I admit it: I've been flirting with the idea of going back into Second Life. My last visit to the virtual world was more than a year ago, and I was frustrated by the interface, even after spending 15-20 hours "in world." What can I say? I'm an awkward avatar. But the buzz around Second Life at the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI) conference earlier this week was too strong to ignore, particularly surrounding Sarah "Intellagirl" Robbins's presentation.

Back when I was dissertating, one of my favor ways of procrastinating on writing the damn thing was to print out articles related to my topic, and to surf the web for advice on dissertation-writing and procrastination. So it's only been natural for me to research Second Life in much the same way: before actually going into SL, I've been poking around the web for advice on how to best navigate SL. Along the way, I stumbled upon some innovative uses of Second Life in K-20 education.

First off, some tutorials: Intellagirl points us to a bunch of tutorials, including one on the all-important aspect of dressing in Second Life. This is apparently more difficult than one might expect: a colleague of mine admits that she can't seem to walk around SL without losing her clothes. (Advanced users might appreciate a store that now sells swinging and bouncing breasts to fill out those clothes.) Intellagirl also offers five tips for getting started with teaching in Second Life. My favorite piece of advice? Start small.

Jeff lets us know about tutorials on what I consider more advanced SL skills, such as scripting and building. In Second Life, of course, "advanced" is a relative term, because the world is so vast that it's hard to become an expert in everything. Once again, I quote Intellagirl: start small. Specialize. Me, I'm planning to specialize in walking in a straight line, or in not getting caught under water.

Educational uses of Second Life are limited only by your patience with the interface, the time you can invest in learning about the virtual world, and your imagination. Suzanne Aurilio blogs about a recent workshop she gave to university faculty on using SL in their teaching. Those who attended responded positively, with most saying they would be likely to use SL in teaching, but the open-ended responses include comments I've heard again and again:

“I am willing, but still unsure of possible applications. I need more time to think about what I learned today.”
” improve may be ambiguous. I believe it will be an interesting adjunct to teaching.”
“Doesn’t seem quite ready for novices — high cognitive overhead and slow performance — but interesting as a test bed for advanced students”
” This medium presents a challenge to instructional design. We should brainstorm on new ideas for design.”
“I believe this techno can be used to encourage DE learners to get to know each other and also be used as a tool in traditional classrooms.
” I am very interested in using this tool as a meeting place for our online students, particularly those working on group projects. Our courses are entirely online.”

More concerns about Second Life were raised in the comments of a post by Liz Lawley on the blog Terra Nova. Go check it out: the commenters offer a nice round-up of advantages and liabilities of participating in Second Life. I especially appreciated Linda Polin's comments because she quite succinctly captures a couple of my frustrations with SL:

Virtual worlds will become popular when the average person can see a reason to be there that outweighs a reason to be somewhere else. Right now, I don't have that reason.

ps
Does anyone find it weird that in SL, where physics is on hold, i.e., a potentially liberating space where people move around by flying (when they're not waddling), that the tendancy is toward building spaces with walls, doorways, roofs, and other obstacles to navigation?

After attending his first workshop on Second Life, An instructional technology colleague commented at the ELI conference that he was impressed with the creativity of those who are using Second Life to teach college students, but that the bar to entry seems too high for faculty at our institution. I tend to agree. As one senior faculty member once quipped to me, "Our faculty are willing to learn two or three technologies every couple of years. Attaching a document to an e-mail counts as two of those." I'd like to see more work done on lowering that bar to entry, but I have no idea what form easing faculty entry into SL might take.

But where does one get started? Julia offers some tips on which learning spaces are worth visiting. Sloodle offers an integration of SL with the popular and open-source course management system Moodle, as well as a site packed with tips and tutorials about education in SL. You can also check out the Second Life education wiki and Linden Lab's own orientation page for nonprofits and educational institutions. There's also the New Media Consortium's Campus Observer blog.

Want to learn about specific educational initiatives in Second Life? They abound, but a couple of my favorites, discovered this week, include Intellagirl's requirement that her students play with their avatars to get a sense of what it means to be a cultural outsider and Suffern Middle School's "proposal, acquisition, development and integration of a virtual presence for education," chronicled on a blog by Peggy Sheehy. You can see a list of colleges and university initiatives within SL at the Second Life Education Wiki, and a top 20 list of educational sites here.

What are your thoughts? Have you explored any of the educational opportunities in SL? And do you have any good SL resources to recommend to educators?

Leslie Madsen-Brooks occasionally (and awkwardly) explores SL under the pseudonym Katharine Olmstead. Monday through Friday, she helps university faculty improve their teaching. She blogs at The Clutter Museum, Museum Blogging, and The Multicultural Toy Box.