WIAOC 2009 Visits jokaydia!
Posted on May 25th, 2009 by jokay Wollongong
Yesterday we gave a session on the Islands of jokaydia as part of the Webheads in Action Online Convergence, a fantastic event which draws educators from all over the world together to share, reflect and collaborate on their work as online educators. There were some fantastic sessions - many of which you can catch up on via the WIAOC wiki. Congrats to Vance and all the Webheads for creating such a fabulous event!
Below is a summary of the session we presented, along with some notes on the thinking behind it. Im planning on developing these ideas further - perhaps into an SL Comic we can publish inworld and online.
Immersing in Virtual Worlds - jokaydia Style!
As those who have attended jokaydia events will know, we tend to try to be creative around how we structure events on jokaydia, often using a tour of the Island’s spaces as our presentation tool rather than slides and notecards.
For our WIAOC session I decided to employ the same technique, with a focus on illustrating the architecture of the jokaydia Community of Practice and some of the tools, environments and communication strategies we have used to support community building on the Islands. By that I mean not only the digital ‘bricks and mortar’ that we have built, but also some of the projects and strategies associated with the community that help to engage and support our members.
My aim was to illustrate how a range of elements come together to support learning and social networking on our Islands. They are:
- Community Entry Points: Inworld and web-based spaces that provide a pathway into our community for existing and new residents.
- Resident’s Locations and Participation: Our community members are our most important asset and bring their projects, ideas and willingness to share to the community.
- Demonstration Tools: Resources and spaces which demonstrate the potentials and can be used by both jokaydia facilitators and residents to share and explore strategies for teaching and learning in virtual worlds.
- Community Resources: 3D and web-based resources that provide visitors and community spaces with leads to projects, tools and teaching and learning resources; and most importantly to the broader SLeducation community.
- Community Learning Spaces: Space for practice sessions, experiments, sharing, just in time learning and project based learning - enabling mentoring and collaboration.
- Social Spaces: Social and informal spaces are an important part of making the Islands a welcoming and comfortable place. They encourage visitors to share, play and communicate with each others.
These elements form some of the key spaces and strategies that I have used to create a virtual place for the jokaydia Community of Practice, and also use to engage with and support our residents and visitors. Obviously the events and classes we run and the social and informal networking that happens on the Islands are also key factors in the community building process, but that’s for a later post/presentation! ;)
Tour Details
Each of the spaces I selected for the tour illustrate the elements detailed above and hopefully provided a good backdrop for the presentation. During the event we used a notecard with embedded links to move participants from location to location as well as landmark givers in each location as an addded navigation aid.
Tour Stop 1 - Community Entry Points: The jokaydia Landing Point
To start the tour, we met at the jokaydia Landing Point (SLurl) to discuss Community Entry Points.
The Landing Point which is our ‘virtual front door’, but also the other tools we use to provide visitors and residents a pathway into our community and activities.
At the Landing Point, I have created a collection of tools which link to our 3D spaces, including our shared community resources and our resident’s spaces. Additionally the Landing Point houses links to jokaydia’s various web-based spaces which form an important part of our community’s presence online and provide a pathway into the community for those who can’t be inworld.
Tour Stop 2 - Resident’s Locations and Participation: Kangan Batman TAFE’s Job Seeking Skills Project
Obviously the residents of jokaydia are our most important asset - they create great tools and spaces and share their work in really generous ways; and of course their rent helps cover the costs for the Islands!
There are many fantastic resident’s spaces on jokaydia, but for this event I chose Kangan Batman TAFE’s Job Seeking Skills Project (SLurl) - which provides resources and information for students on career pathways and job seeking skills, including the ability to roleplay job interviews in immersive environments.
Tour Stop 3 - Demonstration Tools: Virtual Worlds Presentation Platform
The Virtual Worlds Presentation Platform (SLurl) is an immersive space designed to provide an environment for a mixed reality presentation. This space was originally used for a presentation by Sean FitzGerald in 2007, but has since been used countless times as a demonstration tool to provide educators with an insight into how they can use Second Life to provide dynamic and interesting mixed reality or inworld presentations.
Tour Stop 4 - Community Resources: EduSquare
The Islands of jokaydia houses a wide range of community resources, including spaces to hold meetings and events, inworld tools and information in various spaces including the Newbie Garden and the PD Hut. However, the key community resource is EduSquare (SLurl), which is designed to provide a home for our resources and an informal meeting and networking space.
At Edusquare you can access landmarks to 30 Educational destinations inworld, check out some videos or meet with colleagues, connect to the jokaydia Community webpresence or experiment with simple information tools.
Tour Stop 5 - Community Learning Spaces: jokaydia’s SLoodle Hut
Spaces for experimentation and learning provide a space for residents to learn and collaborate together. Although jokaydia has a number of spaces designed to encourage this, for the WIAOC tour, we visited the SLoodle Hut (SLurl).
A recent addition to the Islands, the SLoodle Hut seeks to provide a space for jokaydia residents to explore the use of SLoodle and Moodle in their projects. We have also provided a moodle space for experimentation at http://jokaydia.com/moodle which residents are using to develop and pilot web-based resources to support their inworld resources.
Tour Stop 6 - Social Spaces: jokaydia Beach
jokaydia has lots of social spaces, which have been both fun to create and use. The jokaydia Beach (SLurl) is a good example of the types of informal spaces we use. It has been setup with a range of toys and tools and can be used for parties, events or learning activities.
The informal activities that take place on the Islands are a key part of creating a sense of community and a welcoming environment for visitors. I try to update them regularly and include new things to explore.
Asynchronous Tour
If you’d like to take the tour and check out the spaces for yourself, I’ve left the WIAOC Event Resources on the Island. You can pick up the notecard for the first location at the jokaydia Landing Point (SLurl).
Simply use the WIAOC Signs (as pictured above) to grab a notecard and Landmarks for each location.
Event Recording
Special Thanks!
marlonj - one our wonderful jokaydia residents came along to support the event, and managed to capture a great recording which you can view above. Thanks so much marlonj!!
Thanks also to slammed Aabye and Sapphire Ceawlin who came along to help me with the event!
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