Joe Sanchez and Leslie Jarmon – The Educators Coop

In the spirit forging ahead and “keeping it real” we want remind ourselves, and each other, who we are and why we got involved with the Educators Coop.

We begin our reflective journey with Chade Villota.

Chade has been with the Educators Coop since its beginning.  He may very well have been the first member and is almost certainly the first tenant.

He is no stranger to Second Life and virtual worlds.  Chade has been in SL since April of ‘07, and has been involved with 3D virtual spaces for almost 9 years as a natural outgrowth of his interest in online multiplayer spaces.

His interest in online multiplayer spaces began in the early 90’s in text based worlds working on MUDs and MUSHes.  Chade became involved with the Educators Coop through the Embodiment Research Group where he was working with Bluewave Ogee.  They announced the Educators Coop project and its goal to help educators make the transition into virtual worlds.

Chade currently works with the National Center on Severe and Sensory Disabilities and so he channeled that knowledge and passion into Second Life and the Educators Coop.  He is working to help make SL accessible to people who are blind or visually impaired.  His work on the board of Virtual Helping Hands makes this possible as they’re in the process of rebuilding Accessible Guilds and Club Accessible.

One of their latest projects was the creation of  a virtual German Shepherd guide dog named Max, who can also appear as a cane or completely incognito as a ring for those who choose not to share that they are using an assistive device.

Max has  scripting that tells the owner where they are.  The owner can also tell max to follow, find, or read – among other commands.  Chade also created Marco/Polo scripting which annotates a 3D space.  Max can read the description of an area and tell the owner what’s there based on the description.  Assistance devices like Max make it possible for the owner of a region to tie descriptions to locations.

For example, if you teleport into a region with Max, he can tell you who is there and, if desired, to speak to someone or bring you to them.  Max even does text-to-speech and clicks mouse buttons.

To learn more about the completely free and innovative Max and the Virtual Helping Hands organization, visit www.virtualhelpinghands.org.

In the Educators Coop, Chade primarily helps other members with building and scripting.  He also works to reform education in Second Life; encouraging educators to use and explore all of the possibilities of a 3D virtual space instead of merely recreating more traditional transmissive classrooms.

One exciting example of his assistance with Second Life education was for a project at UT Austin’s Oceanography Department.  Chade designed a simulator to help the students learn  virtually, thereby avoiding the cost of taking research vessels out to the Gulf of Mexico.

In Chade’s simulation, a harbor was recreated complete with salinity, dissolved oxygen, plankton, temperate, wind, air pressure, and any other scientific element the students may need to measure or observe.  In addition, Chade designed instruments that would read the models and display them in real time.  This allowed the students to practice real science; collecting and managing data, making hypothesis and then testing them.  Chade is eager to show other educators of possibilities such as this one that they may use all that Second Life has to offer.

In “real life,” Chade Villota is Dr. Nathan Lowell, professor at Morehead State in Kentucky and currently working at the University of Northern Colorado.  He achieved his M.A. in Educational Technology and his PhD in Educational Technology with concentrations in Distance Education, Instructional Design, and Interactive Media.

I want to introduce you to Carina Gonzales, she is a graduate student pursuing her Masters of Library Information Science inthe School of Communication and Information at Rutgers. She is working with me on an independent study about social media and she will be a guest contributor for this blog throughout the semester.

Carina has a BA in English with a minor in Women’s and Gender Studies, though she spent much of her time in the music building singing opera.  In addition, Carina penned an undergraduate thesis entitled, “The Language of the Night: An Illumination of Ursula K. LeGuin’s Science Fiction” which led to her founding a free critique service for speculative fiction writers called The Zen Pen.  Carina works full-time at The American Boychoir School where she runs their social software and website.  Carina currently lives in Branchburg, NJ with her husband Mike, her daughter Emma Rose, her Portuguese Water Dog River, and her Standard Poodle Zen.  For more information about Carina, visit her website at: www.librariancarina.com or find her in Second Life Carina Gonzale(s)

Dear Friends,
With sadness I regret to inform you that a wonderful and kind soul, Dr. Leslie Jarmon aka Bluewave Ogee passed away last night (11-24-09).

As many of you know, Bluewave has been undergoing chemo therapy for cancer of the lymph nodes the last year. On Friday she was placed in hospice care at her brother’s home in Austin, Texas. She has been surrounded by family and friends. Last night at 8:30PM Leslie passed away.

