Access challenges very much varies from State to State, and I can happily report things are getting a little easier as edu departments begin to finally embrace virtual worlds and games a little more eg. tafe projects like Virtual Enterprise @ jokaydiaGRID and the PLANE project - a NSW PD program for teachers which includes some opensim. However it is still probably the big risk factor to consider. The other is hardware..there are alot of year 9 laptops out there that WILL NOT run opensim. ;(
Having said that, things are much easier in VIC than NSW or QLD, but still a bit of a challenge. Solving port issues via viewer dev would indeed be a huge win, but a big challenge considering how wedded to port 80 and powerpoint alot edu IT departments are! ;) I also suspect that options for running it on SOAS or a local school server would also be very valuable. regards, jokay On Mon, Aug 20, 2012 at 4:00 PM, Lisa Evans <[email protected]> wrote: > Thanks, that helps me a lot to see that it's possible, and to be able to > point the ABC at it too. If we used part of the budget, as Maria suggested > to me, to develop an open source web viewer for OpenSim, would that help > you too? That would get around the ports issue, wouldn't it? Since this > would all be run via the ABC's online education portal, you would think > they would be able to arrange things with schools to get around the > firewall of doom. That must be part of their plan already, otherwise they > won't get very far! > > Cheers, > > Lisa > > > On 08/20/2012 01:29 PM, jokay Wollongong wrote: > > HI Lisa and all, > > Just sharing, as I thought it might be of interest... we (at > jokaydiaGRID) actually developed a historical build with the History > Teachers Association of Victoria last year! You can find out more about it > here - http://virtualhistorycentre.com/ . Essentially the project > focussed on making a virtual replica of the Point Nepean Quarantine Station > in Victoria and additionally a museum which provides virtual worlds access > to a range of research materials and resources for students to explore. > There are also a number of quests built into the environment to encourage > students to explore, reflect and recreate content to add to the build. You > can view additional pictures of the here - > http://www.flickr.com/photos/jokay/sets/72157631154100902/ > > Unfortunatey its had limited use so far because of the ongoing > challenges of opening ports in educational environments in Australia (shake > fist at firewall of doom), but it has had some limited use by students in > Victoria and we're currently working on various Sim on a stick options et > al. Additionally, we're hoping it will be open to the public via > jokaydiaGRID very soon... will keep you posted! ;) > > Kind regards, > jokay > Director, jokadiaGRID / Co-Founder Massively Minecraft > > > > > > > > On Mon, Aug 20, 2012 at 3:00 PM, Lisa Evans <[email protected]>wrote: > >> Hi Chris, >> >> Thanks for that! I'm pretty sure we already know each other, years ago at >> the FTI during the CADSAGAP course? Am I thinking of the right person? I >> was hoping I would run into some local people as I did my research on this! >> Yes, I definitely want to talk to people at UWA, I need some input from >> teachers and/or academics in this area. It helps that my father is both a >> science teacher and a computer programmer, so he's helping me out, but >> someone who has done more work on using virtual worlds in education would >> be very, very helpful for my application :) >> >> I'm definitely thinking of cross media, because I think focussing on 3D >> worldbuilding could become a bit of a distraction from actually learning, >> once you get past a certain point of complexity. I just want the virtual >> space to be a meeting place, and to help give context, kind of like a >> museum exhibition or a diorama representing a story from history. The rest >> of the story, and discussion about different historical sources, would be >> in more traditional text format, along with videos, photos, etc. I kind of >> imagine that each story within the virtual world would be accompanied by a >> discussion page the same way articles in Wikipedia are, where students can >> argue their case for why they believe the event happened in one particular >> way rather than another. There would of course be differences of opinion, >> maybe multiple accounts of the same event. But that's what history really >> is - the competition between different accounts and interpretations, not >> just a series of facts. >> >> So it sounds like Moodle would be a great addition to this project! >> Thanks for suggesting it. I'm looking out for people I can add to my team, >> at least for the purposes of the application (you have to list your team >> members and have a two page CV for each one), so if you're available for >> that it could be a great help. If we then get funding you can see how much >> time you could put into consulting work for us. >> >> Cheers, >> >> Lisa >> >> >> On 08/20/2012 12:47 PM, chris wrote: >> >> Hi Lisa, >> >> nice idea. There was a similar UWA educational research proposal for >> teaching ancient greek using opensim/SL. The idea was to immerse students >> in the culture of the time as well as communicate/learn in ancient greek. >> That one did not get funded but it may be a good idea to join forces with >> such educators and not only go for the ABC grant but also an ARC - industry >> linkage