Ikarus: Teaching and Studying in Virtual Learning Environments Home -> Weekly -> Forums -> Reviewer's Lounge -> Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Monday, 3 March 2003, 06:19 AM Discuss this topic (23 replies so far) ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Monday, 3 March 2003, 06:19 AM I would like to know if others in this seminar have experience with MUVEs such as Tapped In http://www.tappedin.org or Diversity University http://moo.du.org. Several things immediately come to mind when considering these environments: 1) Polysynchronous global educational communities. I have built and sustained professional relationships going back eight years (when they were known as MOOs... before that MUDs) in these environments. Currently Pepperdine University and other schools use Tapped In for education seminars. 2) Online real time help is almost always available. 3) Ability to log conversations. 4) Ability to project websites to remote computers. 5) Free for educators to create their own environments, as well as free client to facilitate learning. I have written several tutorials on this system availabe at http://pages.ivillage.com/edmoo. I would be interested to see if this environment could be used as an adjunct to this seminar to facilitate meetings and classes. I look forward to hearing from others about MUVEs and other learning environments. Regards, Jeff Cooper Education Technology Specialist College of Education Pacific University Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Friedrich Scheuermann - Monday, 3 March 2003, 06:59 AM Dear Jeff, this is an interesting point you made ! We were reflecting for many years now, of how to improve the pedagogical potentials by implementing new features. Having tools inside for synchronous communication and exchange of information is a benefitial, stimulating the interaction (and the motivation). However, to use that in an international settings with different time zones to respect is very difficult, if it is not for use at a voluntary base. Let's continue this discussion after you have made further experience with this envirnment and course. Maybe come to some further idea for improving the pedagogial approch what I would consider to be very intersting! Best wishes, Fritz Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Monday, 3 March 2003, 07:30 AM Dear Fritz, Thanks for the kind words. You are correct in your comment that coordination of synchronous conversation is difficult because of the time differences. However, that does not mean that it is not impossible for formal meetings to take place. With sufficient advanced notice, I have helped facilitate such global conferencing. Furthermore, it is much more useful to use the synchronous feature as a way of informally meeting with fellow participants as the seminar progresses. It is one thing to read someone else's profile; it is quite another to "drop in" to the Foyer and have an online conversation. Currently there are six users online, and yet I am the only one in the Foyer! It would be nice if this system had a method of Instant Messaging other users, or better still, if users would open a second window as a matter of protocol and enter the Foyer for casual collegial conversation to facilitate collaboration. How does that sound to you? Of course, I view MUVEs as beneficial for the reasons I mentioned in my first post, and I would like to work towards incorporating them into my project, as well as for helping to facilitate this seminar (if I become a moderator). If anyone would like to discuss this, please feel free to reply to the main message in this thread, or see me in the Foyer! Regards, Jeff Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Friedrich Scheuermann - Monday, 3 March 2003, 08:28 AM Dear Jeff, I guess that it will be almost impossible to apply these features in this course, even if we agree on new ideas to be implemented (Please be aware that there is a concept behind it). I see the potential of this discussion more in updating the environment and concepts for the course which is scheduled for next year, since we fist have to become aware of the potentials given with the features of this environment. We would like to avoid the use of mixed tools inside and outside the working environment in order to avoid confusion. That means, that we would like to have all tools needed implemented WITHIN the protected envirnment of this course, without the need of changing URLS, new logins etc. But, to make it clear, I agree with your ideas on the potentials of synchronous commication for informal meetings. That is why we have implemented "chat" features for communication as an optional tool to be used during group works. Let's see how this will be used. Last term we made quite good experiences in some cases! I also made some experiences with Moos/Muds as it is implemented in TappedIn. So far, it reamains very interesting to me, but I am still not completely convinced, if this is that what we really need. The added value is not so clear to me, but I could imagine a course concept which is based on such kind of given sceneries. What is you opinion on using audi/video-conferencing? Fritz Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Monday, 3 March 2003, 09:10 AM Pardon me if I disagree that it would be almost impossible to use MUVEs such as Tapped In within this course. I faced the same challenges when I was enrolled in a Fermilab online seminar some years ago. Although it is definitely impracticle to implement within the Ikarus environment (although not impossible), there are ways to make this environment part of the seminar. My understanding of this seminar is that it is self-directed work on distance education methods, technology tools, and pedagogy. My hope is to demonstrate how MUVEs may be used to facilitate distance education coursework, shift pedagogy away from teacher-centered didacticism and towards student-centered andragogy, as well as being an ideal tool for K-12 educators because it is: 1) Safe for users. This is very important and a reason why IRC and other synchronous systems have been banned in over 90% of American schools. 2) Free. Both the Lambda core and Encore Express clients are free for download and open source in their approach. These features are critical for the obvious reason that K-12 schools face serious financial hardships in America (and elsewhere around the world). 3) Accessible. MUVEs may be used by *any computer able to connect to the Internet*. Even simple chat programs have difficulty with slower computer systems. MUVEs may be accessed by users with as low a computer as a 386. 