I was able to spend the weekend at her side, she was in good spirits, jovial and at peace. We spent alot of our time reminiscing about Second Life and the Educators Coop. She loves all of you and she wanted to thank you for all your work and collaborations over the last few years. I asked her if she had a message to share and she replied

“tell them its been REAL”

Rx has built a site where we will keep a permanent memorial for Bluewave. Please visit and in the spirit of collaboration, add a few prims : )

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Educators%20Coop%205/63/98/44

Warmly,
North Lamar / Joe Sanchez

It has been a while since I’ve been able to blog due to a cross country move and new job. This past summer I successfully defended and submitted my dissertation “Becoming: The Evolution of a Learning Organization in a Social Virtual World” (abstract at the end of this post) and in September I started a tenure track position in the School of Information and Communication at Rutgers in New Brunswick. Now that I’m finally settled I will be updating this space more frequently. In the upcoming weeks I will be posting links to a three part video series about teaching in Second Life that features interviews with previous students and discussions about their learning experiences. I will also be sharing details of Leslie Jarmon’s HUGE Second Life initiative through the University of Texas System. For those on Twitter you can follow me @joe_sanchez

–Dissertation Abstract below –
Becoming: The Evolution of a Learning Organization in a Social Virtual World
The Educators Coop is a group of forty-two educators, researchers, and librarians that are interested in learning how to teach and conduct research in the social virtual world of Second Life. This naturalistic inquiry examines how the group utilized the virtual environment in order to meet their goals during a six-month period in 2007.
Members of the Educators Coop exhibited three key behaviors that helped members accomplish their goals of learning how to teach and conduct research in Second Life. Members 1) engaged in a continuous knowledge spiral involving the transfer of tacit and explicit knowledge; 2) were supportive of each other’s ideas; and 3) participated in social networks that often extended beyond the virtual world. Members of the Educators Coop used the virtual world as a complimentary piece to their Real Lives; there were not any synthetic or virtual aspects to their relationships.

One goal of the study was to identify the culture created by the members of the Educators Coop using Choo’s (1998) definition of group culture. Members of the Educators Coop created and participated in a group culture where they 1) articulated a group identity; 2) displayed a common set of beliefs; 3) performed a pattern of behaviors
leading to a leveling of social status; and 4) shaped a group teaching philosophy. The culture of the group created an environment of support, acceptance, and mutual respect for one other’s professional work.

The second goal of the study was to observe and understand how members of the group would alter their virtual environment in order to better perform their work. Members of the Coop altered their environment by creating coordinated weekly events in order to maximize their opportunities for group collaboration. They also used the affordances of Second Life to create a community art space that encouraged a creative and playful environment for interactions. More surprisingly though, the environment altered the members of the Educators Coop as they began to feel embodied by their avatars and the virtual place of the Educators Coop became a real life working space.

The last group in my class Working in Virtual Worlds will present their final project in Second Life tomorrow Tuesday, May 5 2009. This group picked a unique project, they wanted to explore a Second Life culture so they decided to join the Saints of Hell. The Saints of Hell are a 1% Outlaw Motorcycle role-play group in Second Life. The students have told me that the Saints are set up like a traditional 1% Motorcycle Club where they have a President, Vice President and Sgt at Arms. The students have been spending up to 10 hours a week immersed in the role-play for five weeks.

During the last few weeks I’ve observed several changes during their role-play experience. The most obvious is their avatar appearance. When they first mentioned their project as an initial task I asked them to give their avatars a biker make-over. As you can see from the picture below, they went a little over board on the fantasy end.

The students approached the Saints and pitched their project idea. Sims Rang, the current President of The Saints of Hell was intrigued by the project and sold the idea to the other members of the group. She paired each student with a Saints of Hell mentor and the students were on their way to an immersive experience. Each student now has a custom skin designed by the Saints of Hell along with realistic looking biker clothes and amazing choppers

The event tomorrow will be a forum hosted by the students to discuss their experiences in the role-play activity. The forum will have six panelist, three students and three members from the Saints of Hell. A fourth student will serve as the host of the event and he promises that he has been watching Oprah to prepare for his role as host. During the event they will be asking for donations for the Saints of Hell Relay for Life team. The event will be held at the Educators Coop 1

If you have a chance, drop by and learn more about the Saints of Hell and role-play in Second Life.

The second group from my Spring 2009 course will be having their final project event on Thursday April 30 from 4 – 6 SLT at the Utwig Sim. They have been working with the great folks at the Music Academy Online who agreed to let them use their island for the event. During the event they will submerge the entire sim by raising the water level to 100M (normally 20M) and have diving and other water activities. The event will feature the live band Friendly Fire and D.J. Autumn Beaver and is a fundraiser for the American Cancer Society Relay for Life.

As part of their marketing campaign the students made an appearance on the SLCN show Music Academy Onlive. The students did a great job discussing their project and talking about the experience of being learners in Second Life. A video of the show is available at SLCN.tv. My students appear after the first guest, about 8 minutes into the program. They are easy to spot since they are wearing their diving gear. Benton, the host and founder of the Music Academy Online, also interviewed me for a short segment. It follows the segment of my students.

UPDATE: My students that held the Longhorns for 100,000K fundraiser surpassed their project goal. They raised over $111,000L during their event and donated close to $450 USD to their selected non-profits. Way to go Team!!

Starting on Friday and ending on Sunday evening a group of my students will be hosting Horns for a Hundred Thousand. A fundraising event for Project Jason/Garden for the Missing and the Team Fox Organization. An invitation from my students is below.

