SECONDLIFE MOOC 2016 PRESENTATION AND WHAT I HAVE LEARNT

Final  Reflections and  Thanks to the organizers and tutors online.

I finished my  SL MOOC- the 2016  MOOC about    SL  and  Virtual World yesterday. The  Mooc was a great one, one of the best  MOOCs I have ever followed since I started learning online.
I wish to thank the tutors online and the  organizers of  SLMOOC16: you were great supporters and made me enter a new reality. I have just started learning about the many communities online and I will continue learning to enhance teaching and supporting  my students .

The approach to the sessions was  " engaging" : you provided me with interesting ideas, videos and weblinks to what SL and other  virtual worlds can offer  educators and  librarians.  As regards my subject - I teach  English - but I also  teach  German privately, I think that  Sl and other  worlds can support me in teaching and creating a  great  learning environment.


                                               Thanks to the  Organizers !

This is my video where I reflected on what I have learnt  about SL and the opportunities  virtual worlds can offer us:








Here you can find the slides  about  this  online experience where I provided the links to what I watched in most of the sessions which I could  only see in the recordings.  
It was such  a great  experience!

 




Virtual  worlds can enhance our professional development and provide new learning opportunities

       Virtual  libraries can support us in learning and  reading  skills 

                                        Virtual  worlds can help us by building  a community of learners who have also   fun!!

SECOND LIFE 2016 MOOC APRIL 2016 FREE VIRTUAL WORLD LANGUAGE LEARNING COMMUNITY

SLMOOC16: Free Virtual World Language Learning Community 

30 April 2016   Presentation by Kip Boahn/Kip Yellowjacket

Co-Creator Of VIRTLANTIS / Owner Of Oxford School for English (Austria & Germany) / English Language Teacher
CV: https://www.visualcv.com/kipboahn

I watched the webinar as a recorded session as I was busy at school this morning but I liked the presentation by Kip Boahn.

He presented  SL as a great opportunity  for learners, and I checked his  community. There are language opportunities in  different languages and he supports the activities by using FB and a website.
A great innovator and good teacher who cares for his " students".

The website to the learning community 

http://www.virtlantis.com/

Activity locations 

http://virtlantis.pagecloud.com/locations

The calendar 

http://virtlantis.pagecloud.com/calendar

The community on FB

https://www.facebook.com/VIRTLANTIS/

Why is SL an interesting platform to consider for language learning/teaching ?
I liked what he wrote  as SL  can be  a new and interesting tool for creating a great virtual and learning   environment.

What was important for me :    SL   is 

- multinational/multiethnic/multilingual platform

- social networking in 3D

- a sandbox for highly immersive experiential learning (most any conceivable educative scenario can be simulated/carried out)

- a multitude of manipulatives

- English is lingua franca (metalanguage of SL)

Check his file online for more features as regard SL:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/14qFwLaGon8TXi-x888DDfh62_3FIBZRSYHzvGNRd2I/edit?usp=sharing

I could find the old video with his presentation in last year's  SECOND LIFE MOOC 2015 :

My next step will be to check online what communities are offering  language learning. This is new one for me and it will help me think about the best ways for developing language skills in a  virtual world.
Thanks to the presenter of this interesting session!

SECOND LIFE MOOC APRIL 2016 Edmondo the Italian SIM

SECOND LIFE MOOC 2016 - CONNECTING IN VIRTUAL WORLDS- COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE

SLMOOC 16 April 17th Immersive Experiences in Edmondo the Italian Sim

Presenters from ITALY

Letizia Cinganotto and Andrea Benassi gave a presentation called "Immersive Experiences in Edmondo, the Italian Open Sim" on April 17th. Class members who had accounts in the Italian sim, Edmondo, joined the presenters on the sim, and the rest of the live class attendees watched .

I have no account but I wanted to see what Edmondo looked like and what teaching opportunities it could offer.

