My tour of Second Life yesterday was humbling. I lost my very generous tour guide. I lost the tour. I had trouble teleporting. And perhaps, the most frustrating part–I found some cool outfits, but I couldn’t figure out how to try them on!
After bumping around for far more hours than I am willing to admit, last night I lay in bed reflecting on what this all means.
I hit the wall–quite literally. I can only remember hitting that wall three times before in my learning life–in college calculus, in statistics, and in Python programming. You see, learning has always come easy to me, technology has always come easy to me, and damn it, shopping has always come easy to me.
This experience leads me to empathize with the frustrations some of my learners, and my colleagues, experience in worlds where they are strange–the world of careful documentation, for instance.
I truly feel like an immigrant in SL–I must learn the vocabulary, the culture, the currency, how to behave, how to dress, even how to walk. I sense I will now have more patience with others who are lost in worlds they consider foreign.
I know I need an alternate learning strategy for this world, for this learning task. I need differentiated instruction. Sitting at the kitchen table alone messing around for hours just isn’t working for me. Members of the SL library community have sent out emails of instructions and each has been helpful in unlocking a little of the puzzle. But the girl who prides herself on never reading manuals, on learning by messing around, wishes there were a physical Dummies book, not just one on a virtual shelf. I wish I could learn this particular new stuff face-to-face, watching how someone else walks and shops and changes.
Why don’t I give up? Why don’t I just abandon my boring-looking avatar never to return? This has something to do with learning too. I see purpose. I see the potential for this space as a landscape for learning and teaching and extending library services. Knowing this motivates me and prevents me from bagging it.
I will try to find SL librarians at either ALISE or ALA next week and ask to watch them play and work.
(Me beginning my tour)
8 responses so far ↓
Hi Joyce
It sounds like you were more like an infant than an immigrant - learning to walk, behave, dress, etc. As you say, humbling. I think that whenever we try something outside (especially way outside) our comfort zones we are (or should be) humbled. I am humbled by relational databases; no matter how I try, I have not been able to grasp the concepts. Likewise with making pottery - totally alien to me, and something at which I am a special needs student. But, this all helps enormously in the professional development that I do. Empathy for the learner, a sense of understanding what it is like to NOT be able to do or understand something easily, helps me to meet their needs better.
All teachers should try it!
Joyce - A message of “me,too!” and a thank you for the reponse you posted to my request for real examples of good blogging in the classroom. It was very helpful at a needed time - I volunteered to do a professional development session on web 2.0 tools, when I am barely one step ahead, in terms of mastery. Knowing that it was the only way to learn enough to teach others, I started my own blog today - http://mancusis.edublogs.org/ - with a first post that is a twin-separated-at-birth to yours. Sometimes, this new world is a very small place.
SL makes me feel like an utter dufus. I want a full-sized, human-shaped for-dummies guide sitting RIGHT BY MY SIDE. I did, however, learn to put earrings on the last time I ventured inside. They were diamond
.
Yours in sympathy,
Francey, aka Redbud Potato
P.S. I do wonder about the learning curve here. Is it realistic, even reasonable, to expect a critical mass of school librarians to take it on? Especially when so many other Web 2.0 technologies are still floating around, unembraced?
I find SL just as befuddling- I signed up out of curiosity generated from this post- Emerson Mesmer
It is so good to not feel alone–and in the company of so many really smart folks. Jeffrey’s metaphor is far more apt. I do feel like an infant. I even got cranky last time when someone just stood on my avatar’s head and wouldn’t get off.
Still I wonder if I missed a whole skill set by never gaming. I have a feeling that many of those who feel real comfortable real fast in SL moved in from sims and gaming environments. Is there a big hole in my tech experience?
For a much more attractive avatar try:
http://msdewey.com/
PERHAPS MICROSOFT’S ATTEMPT TO HUMANIZE A MACHINE ?
I just put her on my library blog
http://www.bestlibrary.org/
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I was curious about SL after reading your post, downloaded it, created a creature and “flew around” a bit till I hit a hideous batch of disturbing pornography. Here is my question, and i ask you in all sincerity… why do you feel that teacher-librarians need to have more than a superficial understanding of this? I appreciate the paedagogical value of online simulations ( as well as in-person dramatizations) in the classroom, as well as online communication, and graphics applications, but beyond that i do not have any desire to learn more about it. I am not privy to many communities: the world of artists and nuclear physicists and Dungeons and Dragons members for example - but I know enough to integrate them into my regular teacher-librarian day. If avatars and simulations are going to be far more advanced ( like Ms. Dewey), then that’s great, but do I really need to understand what makes her make those smart-ass comments? I do not mean to be a smart-ass here, but really want to know why you feel a professional necessity to learn about Second Life. I just checked out in Wikipedia and my curiosity is satisfied. thanks
[...] OK, I arrived late to this afternoon’s ACE meeting in Second Life, looking like some kind of raccoon hooker (I am totally confident that Intellagirl will help me with a re-do before our next meeting. And, yes, I did get fondled by an avatar or two when I overshot Middleton), but I’m very excited about continuing my explorations of SL, which I first visited during Sara Robins NCTE ACE workshop in Nashville. Just last week, I heard Bernie Dodge at MacWorld state that he did not yet see classroom applications for SL. Sixty Minutes is on TV right now. They just did a feature on the need to introduce high school students to entrepreneurialship. Oh my, is that ever a SL project waiting to happen - with maybe an ACE and or NWP guide or two:-). I’ll admit I was frustrated when first trying to enter, but maybe that was due to reading Joyce Valenza’s post before setting off. Now that I’ve been in SL, I’m looking forward to return visits. January 15th, 2007 at 10:06 pm [...]
Joyce, I loved this description of your adventure into SL. I too have lost my tour guide and because we were skyping at the same time the tour guide was able to teleport me back to the group. Whew!
Great learning takes place when we are off balance. I wrote about this too at TechLearning.com/blog this week.
Off balance is a good place for teachers to be, just as a reminder.
http://www.techlearning.com/blog/2007/01/the_scariest_thing_i_did_last.php
thanks,
cheryl oakes
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