The Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois / Urbana-Champaign and the Illinois Alliance Library System are offering several non-credit continuing education courses “for librarians, museum professionals, educators, and others interested in learning and teaching in virtual worlds such as Second Life.” Click here for the full list, including the names of the instructors, many of whom are among the most experienced and respected Second Life educators in the metaverse. I’m proud to say I know and have worked with several of them! The classes are not free, but they are inexpensive, and considering the quality of the instructors and the program, and the fact you get CEUs, they are very reasonably priced! Decide for yourself!
-kj-
7 responses so far ↓
1 Jeanette Tranberg aka Kita Coage // Oct 3, 2008 at 8:45 am
Hi Kevin
This is great!
However, I wish they would be more European friendly on hours. I think the educational benefits of SL will increas even more as the use in other countries – educational institutions – rise. I’m thinking of cultural and language fields of course.
The population in SL at the time, on the edu sphere, is basically a representation of English speaking countries (and particularly the US). I therefor propose to all pioneers in the field that they consider teachers across the pond when they make their wonderful classes. We would love to join you!
This is not meant to be a critic at this university, but rather a prayer to all institutions involved in education in SL – in general. Lets connect – more!
2 Kevin Jarrett // Oct 3, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Hi Jeanette,
You are so right. We struggle with this at ISTE all the time; most of our events are in the very late evening (and into the early morning) for people in Europe. We try extra hard to have docents available in these hours but for our own events, 6pm SLT still rules the roost. It’s a chicken-and-the-egg scenario I’m afraid; if we had more European users, we’d be able to launch more events at times friendly to that part of the world. But, because we’re not having those events, it’s hard to attract the interest of a large group of people from that area. Any ideas how we could bridge this gap?
-kj-
3 Jeanette Tranberg aka Kita Coage // Oct 4, 2008 at 4:55 am
Well, that was one of the challenges Shamblesguru turned over to Tim Magner wasn’t it :) Lets hope he’s working on it – lol.
Chicken and egg scenario – hmm
Your the chickens – we’re the eggs. To grow up we need to cooperate. We need help to get out of the shell, thats all I know. After all, I’m just an egg yolk :) Some chickens are really nice, and keeps us European yolks nice and warm. That helps a lot, there is several cracks in my shell already. If all the chickens care about all the eggs when they plan, I’m sure we will be a great and productive chicken farm in the end.
One way, would maybe be to let the learner(s) decide the time schedule … (?): http://doodle.ch/main.html
Maybe the edufarm would grow faster that way …
Again – I’m just a yolk c”,)
4 Kevin Jarrett // Oct 4, 2008 at 7:18 am
Hey Jeanette,
I can tell you without hesitation that ISTE would LOVE to have more events at convenient times for folks outside the ‘regular’ time zones, the issue is finding people to present (and attend), as well as promotion … personally, I’m up every day around 3am or so Eastern US time and I could easily facilitate a session or two then, but I’d need speakers, volunteers to help, that sort of thing…what do you think?
-kj-
5 Jeanette Tranberg aka Kita Coage // Oct 4, 2008 at 7:47 am
Kevin
I know you do SO much for ISTE, and there is – for sure – a whole lot more that appreciates that, then you probably think and know of. A big THANK YOU KEVIN!, I will give you here and now. I should be getting better to tell people how good they are – tell them more often.
I already joined as a vountaire, and will try to learn as much as I can to promote both ISTE, the edu community in general and SL. There are so many people out there doing a great job. I still feel like a newbie, after 18 months in there (present time is not that long of course :). I joined not only because I wanted to give something back to ISTE, but also for very selfish reasons. You see, I learn a lot more, by being interactive helping others (thats my secret – dont tell :).
I could have done that a long time ago I guess, but I thought I had to know so much. Now, I know that I really didn’t, the basics I guess would be enough … Lets hope more people join the list of ISTE docents. Its a great way to meat others, and I have connected to so many more great educators – just this last week.
Maybe we could arrange a European party get-together. You never know what could grow out of that … I actually have no idea of how many European teachers there are in the ISTE group for example. Do you? Takes no more than two to make a party I guess :) We have to talk more about this – in-world – I think.
6 Kevin Jarrett // Oct 4, 2008 at 8:12 am
Hi Kita, a social for the European crowd is a great idea, yes, let’s talk inworld, and also get Corinne Fleury (SL) involved, she’s the socials chairperson for ISTE!
7 Life // Oct 10, 2008 at 9:21 am
There are also a lot of european universities in SL…
Leave a Comment