I watched the recorded session on the Youtube last week. It was a presentation about a system that is closed and offers the opportunity to work online where teachers and students enter the reality with their real names.
What students can do : play and learn why using  English. It is a game based approach. In Italy the platform is used for teacher training and teachers of any level are learning online thanks to Edmondo. An interesting learning environment which is  worth checking.

                                       SL  and  Italian  Educators : 
                                        a  great experience

My next step was to check more online and realized that the Italian school system is working on the virtual platform to promote language learning. 

I will continue  checking online..... and see what people have presented and shared as regards their projects. 

Further  links for checking online

https://www.edmodo.com/?language=it

http://www.scuola-digitale.it/ed-mondo/progetto/info/

https://www.edmodo.com/?language=en_GB

http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/rubin/edmodo-teachers-share-experiences.shtml

SECOND LIFE MOOC 2016 - Professional Development and Networking in SL

SLMOOC16: Professional Development and Networking in SL
Presenter   Beth S. O’Connell   - Beth Ghostraven in SL

 Video recorded  session of the  event which was held on  23rd  April 2016

Last weekend was spent on checking the opportunities for self-development of educators.  Beth S.O'Connell made her presentation on SL and she was really great at presenting what we can find on SL. The world of educators and librarians is getting bigger and bigger and as a teacher of English I have  access to a lot of virtual communities.
I could not attend the session but  I watched the recording online and I was  surprised at seeing how many communities we can find online.  There are communities for any type of learner and educator. It is up to us to check and see what might meet our needs.

For educators the great advantages are the costs:  Professional Development is  free !! We work online from home  and have  virtual conferences about  topis and issues related to education.
I will try to find out if there are online communities for  ESL and ELT teachers as I feel that internet can open new ways for updating and learning thanks also to virtual worlds. I have seen that  technology is really important and educators   can share, learn and learn from the others.  This is my world for getting connected to others!

My next step will be to check online and see what is going on.

This is the contact for learning more  about  such communities:

Link to the  slides of the  presentation online:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Kr3fGdRVK5N7LyjsLupDb_y75_TEM27IsTJIq-dPk7U/edit?usp=sharing

Link to a community online which I have  checked :

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/VSTE%20Island/62/104/22

Here is the video uploaded online :

SECOND LIFE MOOC 2016 - Community Virtual Library

SECOND LIFE MOOC 2016 - CONNECTING IN VIRTUAL WORLDS- COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE

                            Reflecting on the webinar 

SLMOOC16 Valerie Hill Community Virtual Library April 4th 2016   

I watched the recorded session by  Valerie Hill and she was so engaging that I was favourably impressed by the idea of exploiting virtual worlds for education.

She presented her community: she was  a librarian also and showed how the Virtual Library can be used. It is now a must go and see also for me. I went to the community on SL which she presented and I could see the library and the links to the books which I could find online.

Digital libraries are important today so most of teachers and educators should be aware of the new worlds and learning opportunities which are online and some are really worth checking. 

Key ideas underlined by the  presenter: education is now different from what we did when we studied at college or university.  Information literacy, education, collaboration online and new tools are the new world of  education in which we are asked to work with our  students.

My next step will be to check what is on SL and what can help me: reading and literacy are important skills which can be enhanced by  having  access to virtual libraries!

And this is me when I first visited the  library:

I also carried out  a research online and found more. Here you can find the link provided by the presenter about  ARCHIVING  VIRTUAL WORLDS.

Useful links:

http://web.stanford.edu/group/htgg/cgi-bin/drupal/?q=node/13  ( Archiving  Virtual Worlds) 

SL INVENTORY  shared online :

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14zRamPCSafM7u6pvermvC2gXiv-CEOFM_vhxCAs4iGw/edit?usp=sharing

My visit to the community : http://screencast.com/t/LTE70Sma

The video recording of the session uploaded on the Youtube:

 
A question for the  presenter?  How many students are today working and learning thanks to  SL?

