Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Teaching Tools in SL


I have received a few IM’s from people saying they were sorry they couldn’t make the tour on Saturday and asking for copies of the links. This made me realize I haven’t updated the blog!

On Saturday, January 24th the Teacher Networking Center had a tour of educational places that provide free educational tools for teaching in SL. Of course these places are only a few of the many places that offer tools but time is always a issue when it comes to showing all of the wonderful places in Second Life. We had one hour and only went to 4 of our 6 locations.

The tour started with Shambles telling us about the International Schools Island and showing one area in which they offer teaching tools http://slurl.com/secondlife/International%20Schools/65/93/24. Shambles has also offered to take us on a tour of the Island and we will be scheduling this soon!

From there we went to Rockcliffe University http://slurl.com/secondlife/Rockcliffe%20I/201/95/40 where we toured the wonderful tools that were in the library. There are many textures as well as other resources available at Rockcliffe and if you have time we also recommend that you look at the classes they offer.

One of Pia Klaar’s favorite resources is the ICT Library http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island/50/199/33/ At the ICT Library you can find lesson plans, textures, scripts, and other tools.

We couldn’t forget the Teacher Networking Center on Eduisland II http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%20II/36/30/22 This is our other location in Second Life that specializes in teaching tools. Everything in the TNC on Eduisland II is free and you are able to use the tools to support your teaching.

Places we were not able to tour on Saturday were Crystal Gadgets, Babeli http://slurl.com/secondlife/Babeli/129/121/24 and Freebie Dungeon http://slurl.com/secondlife/Ello/133/196/81 . We encourage you to take a look at these two areas and we will have another Teaching Tools tour in the future featuring other places. If you have a favorite place please let us know!

I also want to remind everyone about the Education Faire which is going on right now in SL but it ends on January 30th! http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Education_Support_Faire It is worth seeing.

We have also scheduled some upcoming events to tell you about. Each of these sessions will take place at the TNC center on Eduisland 5.

February 7th (10:00 am – 11:00 am SLT): SL 101 We will have people on hand offering short training sessions on tips and tricks to using Second Life.

February 21st ( 11:00 am – 1:00 pm SLT): Meet and Greet Social. Come and meet other educators in SL at this informal gathering.

March 7th (10:00 am – 11:00 am SLT): Photography 101. Pia Klaar will be giving a tutorial on basic photography in SL.

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