Bioscience and forensic science students get a Second Life®

Rose Heaney, Stephanie Henderson-Begg, Olivia Corcoran
University Of East London, United Kingdom

Large practical classes, limited physical space and competing demands on staff time often conspire to give students only one opportunity to practise a laboratory skill or investigate a crime scene. In addition, there are considerable financial implications associated with running large molecular biology practicals with expensive reagents. To address these real-life problems, the Health and Bioscience E-learning Group (academic bioscience staff and learning technologists) evaluated existing virtual provision of problem-based learning (PBL) and concluded that virtual world (VW) technologies such as Second Life® (SL) merited further investigation. In recent years the adoption of immersive 3D environments such as SL has gained momentum across diverse subject areas in HE though it is still unclear how effective these environments are and what expertise is needed to develop and maintain them. A building containing a virtual conference room, crime scene house with several scenarios and a laboratory for conducting Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) and electrophoresis experiments has been constructed on UEL Island. This facility has recently been unveiled to students on the Level 2 Forensic Science degree programme, who are able to examine the virtual crime scenes presented using real world methodologies, to learn the principles of forensic evidence gathering and note taking. Level 2 Bioscience students are using the laboratory to practise general laboratory skills such as pipette use and molecular biology experiments they usually only get one opportunity to do in the real world. Data including student learning outcomes from both groups above will be analysed and feedback from surveys and focus groups of staff and students on their experience of the SL environment will be evaluated using established qualitative and quantitative methodologies. Initial findings suggest that the 3D immersive environment clearly has potential to overcome many of the constraints associated with real world teaching of the subjects mentioned above. However the environment itself also imposes its own constraints and is not a full replacement for real world experience. The full results of these two pilot studies will be discussed.

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