4) Adaptable. MUVEs have high end capabilities as well... including audio and visual, as well as a WWW interface. Audio-visual systems such as Horizonlive, Centra and Placeware are all excellent systems, but they are priced too high to make them accessible by most K-12 schools. Netmeeting remains one of the few viable options for public schools. Although it is not possible at this time to shift over from the chat system now in place, I would like to examine the possibilities of incorporating MUVEs into my project related to this seminar, in addition to facilitating collaborative meetings at MUVEs such as Tapped In to demonstrate their potential for future possible uses. Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Sandra Reitz - Monday, 3 March 2003, 09:25 AM The only MOO I know is this one: http://schmooze.hunter.cuny.edu:8888/ Originally intended for Learners of English as a Second Language. I agree that MUVEs or MOOs can be very helpful, but instead of "officially" implementing them in this seminar, I would leave it open to group work. My guess would be that the tasks are already planned and not completely changeable anymore, but maybe one could add this topic to an appropriate task as an additional, voluntary research topic? Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Monday, 3 March 2003, 09:36 AM Dear Sandra, I'm not proposing officially implementing them in this seminar; I agree that it would be nearly impossible to do so. What I am recommending and proposing is that they may fit in as the core of *my* work, which is is what I would like to explore in my Technology seminar. That means that I would like to demonstrate them to other users and explore their uses in K-12 and university courses. I haven't been to SchMOOze in quite some time, but it still is in operation as an ESL MOO to my knowledge. Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Laurence Wilson - Monday, 3 March 2003, 09:54 AM I notice this course uses Moodle (http://moodle.org) as the learning environment. What are the differences between this and a MUVE? Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Friedrich Scheuermann - Monday, 3 March 2003, 10:01 AM Yes, sorry, I might have been misunderstood! For sure this is an intersting project and I strongly encourage you to reflect on the potentials. But concerning this course and the work of the whole group of others (including the moderators) we have to concentrate on the tools provided by this environment. Best wishes, Fritz Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Ana Sousa - Monday, 3 March 2003, 06:35 PM Hi Jeff, Although I know practically nothing about this topic I find it intriguing and would be interested in looking at a demonstration of the use of MUVEs in educational settings. I'm currently involved in developing online courses in Portuguese as a foreign language in California. A possible idea to start with is to involve K-12 schools and colleges in the Central Valley area. Ana Sousa Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Monday, 3 March 2003, 06:41 PM Ana, I will be happy to give you (and other interested participants) a demonstration on the use of Educational MUVEs, which I hope will become a major part of my project here at Ikarus. FYI, there are several Portugese speaking MUVEs already in place. One I know of is entitled "MOOsaico." I will get the address for you. Users there speak in Portugese, which of course is your goal with your students, correct? Where in California do you teach? I was born in Berkeley and taught for 10 years in the Bay Area. I now live in Oregon. Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Monday, 3 March 2003, 08:33 PM Dear Laurence, Thanks for the question. The best way to see the similarities and differences are to try out the MUVE environment for yourself. I plan on giving tours as part of my own project within this Moodle environment. First, let me comment on some similarities: 1) Both are free open source environments that allow educators to collaborate at varying levels. 2) Both allow for messages to be shared, 3) Both allow users to create and view profiles of other participants, both online and off. 4) Both have polysynchronous (both real and non real time) features. I have only used Moodle once before, and am not an expert on this system, so I'm not sure if there are file sharing features (MUVEs have some ability in this area), or shared whiteboards. Differences: The major difference I see at this point is that this Moodle environment will live for the length of this course, and then die shortly thereafter. MUVEs are growing educational communities that evolve over time, and do not end. I have professional relationships on MUVEs dating back eight years, and these relationships sustain today. Moodles are easier to use, and the threaded discussions, although possible on MUVEs, are crisper and cleaner here on the Moodle. The learning curve on MUVEs can be somewhat steep, but help is almost always available in real time. Moodles are more of an asynchronous tool, MUVEs are used more for the synchronous features, although there are many asynchronous tools available as well. I am planning on demonstrating MUVEs at some point in the near future as part of my project. Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Laurence Wilson - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 10:19 AM Thanks, Jeff I have the task right now to create and develop an online community for a group of medical professionals with a particular interest. I am very familiar and practised with Lotus/IBM QuickPlace (http://www.lotus.com/products/qplace.nsf/homepage/$first), so planned to use it for this purpose. Maybe I should consider a MUVE instead? Laurence Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Shu-chuan Chiu - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 01:50 PM Hi, Jeff, Thanks for the sharing. The comparison here is really very educational. I'm not familiar with either MUVEs or Moodles, but I've tried a couple of synchronous chats in TappedIN in EVonline courses. The experiences were great. I'm a new member in the community, but as far as I observed, the relationships among those old members have grown into long-term friendships. They have continued their professional chats even after the courses were over last March, which is pretty constructive for their professional growth. I would love to learn more about MUVEs and experiment on their educational applications too. Regards, Shu-chuan Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 06:28 PM Dear Shu-chuan, Your comments are very much appreciated. I agree with you 100% that long term friendships, as well as professional relationships, have developed over time at Tapped In (and other MUVEs). This, to me, represents *community building*. I am interested in sustaining professional relationships, in addition to gathering as much information as possible in the short term as well. One difference I see between the Tapped In environment and one such as this one is that after May 1, when this course is over, where will everybody be? Back in their own schools? How will we continue to communicate, or will we? One of the major criticisms of "chat" rooms is that they are temporary, users are anonymous, and nothing of substance comes out of them. MUVEs have a chat element, but they are anything but temporary, neither are they anonymous, and quite a bit of substance may be developed from them. I look forward to working with you and others as I develop my project utilizing MUVEs (most specifically Tapped In) to facilitate polysynchronous community building. There is already another thread on polysynchronous communication, and I believe I will replicate this post to that thread, so others may respond. Regards, Jeff Cooper Education Technology Specialist College of Education, Pacific University Forest Grove, Oregon USA Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 06:35 PM Dear Laurence, Thank you for writing. I am not familiar with the Lotus Quickplace environment, so I took a look at the homepage. My suggestion is that if you are very practised within that environment, comfortable with its tools and features, and feel that it meets the needs of your class, then I would *not* recommend changing over to the MUVE environment at this time. MUVEs do take some time to get used to, and may or may not have the tools that you would like for your class. I will be demonstrating MUVEs for my project, and will invite you and others to come and "look around" for yourself, ask questions, and see if the environment holds appeal for you. Please feel free to write back with other questions, and I look forward to meeting with you online. Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Roberto Yunes - Tuesday, 4 March 2003, 06:43 PM Dear Jeff, I found your forum to be very interesting since I'm experiencing right now the lack of some kind of synchronous communicaton myself in another online course. According to my experience, I found useful to have a synchronous communication system. I remember that the problem -a very real one- of dealing with the whole world, and their several time zones, was solved by dividing the MOO in two main groups, and it worked pretty well. Now, please would you be so kind of giving me some feedback about online learning and communication systems (i.e. synchronous, polysynchronous, asynchronous and so on) Maybe just a link to someplace were we could find some structured information about the field. Thanks a lot, Regards, Roberto Yunes PS: by the way, I would be glad of helping you with your project and the tests you need to perform. Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Rosemary Raygada Watanabe - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 02:45 AM Hi Jeff I do not so much about technical issues of MUVEs but I would like to know about it. Here, in Japan for the Universities it is difficult to have on line course outside Japan a cause of the difference time. I had the opportunity to participate in an on line course from New Zealand to Peru and time was the hard work what we did it successfullly. I would like to participate in your experiment if it is possible. Rosemary Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Joachim Sabin - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 05:55 AM ohuu, all professio als damn nothing happens by enter Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Jeff Cooper - Wednesday, 5 March 2003, 06:20 AM Dear Joachim, I'm not sure what you mean by this post. Did you try to go to Tapped In or some other MUVE and have trouble logging in? Or is it something else? Regards, Jeff Cooper Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Joachim Sabin - Thursday, 6 March 2003, 03:14 PM Dear Jeff, I'm afraid the posting from 03.05 was just a result of carnevalistic happiness without any deep sense. Don't mind :-)! Joachim Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Cherry Stewart - Friday, 7 March 2003, 04:34 AM Thanks Jeff for the excellent demonstration yesterday of a MUVE suitable to educational delivery. I will certainly be investigating them more in the future. Cherry Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Cherry Stewart - Friday, 7 March 2003, 04:40 AM I couldn't agree with you more Jeff. I think it is important in an online environment for the participants to be able to contact instantly anyone else in the group. It is like seeing someone at a party and thinking — " oh, there is Jeff, I just wanted to ask him about ... I'll hope over now and do it!" I have tried keeping a couple of windows open so that I could surf this site as well as find someone in the chat room if there. But my multiple windows are becoming dificult to manage. I certainly thank the organisers for adapting moodle to have the 'who is online' feature. But in order for it to be really effective we have to encourage all these individuals to also log into the chat room on arrival if they want to be contactable. Cherry Reply Re: Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVEs) by Nick Kearney - Monday, 10 March 2003, 01:07 AM Hi I find the difference you note between Moodle and MUVEs interesting Jeff. I think it is not so much a quality of the environment itself as of the objectives of each. This is a course with limited time span, while MUVEs aim to be long term communities. It would however be quite possible to maintain a longer term conversation between a community of professionals through the forums and chat here in Moodle if that were the objective. Equally this could arguably be done through an e-list. I am on several e-lists that exhibit "community" characteristics (though the word is perhaps used rather freely) One adapts to the technical conditions if the conversation is rewarding. I experimented a few years ago with Schmooze in various language groups I had. My students found it hard to learn to use it and in the end wondered why I wanted to, when there were other communication tools available that they felt were easier to use, so we returned to the more familiar chat, e-mail and discussion forums. I must say I rather liked it, but had to admit that for many the learning curve required was not compatible with their needs, they did not want to spend so long getting familiar with the tool, and this outweighed the advantages. I would like to come and have a look, though it may have to wait until this course is over! I am a little busy right now. All the best Nick