I've been studying Second Life for about 2 years now as part of my work duties investigating emerging instructional technologies. About two years ago I worked and lived in-world for about 3 months meeting all kinds of interesting folks and experiencing all kinds of cool things...
Flash Forward two years later and here I am taking a course about Second Life in Second Life as a graduate student. Learning within Second Life in the context of an academic course is very fascinating. I've "learned" in Second Life before in context of taking building courses, attending conferences and other educational "walking tours" within world, but a class for academic credit is something else! In terms of the adoption curve of teaching credit courses in-world I know we're at the "early adopter" portion of the curve as many Universities have taught in-world for a few years now, but taking a credit course in-world is still quite a trip!
This week we had the chance to learn the basics of building in-world. I've taken building courses in the past during my foray in SL a few years back and I have the basics of manipulating Prims down but it still amazes me how you can construct some nifty things with some very basic shapes. I for one will probably never become an expert at building (don't really need to as I can just hire whoever I need) but I have a fine appreciation for the power of geometry :)
More next week.
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Yes, you're all early adopter in this course! I can't agree more with you that "one will probably never NEED to become an expert at building." However, in order to teach & learn in this environment, you will need have an appreciation of what can be build/done in this environment. Only then will we be able to use SL effectively to teach & learn... We need to understand the strengths (& weaknesses) of SL and leverage it strengths for teaching & learning...
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