grant. I can put you in contact with those ppl if interested. >> >> Another link suggestion if you wish to meet educators is on the >> jokaydiagrid - a relatively inexpensive grid if you want to meet educators >> and learn at the same time- see: >> http://jokaydia.wikispaces.com/Edusquarelandmarks >> >> Another thing to consider is sloodle: an integration of the open source >> Moodle educational course tools with SL sims. It has its limitations but >> does provide a good way to develop Web based courses with a sim. I suggest >> cross media is the best way to go - not just relying on opensim but do >> Web/sim/film/machinima - which it seems you are already thinking - am I >> right? >> >> My main experience in this area is in SL and Moodle (both deparately >> and combined) but I am doing a little edu project in opensim too atm. Over >> the next year I plan to move stuff from SL to opensim so maybe I will meet >> you on a grid sometime :) >> >> cheers, >> >> chris >> >> On 20 August 2012 01:18, Lisa Evans <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> Hi all, >>> >>> I'm very new to OpenSim and just signed up to this list to ask a few >>> questions. Sorry if I come across as a bit of a newbie, although I've been >>> studying OS for a few days and I have my own standalone grid up and running >>> at home. >>> >>> I'm putting together a proposal for this educational portal run by the >>> ABC here in Australia: >>> >>> http://www.abc.net.au/learn/proposals.htm >>> >>> My project is all about teaching history, the idea being that students >>> and history classes could put together simple sims telling stories about >>> the history of their own local area, linking them up with videos, photos, >>> essays, etc (which you could hopefully launch from within the sim). Their >>> sims would all be linked up in a hypergrid, so students from all over >>> Australia (later maybe the world) could get into a virtual time machine and >>> visit different places at different times, to see what was happening. >>> Students would be able to chat with each other and show each other around >>> their creations. Hopefully the act of collaborative world building would >>> engage them in learning about history, but I would want them focussed on >>> just telling small stories, involving a small number of characters (which >>> would be created as NPCs if that's possible, with simple, looping >>> animations if not more complex behaviour) and buildings, objects, etc. (I >>> have ideas about how to source lots of 3D content, which I need to explore >>> more). >>> >>> I'm sure none of this is an original idea, but it seems like a good >>> opportunity to put an idea like this forward. I just was wondering if >>> anyone could tell me whether it would work in OpenSim or if there are some >>> big barriers to creating something like this. >>> >>> My main issue right now is trying to work out how you create sims that >>> represent not only a region in space but also a period in time. I've been >>> thinking that I would have a grid that contains regions in which only >>> stories from, say, 1950 to 2000 were created. Then another grid would >>> represent the same real world area, but contain stories from 1900-1950. The >>> further you go back in time, the longer the time intervals would get, along >>> an approximately logarithmic scale, so if you were telling stories about >>> the dinosaurs one grid would represent the entire Jurassic era, for example. >>> >>> Would this be the right way to go? I've been reading about regions and >>> grids and hypergrids but I'm pretty sure there's a lot I don't understand. >>> >>> My own background is that I've been working in 3D animation for film, TV >>> and games for the past decade, as a 3D all rounder and a technical artist. >>> I've worked on one big MMO for three years that was never released. So I >>> know about 3D modeling, animation, worldbuilding, etc. but I've never spent >>> much time around Second Life or OpenSim, so a lot of this is new to me. >>> >>> Thanks for any help! >>> >>> Cheers, >>> >>> Lisa Evans >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> Opensim-users mailing list >>> [email protected] >>> https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users >>> >> >> >> >> -- >> >> Dr Chris Thorne >> >> >> http://www.vrshed.com >> http://www.floatingorigin.com >> >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Opensim-users mailing >> [email protected]https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Opensim-users mailing list >> [email protected] >> https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users >> > > > > -- > -- > Jo Kay > ________________________________ > Freelance Design, Virtual Worlds and Facilitation > jokaydiaGRID: http://jokaydiagrid.com > Twitter: http://twitter.com/jokay > Email: [email protected] / [email protected] > Tel: 0405179622 > > > > _______________________________________________ > Opensim-users mailing > [email protected]https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users > > > > _______________________________________________ > Opensim-users mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users > -- -- Jo Kay ________________________________ Freelance Design, Virtual Worlds and Facilitation jokaydiaGRID: http://jokaydiagrid.com Twitter: http://twitter.com/jokay Email: [email protected] / [email protected] Tel: 0405179622
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