Many colleges have begun to incorporate Second Life into some of their courses’ curriculum, and some have held entire classes based in the virtual environment. At Seton Hall University, students taking Danielle Mirliss’s Industrial and Organizational Psychology course this fall were able to use Second Life as part of a virtual team-building exercise. In it, students were given a cover story in which they were working for a public-relations firm that was building a piece on the best places and people in the Second Life world. The class spent two hours completing a structured scavenger hunt within Second Life, followed by completing a wiki and a survey.

What is unique about this community is that the “experts” are hidden behind avatars.  I meet people at the teachers buzz sessions and other events in Second Life but have no idea about what they do in real life (and that they are truly experts in their fields).  My recent campaign to get access to the LearnLand sim is a great example.  I literally went down the names in the group, IMing anyone who might take pity on the this non-consortium member until finally Mark Oehlert, Booze Allen associate, responded and (I am sure it was his influence) shortly after I was added to the LearnLand group.  Mark – if for some reason you stumble upon this post, would you ever consider being a guest lecturer for my class in Sl as well???

What I was really hoping for was for someone from this project to speak to my students about how virtual worlds are being used or how they might be used for corporate training.  I stumbled upon Brent Schlenker’s blog and his posting about LearnLand and asked him to be a guest presenter (keeping my fingers crossed that he can make it).

Digging around even further and after reading more posts on both their blogs I think I might have met them before in world at various NMC events (LOTS of credit to the work that NMC has been doing, especially these events!!).  Who knew that Mark is ChuckNorris and Brent is Rightbrain?  It is really a small world!

It is interesting to hear the different perspectives on ePortfolios – the need for collecting products of student work sometimes lends itself to language that reminds me of the “mind as container” metaphor.  How can we create a portfolio that serves as a creative, reflective vehicle for students but also meets the needs of institutional assessment?  I hope to be able to explore other uses of electronic portfolios with our involvement in the National Coalition for Electronic Portfolio Research (more to come).

While losing time looking at Flickr pics I stumbled upon pictures that were taken at the ELI Fall Focus Session – Supporting Learning with Techology: Assessment’s Role. I knew that pictures were being taken but to my surpise I found a couple of me (and even more of my Director – I have to tell him *smile*).  Cyprien must have edited out the bad ones – thanks!!

The program’s objective is to enhance the knowledge and skills of health care professionals to meet the public health preparedness and emergency response demands resulting from acts of bioterrorism and other incidents. Training will assist and facilitate understanding of the needs and response measures as they relate to the following: Recognizing indicators of terrorist events; Meeting the acute health care needs of patients and victims, including pediatric or other vulnerable populations, including those with mental health needs; Participating in coordinated, multidisciplinary response to terror events or other health emergencies; and Rapidly and effectively alerting the public health system of such an event at the community, state or federal levels.

 
Ramesh making a building explode!

I hope to be able to allow my students to experience a virtual training simulation as part of our discussion on training and development.  Stay tuned for some ideas…