Wild Girls

Amethyst and Andie finally joined me in SL together tonight to see what it's all about and they were wild! Trying to slow them down long enough to learn a skill was like trying to keep a litter of puppies in a box! I'm glad SL was more stable tonight and they had a good time.

Wayne, who showed up at Tringo to help, could do this amazing thing for Amethyst. She touched his head and the two of them did this "Dancing with the Stars" dance while I looked on. It looked fun but I'd have been shy to try it myself. Wayne was a good sport though and Amethyst enjoyed herself.

I enjoyed the time we spent at ISTE island. I've wanted a group sitting at one of these outdoor tables since I first discovered them. Amethyst and Andie discovered gestures while there and we had an endless display of all they could do WHILE SITTING under the umbrella. LOL. I tried to show them a good time. I think they found a jazz club they will return to, if they can ever find it again.

Hilarious!

Thanks, Kiwi. I laughed so hard! I have to paste that here so I can click it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flkgNn50k14

What a Night

Last night in "inworld," as I understand it's called, everything went whacko! A RL friend I'd convinced to try Second Life came in and found me but had an awful time and soon gave up. The servers seemed to be struggling. We kept having to fly off to another location because ours was being rebooted or something. Poor Amethyst (did she pick this just to make me learn to spell it?) was about 12 feet tall and very strange looking. In trying to help her improve her appearance we ended up in a very unsavory place. I was worried when she disappeared and never returned again, but she was laughing this morning. Whew! It was like the blind leading the blind. I don't know what I'm doing! Even on a good SL day, when all the machines are working, I end up losing site of myself, running into walls, sitting in a friend's lap, or with my head stuck under a beach umbrella and my arms and legs flailing about like some sort of idiot. Last night I ran into a man who could not see himself at all and to me he appeared completely black, very tall, with a tiny head. It reminded me of a scene from the movie, “Bettlejuice!” I tried to help but was completely useless. I'm hoping that at least some of my frustration was machine-made.

Virtual Worlds You Shared with Me

Maybe schools could do a tame SIMS application. A parent asked me today about her child (age 18) having a My Space. She doesn't want her to and I agreed. I explained why I find Facebook a better idea and told her that future admissions and employment offices may look for her there to get a sense of who she is, so she needs to be careful. It's unfortunate that we don't attempt to teach any of these skills in public school. But then am I the one to be teaching it?! As he was walking down the hall at the end of the day, a second or third grade boy told me where he was going online as soon as he got home yesterday. He gave me the web address, login name, and password without skipping a step and he couldn't wait! It sounded like a Discovery School Network or PBS type place. :-) Cutiepie!

No name calling please

This is an introduction to a project where several ITSE members are creating machinima (movies of computer generated images) to describe how they use SL professionally. Just watch the one on this first page. The idea is that they will show their avatar and their RL (real life) selves. http://knowclue.com/ISTE.html Do this at home. For some reason only the audio comes through at school. A blog by someone who is a member of ISTE in RL and SL (second life). http://www.storyofmysecondlife.com/ I’ve only read a few entries but the photos are very familiar to me. SL is cool! Ideas I’ve had today for using SL if they ever come up with a safe version to use on elementary school servers: (I talked to a woman last night who knows of a project very much like that at Harvard that is just about ready to go.) These are cut out of emails I have sent to a new friend, Kiwi, in SL who will use it to train young adults in another state. No, I don’t know his real name or have his email. The SL server allows us to communicate anonymously. Very cool! He knows me by Thunder (think school spirit!). I just taught kinetic and potential energy to fourth graders, along with friction and inertia. There are some cool places where they can alter roller coasters and then run them. Wouldn't that be a neat use of an elementary SL? [Here I’m thinking actually building the coaster and sitting on it to give it a try. Rebuild. Try again. Objects in SL respond to ordinary forces of nature. It would have to be a lot easier than it is right now to build. I can barely walk across a room without wreaking havoc.] On my way to teach first graders about the four famous Americans they have to know. I'm using three different pieces of software. In an elementary SL we could have avatars for those people in period correct landscapes talk to the kids.