Hi there,

We are students at University of Texas in North Lamar’s class. As a group project that we have been planning for a few weeks now, my group and I have decided to hold an event benefit to raise money and awareness to the Project Jason/ Garden For the Missing nonprofit organization and the Team Fox organization in order to bring awareness to people through using Second Life as well as donating all the money raised at the event to these two organizations. We will be trying to raise L$100,000! The event will consist of a dance, live DJ and music playing, a dance floor, raffles for items, silent auctions, go-karts and bumper cars as well as free stuff given out all of this which benefits two great causes! We would greatly appreciate a donation to our event that benefits two nonprofits, Michael J Fox Foundation for Parkinsons research and Project Jason assistance for families of missing persons so come to our event!

Come help the University of Texas Longhorns Raise L$100,000 for two worthy charities – free entry & free rides.

Friday April 24th to Sunday April 26th.

Activities include: go karts, bumper cards, raffle, and silent auction.

Live Performance Schedule (SLT):
Friday April 24th
6pm – 7pm Dann Numbers
8pm – 9pm Harper Messmer

Saturday April 25th
3pm – 4pm Vienna James
8pm – 9pm PheobeAnn Theas

Sunday April 26th
12pm – 1pm Phemie Alcott
4pm – 5pm Gregg Huet
8pm – 9pm Dale Katscher

SL URL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Remora/68/226/22 or

Search: University of Texas Landing Point for Project Jason

Please stop by and check out how my students have learned to work in a virtual world. The students designed the entire project, booked all the talent, and found the non-profit clients to work with. Their goal is raise 100,00 Lindens.

The fine folks at SXSWi have started placing some of the video segments from the Interactive conference on youtube. I’m embedding a couple of videos from sessions that i enjoyed. SXSW will be posting more videos throughout the summer so subscribe to the youtube channel if you like what you see. The panel I participated on is not yet available but Joystiq has a great synopsis of the session

SXSW 2009 – Strong Gaming Communities: Text vs. Speech

SXSW 2009 – Tangible Interactions in Urban Spaces

Oh yeah, to my research friends; you aren’t the target audience here so follow the spirit of the talks, don’t focus on the data : )..

Tags: sxsw

April 15 at 6SLT I will be leading an interactive discussion about the use of role-playing for learning in Second Life at ALA Island . During the event we will participate in a role-playing activity so I ask that attendees come dressed as a favorite historical figure. We won’t be judging the avatars so homemade, default, slider-type avatars will be fine. This is a learning experience so please don’t feel the need to purchase a new avatar and by all means don’t be embarrassed if your avatar doesn’t look as good as you like. As you will see, role-play is more about being able to “play” the role rather than looking the part.

I think this will be a fun event and will get us (educators in SL) away from the typical slide show and lecture format that currently dominates educational events in SL. At the event, ALA Tech Source will have a Chapter of “Virtual Worlds: Ideas, Challenges and Innovations” available for free!

From the Tech Source Blog

ALA TechSource is proud to present our first virtual world event—a discussion of virtual worlds, libraries and education with Second Life expert Joe Sanchez. Sanchez, a doctoral candidate at the University of Texas, is the author of February’s issue of Library Technology Reports, “Virtual Worlds: Ideas, Challenges and Innovations”.

Please join us on the ALA Island on Wednesday, April 15 at 6:00pm SLT for an exclusive interactive discussion and presentation of his work. We’ll be discussing virtual worlds and their potential to impact library service and freedom of information, as well as Joe’s work with LIS students using Second Life. One of the topics discussed will be role-playing in virtual worlds, so we are asking all participants to come dressed as their favorite historical figure!

Tags: ala, learning, roleplay, Second Life, sled, teaching, tech source

In October i wrote an issue of Library Technology Reports about some of my research in Second Life. The Issue, Implementing Second Life: Ideas, Challenges and Innovations is now available through the ALA TechSource Bookstore. In the report I identify the Second Life learning curve and how the learning curve creates barriers to student learning. I also discuss ways that i have designed curriculum to overcome the learning curve with specific examples from K-12 – higher education. A former student of mine and my current TA guest authors a chapter about libraries in SL. Her chapter is one of the few pieces I have read that that pushes back against some of the common held beliefs about building a library presence in SL. The editor of LTR says

In this issue of Library Technology Reports, virtual world virtuoso Joe Sanchez takes us beyond a mere exploration of Second Life and looks at the history of virtual worlds and how educators have used them as tools for learning in the twenty-first century. Sanchez extensively and objectively explores the pros and cons of using second life for both educators and librarians, and a chapter guest-authored by LIS student Jane Stimpson examines several examples of public libraries who have established a Second Life presence. Topics covered include:

A Social History of Virtual Worlds
Public Libraries in Second Life: Expanding
Service to the Virtual Environment.
Pedagogical Applications of Second Life
Barriers to Student Learning in Second Life
Understanding the User Experience in Second Life
The Second Life Learning Curve

To read more about the report visit TechSource

Tags: Second Life, Second Life research, sled