Virtual Reality: designing learning environments in Second Life
Fay Cross
The University of Nottingham, United Kingdom
The University of Nottingham has recently been developing a Web Campus in Second Life as an exploration of the 3-D web and how it can help in teaching and learning. Based on the university’s experiences in Second Life to date, the presentation will focus on the question of whether it is necessary or beneficial to recreate recognisable, realistic and structured settings in which learning can take place or whether more flexible and ‘unrealistic’ spaces can also provide immersive learning environments.A key factor in the spread of educational content in the Second Life world is that the virtual classroom enables geographic barriers to be broken down and a sense of community to be built amongst disperse students. As a global university this offered The University of Nottingham exciting possibilities for making students and teachers feel connected and as such the first project undertaken was to build a replica of the Trent Building, the most recognisable building from the university campuses. The creation of the building raised questions regarding whether real world replicas were of any value to a virtual 3-D environment and how far real world constraints and conventions should be brought into Second Life.Since then the Web Campus has been developed further with several specific teaching areas. These range from photorealistic landscapes to less traditional areas where visitors are encouraged to explore and discover information in a less structured manner. The presentation will draw on these experiences from our first few months in a virtual world and discuss whether it is important to bring a recognisable environment into a virtual teaching world and whether it is possible to become immersed and explore an environment if it is less related to reality.no references included