SECOND LIFE MOOC 2016- Higher education in Virtual Worlds

Second  Life
April 2016 has marked my first learning about  Second  Life. Second Life is very popular abroad and among  educators. I am new to  SL.  Thanks to this  MOOC I have learnt a lot about  SL. Here is the presentation by the tutors which was  released to  present the course. I did most of the activities in my free time by watching the recorded sessions. First of all  I had to enter the world of  SL:  I registered online and  created my avatar. Later I could follow some webinars and learn about  SL , virtual worlds, and  education .



The programme is online : https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SHsoYS6KW2vQDRIq-nA16mTYlRYHlB3V_22WM4wWwTw/edit?usp=sharing

Before starting writing about this  experience I wanted to check online about   SL  and I  found some blogs and wikis about   SL:

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Second_Life_Education

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Second_Life_Education/Resources


Reflecting online .......................

3rd  April 2016      THE JOURNEY HAS  STARTED 


REFLECTING ON THE WEBINAR BY   Nancy L. Zingrone, PhD

aka Maggie Larimore in SL

"HIGHER  EDUCATION IN VIRTUAL WORLDS"

I could not be online when they started the SMOOC16 but the presentation by Nancie L.Zingrone was a " must see" so I checked online and I was able to follow most of the events which were uploaded on  the internet thanks to the great tool which is   Youtube and also WizIq platform.
It was a great introduction to the internet and virtual worlds: something I had not been aware of . I should know more about it as education is undergoing many changes.

Key ideas underlined by the speaker: virtual worlds can offer great opportunities for collaborative working , this is similar to what happens when we work online with modern technology.
Second Life started in the USA in American universities and it helped students work, learn together as there are many groups on SL. The presenter focussed on the main advantages:

What fascinated me when I watched the recording was the great idea of having an international community where learning can happen at any time and from anywhere.
Of course, there are disadvantages: technology, language barriers but...............on the whole it is a great  opportunity as people can choose when and how to work. Educators and  learners are offered a great " environment" where learning can happen!

After watching the video I had a lot of  questions, first of all I wanted to learn more about SL and how virtual worlds can help me as an educator.

I googled  SL and  found some  interesting things about language learning.  This is an  interesting video about language teaching which I think is worth seeing.....

I will now  get into " SL" and I will try to enter this  new  world................................    A lot of  new things  I need to know about............to  work in a different  way.
My next step was to get into SL and see how avatars live, work, collaborate and also learn.

EARTH DAY 2016

22nd  APRIL  2016

A  great  day to celebrate the  Earth .This year  the best day to celebrate it...............

Today is an important date, it is   EARTH DAY , and more and more educators and people are talking about it and discussing the issue of earth and the environment.
Educators have now access to many tools online where they share ideas and activities. Social networks can help them in providing links to tasks  and interesting articles to brainstorm the topic and help the students think about the problems the earth is facing. 
I just googled  the term  Earth Day and I came across an interesting article,which I think we should all read:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/04/21/earth-day-2016-five-facts-to-inspire-you-and-how-to-get-involved/

I also checked among the many mails which  I received this week and I could find lots of links to activities shared by teachers and which we can use. I also think that competences in English can better if we talk and discuss about  interesting topics that can interest our  students and PBL can help us in developing the best interactive activities thanks to new tools.

To begin with  PADLET is a great tool which can help us share links and documents : this is one worth checking.

Created with Padlet

A great  source is   the  hashtag  #  EARTH DAY where you can find the best links shared by people from all over the world.


Tweet riguardo #EARTH DAY



There are also  Livebinders  where teachers have collected the best activities:

TLC – Earth Day

Click here to open this binder in a new window.

Click here to open this binder in a new window.




Finally, I created my own collection of materials after I checked online and  used my favourite tool  Pearltrees: I must confess that I found  so many weblinks that I am aware that the community of educators has been working well.  


EARTH DAY ONLINE MATERIALS AND MORE, by italianteacher



And the great news from today: yes, we can do something to help our earth....... 

Watch 150+ world leaders sign the #ParisAgreement live from @UN. #EarthDay2016 https://t.co/Wj2VRxzlWw pic.twitter.com/1mYZuKTEsm

— Earth Day Network (@EarthDayNetwork) 22 aprile 2016