Self Blog #2

I signed up for the COIL conference, which is the Collaborative Online International Learning, whose goals are to promote a more online interactive learning program and relationship with SUNY colleges and international schools. They had two sections that I was really interested in and both were presented by Prof. Pine. The first one was a large meeting with another prof. in Second Life who teaches in France but also teaches other courses from another school. The presentation was more about how fellow faculty members could join the online community of Second Life and build a curriculum through it to teach their classes in whatever subject they were teaching. One of the interesting things about the conference was the part where prof. Pine talked about all these interesting locations they send the students to, like a life size built community in a small French town, or a place where simulations can happen to the avatar like a random hurricane. It was places that were made to challenge the ideas of physicality in a virtual world, something you cant really feel or smell but can see and hear just the same. As a student of course I would love to be in a class that is online and Second Life is definitely a fun place to wander around in, though it seems not many other students like it. Could be the difference between the work and play factor though I can see why people wouldn't really understand a place like Second Life in terms of it being a classroom, that or really its just hard to understand when there aren't any goals to accomplish. I suppose objectively we see it as a game so we approach it in that sense but what we really figure out is that its a second world thats just as complicated and intricate as the first.
I also went to the afternoon workshop that Jason Pine had set up and this was a bit more of a tutorial kind of lecture. It was generally the basics of how to set up in Second Life, whats the best thing to do if you want to set up a classroom space, and a tour of some specific areas that are already set up by other schools around the world. Overall it was a very interesting conference and I'm definitely going to use it in my senior project along with some interviews and a few connections i've made with other faculty members.