Monday, January 30, 2012

Week 4 - Using Second Life for EDUCATION!


Dear Mr. Sanchez,

            I am a new user of Second Life. I started using the program for one of my classes for my minor and so far, I am not a fan. I do not like going onto a virtual world and living a fake life through a computer program. From reading your chapter, “A Social History of Virtual Worlds” I found it interesting how far virtual worlds have come since they were created in the late 70’s. They have grown a lot since they were text based programs but I feel like there is no purpose to having these virtual worlds. If  the programs were entirely games I could understand the purpose of them but I personally think it is useless to pay $9.99 to play a stupid online game that could suck you in and make you waste your time for hours.

            It is intriguing that computer software has come so far to be able to create these virtual worlds, but I think with this new innovative technology, it should be put to a better use, rather then being used as a “second life” virtual world. This technology advance could be used for educational purposes within programs that could teach students through virtual worlds. For example, right now I am using the program for education but they are people logged on who are using it for personal use. I think it should be used for just education. There is just no purpose to having an avatar in second life beside entertainment. However in my eyes, how could this be entertaining is there is no gaming purpose of the program or no goal to actually reach? I just feel like it is a waste of time and money. We have a real life to live, so why would someone want to sit at a computer and waste their time on a computer living a fake life. Like I said before, I am using second life for a class, I am not sure what we will be learning by using it yet, but hopefully throughout the semester my thoughts about the program will be proved wrong.

Sincerely,
Deanna Dimino

Hopefully this video can help prove my point that virtual world technology should be used for education: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOFU9oUF2HA

1 comment:

  1. A bit confused by the extreme dismissiveness in the body and the link at the end.

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