to create a real lab for students to learn in.

My group and I decided that we like it more than Blackboard, but it was also more distracting. Overall the concept is very appealing and could have great application if the design is well planned out and a more controlled environment was available. However, Second Life, as a whole is very open and thusly has a lot of adult content. Although you can turn on censoring, it’s controlled in the profile of the account and is simply a preference. I wouldn’t want my kids playing this game.

References

(2015, November 11). Second Life GDP totals $500 million [Digital image]. Retrieved July 7, 2018, from https://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2015/11/second-life-gdp-totals-500-million/