Week 4 - Posting #7 - Second Life

There is observational learning, imitation, and behavior modeling taking place in Second Life (Bruner, 1990; Wood, Bruner, & Ross, 1976). When I first visited second life, I was more than a little skeptical.  It was hard for me to see the educational uses for this social networking platform.  Everywhere I went there were avatars representing people from all over the world taking time out of their day to become someone they were not.  Chatting and instant messaging for purposes that hardly seemed educational.  

Many people kept telling me that there was immense potential for learning in second life and to keep looking.  I was directed to many different groups and sites within this second world.  I joined groups such as edublog and fullsail that helped me to see other purposes for communicating in second life.  People were sharing information that was helpful to me as an educator and they were sharing just for the sake of sharing and helping me learn.  Slowly and surely, I am beginning to grasp that this is an opportunity for me to learn but also for my students to explore their ideas and use their creativity in a safe realm before bringing their efforts into fruition in the "real" world.  I think it would be a great place to expose students to other perspectives, kind of like Oregon Trails meets web 2.0.  Also, another way I would use second life inside the classroom would be to have students create virtual businesses.  Here is one video that really helped me to understand second life better, and get a better idea of what second life was all about:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMGR9q43dag&feature=player_embedded  Really, second life educational possibilities are wonderful and should be explored.  Don't limit yourself or your students.  Don't just think about the reasons everyone else is there, think about how you can use it to benefit your students.  It would be a shame to miss out on this social networking tool in the classroom.