entrepreneurship course in second life®
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TRANSCRIPT
The use of New Technologies in Education: some proposals on
designing an entrepreneurship course using Second Life®
University of CoimbraPedro Nunes' Institute
Paula Simões, J.R. De Carvalho, M.Z. RelaIASK – Teaching and Learning 2008
http://flickr.com/photos/ferranrodenas/398064052/
Summary
● Changes and new students' profile;● Second Life examples;● Entrepreneurship in Second Life;● The entrepreneurship course;● The use of technology in each step of the course;● The actors● Conclusion
Children Keyboard
http://flickr.com/photos/spullara/501715356/
“Always on the phone”“She's got a blinged out red phone with a camera, internet, and everything.
My own phone isn't even 10% as pimp as this. ”
http://flickr.com/photos/tavallai/2084954580/
A Student's Backpak: “my laptop, what would I do without it? I really take it almost everywhere, I use it as mp3 player, movie player,
mobile phone, note pad, address book...”
http://flickr.com/photos/gabork/9336784/
“The “shape”of the average student is changing, too; more students are working and commuting than ever
before, and the residential, fulltime student is not necessarily the model for today’s typical student. Higher
education faces competition from the forprofit educational sector and an increasing demand by
students for instant access and interactive experiences.”
InThe Horizon Report – 2007 Edition p. 3, available at http://www.nmc.org/pdf/2007_Horizon_Report.pdf
Second Life
● 3D Virtual World;● Free account / paid account;● Avatar(s);● Residents can own land;● Residents can build everything they want;● Linden Dollar based economy.
Second Life is about experimentation
Using the building and scripting tools in Second Life, she has created laboratories where students can take part in virtual
experiments that produce analyzable data.In http://flickr.com/photos/jokay/838472666/
Second Life is about imersive replicas of ancient and historical places
in http://www.flickr.com/photos/jokay/1158839854/
Second Life is about Training
“Participants visit six patients, listen to their heart rhythms and make a diagnosis.”
In http://www.flickr.com/photos/jokay/477434313/
Second Life is about Visualization
“Matt Biddulph was recently contracted by the scientific journal Nature.com to render gigantic islandsized bacteria so that
scientists can walk around on their own cellular models.”In http://www.flickr.com/photos/jokay/836723731/
Second Life is about learning
In http://www.flickr.com/photos/jokay/566191221
Entrepreneurship in Second Life
● Several examples of people starting their business in Second Life;
● Contests about the best Business Plan (The Electric Sheep Company and Eldman);
● Books about the subject (The Entrepreneurship's Guide to Second Life by Daniel Terdiman).
The Entrepreneurship Course General Structure
● Idea;● Team;● Ethic and Legal Issues;● Investment;● Market;● Business Plan;● Evaluation.
Technologies used
● Second Life – 3D Virtual World;● Moodle – Learning Management System;● Sloodle – Communication between Second
Life and Moodle.
The Entrepreneurship Course Structure
● Information/Presentation;
● Information;
● Idea;
● Team;
● Ethic and Legal Issues;
● Investment;
● Market;
● Business Plan;
● Business Creation;
● Evaluation.
The course will be designed in Moodle. Students will have a overall
image of the course.
Uses of the chosen technology● Information/Presentation (Moodle):
– Learning Outcome: Information about the course– News forum – students can be notified about meetings in SL and
changes during the course ;
– Real time chat (General);
– Information about the course – Time structure; learning outcomes; information about institutions and teachers;
● Introduction (Moodle and Second Life):
– Learning Outcome: To Know the technology and fellow students
– Simple tasks to promote knowledge about technology and socialization – creation of an avatar in SL, profile in Moodle; presentation in SL and discussion about motivations and expectations about the course;
“The first task of the eLearning teacher is to develop a sense of trust and safety within the electronic
community. In the absence of this trust, learners will feel uncomfortable and constrained in posting their thoughts
and comments.”
In Anderson, T., “Teaching in an Online Learning Context”. Theory and Practice of Online Learning, ed. Terry Anderson & Fathi Elloumi. Athabasca University, 2004. p. 280
“Having a physical representation of their "selves" through their avatars, whether it looked like them or
looked like something completely different, was quite important in having them establish relationships with
each other.”
In http://ilamont.blogspot.com/2007/05/interviewharvardsrebeccanesson.html
Uses of the chosen technology
● Idea (Second Life, Sloodle and Moodle):
– Learning Outcome: To create a business idea
– SL: Meetings of brainstorming activity, in context;
– Sloodle: export the discussion to Moodle;
– Moodle: review of discussions.
“In Second Life, that problem of students not participating in class discussions just totally disappeared. (...) On the flip side, we didn't have any trouble with students who dominate the discussion.“
In http://ilamont.blogspot.com/2007/05/interviewharvardsrebeccanesson.html
Rebecca Nesson, professor at Harvard Extension School in http://ilamont.blogspot.com/2007/05/interview harvards rebecca nesson.html
“But as we progressed in the class, it became clear that running the class in a text based environment has a whole
lot of advantages over the face to face environment that I just hadn't anticipated.
(...)So for me the idea that I would actually end up
almost preferring to run a class in a text based environment to a
voice based environment, that was a huge surprise.”
Uses of the chosen technology
● Team (Second Life):
– Learning Outcome: how to develop a good team
– SL: Students meetings in order to create their work teams
● Ethic and Legal Issues (Moodle):
– Learning Outcome: to know legal aspects of creation of a business
– Differences between a virtual and a real business
Uses of the chosen technology● Investment (Second Life and Moodle):
– Learning Outcome: to learn about types of investment and investors
– SL: Roleplay activities – Training of communication of students ideas to a potential investor
● Market (Second Life):
– Learning Outcome: identification of market opportunities, marketing strategies
– Access to market studies in SL
– Students will be able to run their own market studies in world
Uses of the chosen technology● Business Plan (Moodle and Second Life):
– Learning Outcome: to write the final business plan
– Moodle – Wiki: collaborative writing;
– SL: Presentation of the business plan in Second Life to experts in order to receive feedback;
It is easier to bring experts to the classroom
http://flickr.com/photos/ialja/495067087/
Uses of the chosen technology● Business Creation (Second Life):
– Learning Outcome: create and run a business
– Students will create their business in Second Life;
– They will have a small grant of Linden Dollars to begin with;
– They can sell and buy objects or services to other residents or fellow student;
– Students will apply the techniques learned in the course.
Uses of the chosen technology
● Evaluation (Moodle):
– Final evaluation of the students' work;
– Evaluation of the course by the students, by questionnaire.
The actors
● Students;● Teachers;● Software Engineer;● Instructional Designer / Tutor.
Conclusion● This course is designed according to the new profiles of students that
are emerging, due to the use of technologies;
● Second Life, Moodle and Sloodle are used as tools in specific steps of the course;
● Second Life is used for discussions, roleplay activities and the creation of the business;
● The use of technology is mandatory: it would not be possible to benefit from the motivation and practice of creating a business in real life;
● Moodle is mainly used for documentation and review of the sessions;
● The technology is used according with the learning outcomes students much achieve.
This presentation was made with OpenOffice Impress (http://www.openoffice.org)
and Gimp (http://www.gimp.org).Images are licensed with
Creative Commons (http://search.creativecommons.org).Second Life and Linden Dollars are trademarks of Linden Research, Inc.
Thank you very much!Ideas? Sugestions? Questions?
Paula Simões, J.R. De Carvalho, M.Z. Rela