After a few more hours with second life.. a few tutorials later

Well I've watched the first coding turorial and I understand it! And...I have no watched two or three SL building You Tube tutorials, which makes it all seem a lot less fearsome than  I thought.I am faiirly certain I can mock up a few chair workshops and some chairs some techniques some background and a seminar room with a a presentation screen with real pics... 

However it is going to be very laborious... Ive also odered the book

"Introduction to Linden Scripting"   though it seems to have some poor reviews - maybe it will be a good reference, as far as I can make out so far it seems that we actually have to code inside the SL browser - which makes me feel a bit claustrophobic.. oh well ever onward.. though I 'd like to be able to see the wood for the trees..

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Introduction-Linden-Scripting-Language-Second/dp/1604390042/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1288301230&sr=1-3

I have bought a brand new laptop to do this work ( a Toshiba C650) which has a nice spec and a reasonably large screen but SL renders like a gameboy ATM...  I have fond memories of an earlier Toshiba; in 1986 I had a Tosh T3100 which was the first ever portable laptop - it was £2000 and had a pre windows orange plasma screen - I ran Lotus 123 and quickbasic in DOS on it and was as proud as punch...

Complexity of build vs relative merit second Life as a VRLE...

The Virtual Reality Learning Environment....

I am now four or five hours into Second Life, I have met absolutely no one..... so the question of popularity is high in my mind... my own and or second life...

Im going through the tour of SL and I reckon that learning the interface alone will put off most learners... and then there is the immense development overhead.. Im not enjoying the user interface or experience and the look of how to build is seemingly complex as well.... I wonder whether the effort is worth it...

I reckon that if the experience is not immediate enough the learner will not use it, if a Student Learner can "borrow" a ready made avatar and negotiate an alien environment without a lengthy immersion session  then we may be in luck... EPIC and Caspian offer a single person avatar presented with scenarios, in second life the path to learning is embedding as the sheer variation within SL offers exponential outcomes (only some of which will be valid)  - this then begs the question then whether the learning of the environment is more important than the stuff we are trying to impart - is the content getting a fair crack of the whip.....?

If I can place my avatar in a closed environment that offers little distraction and learning tasks that are simple, fun and engaging  then potentially Im winning pedagogically..  its not looking good atm..

Further to the virtual Furniture Museum

work work work... I think I can link the C&G fine furniture qualifcations  pedagogically to the Sir John Cass Foundation Chair museum via trade schools and examples of practice, The need to have an expert primary resource,  in the old days an apprenticeship was 5 years and the practical elements of contemporary furniture courses are based on less "tool" time... ho hum considering that my last module effort was maked back for too much partisan content...

Further to this, on this module Ill have 5 paymasters: Nigel Alan ( my Met tutors) John Cross (Sir John Cass Foundation) Stratford College and City & Guilds... (there are at least 4 or 5 parties here to keep happy as well..)  which doesnt bode well...

Also the upcurve on this is an enormous tech overhead in putting anything meaninful in the lovely Second Life..   (scripting language and 3D object renderers...) as I dont have a machine that works well with it Im considering spending some of my hard earned on a Net book.. oh well <second> life can only get interesting.. Im uncertain I have the ability to nail the scripting language and the content even before I have to consider pedagogical value or virtue.... and by the nature of Lindens liscencing agreement there is no universal access.. am Im not certain a film set has any pegagogical value at all... pah....

Which project to chose?

Well the next thought is what project, the synergy of project 13 is fate potentially, maybe seven years ago I tried to start a part time restoration and conservation course at Sir John Cass foundation in the Commercial Road, which is a continuation of the London school of furniture, which I had studied cabinet making at in an earlier life.

Many years ago at school when asked what career I wanted to follow I suggested Furniture design and was laughed out of the class which seemed to feature many future brokers and lawyers at that time ( bet they are all doing something totally different these days )

So that and managing to get the name of the chap at the trades college at Stratford who is responsible for City & Guilds fine woodwork at London skills 2010 is conspiring to formulate something in my mind..

Blog for the Second Life project

Right ho, Alan Hudson my course supervisor has given me a list of second life projects most of which I am finding rather uninspiring, I essentially have two paymasters here, in that as I have to complete the assignment for the MSc, I am morally obliged to build something that my sponsors (my employers) might be able to use or develop further.

Also it has to be said that I am rather unconvinced with second life as an environment that has universal access, as I feel elearning should be ostensibly utopian in nature.... Ah a moral dilemma