Your Imagination will lead to Your Computer Science Education

Second Life is full of life both virtually and real. People from all over the world escape to this virtual world to communicate for a variety of reasons, including, education, gaming, finding their one true love, preying on peoples’ innocents. Navigating yourself through the nonsense and irrelevant information, which is different for everyone, can be a waste of time, but just think about all the things you learn along the way.

I have joined a variety of groups to get involved in the SL community. The group is for educators interested in or currently using SL. Information is sent out by any member via email that they feel is of interest to educators and academics. The amount of emails sent on a daily basis is massive, approximately 50 a day. The emails range from people introducing themselves to information about classes or exhibit being held in SL. I have found myself questioning do I really need this amount of email in my already full email box. Just when I thought I have had enough, I get something that I thought was useless but find out that my own students actually need this information, i.e. SL and Vista. The island for this group is no other than Campus: Second Life, I took you there. I have meet people from Germany, Ireland, Spain and many more. We talked about renting land, the latest art gallery, concerts, and how to build items in second life. In addition people are always asking for advice or to participate in some SL activity for research purposes. Just today I talked with a person who is a journalist for Sciende in Germany,see figure1.

Figure 1: Image in SL on Campus Second Life.

The other group that I am going to tell you about is EDTECH. “EDTECH island is a teaching resource for all educators. We offer space for education events and teaching, and two informational centers [1].” I have received notices, see Figure 2, from these but have never participated since they meet at night when I am at home with my kids. The nice thing is that they allow us to use space for free. The group is 317 strong and has members mostly from the US.

Figure 2: Invitation from EDUTECH

[1] General Description from SL Search Engine on EDTECH.