Harvard video on the Inside Scoop #2

This on the Inside Scoop talks about the increasing importance of technology and its influence on how students learn these days. Our generation is living in the built learning system: school where everything is standardized massively and graded based on our memorization and physical work.

As we move from grade to grade, we are just left with just a lot of compiled "facts". However, as the generation changes, the learning system also changes. Instead of studying materials by doing "school work" or memorizing, reading and taking notes, students can interact and be active when learning in virtual world.

A diverse opportunity is open in virtual learning system and it is critical to take an advantage of this system for growing globalization and developing technology.

• This post is published for Immersive Education at Boston College.
  

Educational Spacewalk Simulations STS-125

Figure 7. General camera
Figure 6. View from the astronaut

Figure 5. View from the side

Figure 4. View from the top

Figure 3. View from the astronaut

Figure 2. view from the astronaut

Figure 1. View from the top

This program, STS-125 Simulation, was downloaded from the Education Spacewalk Simulations Web site. STS-125 astronaut crew perfomed extravehicular activities during the shuttle mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope. In this simulator, we can experience one of three spacewalks and observe astronauts performing tasks to replace parts of telescope by selecting various camera views. By rotating and zoooming with crmeras, we are able to virtually participate in reparing the telescope.

There are activities which makes us to find different items in space shuttle. As we explore this simulator further, we can realize there is no extend for applying Immersive Education learning tool everywhere around us. It can be used not only in the earth, but also in the universe where we might not be able to explore. Although it was only Beta version, this simulator has been the most amazing program ever used in VR class.

This post is published for Immersive Education at Boston College.

Harvard video on the Inside Scoop

This video is posted on the Inside Scoop twitter and how Immersive Education can be a useful learning tool. Graduates in Harvard school of education are on the project which allows students to study ecology through the virtual world or virtual representation of marine ecosystem in Alaska. Immersive virtual technology is applied to provide a condition that a student can play a role as a scientist to explore the ecosystem and work on the assignment generated by a virtual scientist.

A student will be walking or swimming to discover the land and work on the assignment.Various tools are provided for students to gather information on the ecosystem like temperature and amount of nitrate in the soil.

The data are saved on student's digital notebook and it will be used to solve the problems where their sub-skills are applied to the knowledge. Teachers can track the amount of time students worked on or progress a student made throughout the activity and it seems to provide more reliable, affordable and practical than physical performance assessment.

This post is published for Immersive Education course at Boston College.

Smithsonian video on the Inside Scoop

This short Smithsonian video on the Inside Scoop twitter shows interesting way to learn about nature through Immersive Education. In this program, Mi Tierra-Mi Mundo or My Land- My World, anyone can become LVM Eco Explorer. Diverse imitation of the earth allows Eco Explorer to take a virtual journey on anywhere that is built in the system; avatars can climb up a snow capped mountain or even scooper dive to the depth of the ocean.


As we explore the various sites those we cannot actually reach, we can learn about how nature and human are balanced and interacting each other. More specifically, we can discover artifacts to learn how we influence the nature and how we can preserve it.

To experince and explore in multi-user virtual world can bring advantages those cannot be obtained in the real world or even in school. This useful tool will provide students more affordable and practical skills to learn about nature.



This post is published for Immersive Education cource at Boston College.

Inside Scoop

Here is the link for videos on the Inside Scoop twitter account.

Proejct Wonderland

Scene 6: This is how my avatar looked like in the game. Avatar can be accessorized. The view of camera can be changed into 1st person, 3rd person, chasing and so on.

Scene 5: I am looking the outside of the Wonderland. Graphic is not so great compare to Wow I played in the previous post, but still it is exciting and in good shape.
Scene 4: The object on the bottom left is the portal key and the postage I have created. There were much things to learn about how to use.
Scene 3: Click on the insert menu and choose the object that you want to upload in the space. In this case, I chose a postage, a portal and a telephone. If you move inside the portal, you go back to the starting point.

Scene 2: What was interesting in this Wonderland was that the graphic in this game was more like a video game. I could change the view of camera. In this scene, I'm about to create a phone.

Scene 1: This is where I started. It is much like Rocket-World. I have an Avatar and can walk around to explore the second world.

Hello class
I have played around in the Project Wonderland and captured some screenshots of what I have done. This course is an Immersive Education course at Boston College (http://ImmersiveEducation.org). The program was launched at (http://ied.hep.kbfi.ee:8080/wonderland-web-font/).

IBM GIO Gaming Report

Summary of Virtual Worlds, Real Leaders.

In theses days, our world has become more opened to the digital world and, at the same time, connected people around the world closer. The main concern in this article was to discuss about how will leaders need to succeed in work environments that are increasingly virtual and distributed, types of traning and tools those allow a new breed of leader that thrives in these uncertain environments and what skills are needed to be rrefined and developed.

Online games, specfically massively multple player online role-playing games (MMORPGs), allows a person to gain different type of skill, orgnization or control the virtual world through his Avatar. Millions of different players communicate and play the game for the common goal, assuming digital personalities known as avatars. Avatar is like a self reflection in the virtual world and people all around the world can communicate, trade and do a lot of activities through avatar. Each player is provided with tasks that ultimaetly used to achieve a common goal of the entrie uses. They can achieve the goal by developing leaderships, communicating with players and by joing a guild, a group of characters working together, formed in online world.

Of course, online games can not provide a perfect analog for the business world of the future. The stakes in the real world is much important while it is still possible to see a person who can control virtual world have an ability to be a leader. However, those leaders of online world are often able to translate those skills in online game to the real world: they plan ahead, take a rist and accept failure. There are growing number of people who believe their "real world" leadership capabilities can be applied to their leadershup effectiveness at work in online. In addition, many qualities of online game catalyze players to gain leadership or speed up the process of identifying leaders. The qualities those can be used in the real world are far more than we could easily think of.

Increasingly popular virtual worlds facinated many large business companies about whether the leadership in online game will really be observed in the real world. IBM worked with Seriosity, Inc., a software company to experiment this hypothesis in 2006. A growing number of researchers or employers are seeking the possibility of leadership formed in the digital world to be practiced in the real world.

The quality of each guild member is readily observable to a potential leader, making delegation a relatively straightforward task. A good communication, relationship and ability to work efficiently allow one to form a strong between guild members. The act of creating a compelling vision of the future, Visioning, predict who really fits the criteria of a good leader. In the online game, leadership is not an identity that follows a player around forever; it is continuously changing. So one should be able to keep developing his avatar and prove his quality.

In conclusion, the leadership in the online world can be obtained by transparent competencies, project-oriented organization, multiple real-time skills to make decision and purpose-specific communication mediums. However, the leader does not usually last long. It is only a temporary and task-oriented because the game is dynamic and constantly chaning. Video games have much to give; an opportunity for a person to attain leadership that might be used in the real life.