Thursday, July 31, 2008

Journal #4 Virtual Worlds

A virtual world is literally what it says it is. A Virtual chance to make a Pseudo life for yourself while actually interacting with other people. You build your own homes, go on vacations. Have dinner parties, you make friends and have pets. You can do pretty much anything that you could do in real life. It seems somehow people have been using these virtual worlds to hold classes in, which is quite a controversial topic on the web. I guess what happens is some teachers create an instructor in the virtual world to do their lectures. It is argued that these methods rob the students of many of the benefits of a more traditional class such as participation. Yet the argument goes both ways a class taught by a teacher or an online entity, it’s the same class is class to them. One teacher is creating a novel setting where the students can act out the different characters, making their own “novel”. What a novel idea, no pun intended. I think that this new technology could be used in a positive manner in the classroom, but it is important to critically think about what is adding to children’s learning experience and what is taking away from it! At any rate, the real problem seems to lie in the fact that this technology is just so new, people tend to reject or disagree that they don’t understand or are not comfortable with. We tend to think of things the way they have always been but the truth is there is room for using the virtual world in a beneficial way in the classroom, if done properly. It is not a method to instill laziness in teacher, saving them a lecture. Education should always be in the best interest of one the student and secondly creating the best learning environment possible!

3 comments:

Jsnd08 said...

I have never heard of virtual worlds before. This is great I learned something new today. I can understand how conducting classes using virtual world can be controversial. Not having the physical presence of a teacher will have negative effects on the students because there would be no interaction.

Valerie said...

Virtual world seem interesting for anyone who like to have their plans or events for everyone to see if needed. For the classroom setting, I think it not a great value to the student. If you are a student who does better face to face, then the virtual world learning is not for you. Not having the face to face with the teacher could hurt your studies. So it best to have the face to face then the virtual world

Ms. Wood said...

I agree with you. There are pros and cons to using technology like Virtual Worlds. On one hand, this format encourages creativity and sharpens technological skills. On the other hand, this format does not allow for aspects of education like social interaction and participation. Like anything I think it is a good idea in moderation and in conjunction with other tools.