Virtual Museum Experiences

Originally uploaded to Flickr on June 12, 2007by bcg8

As we struggle to get our heads around how best to present ourselves in the virtual world, the Smithsonian is, of course, light years ahead. When you have a spare moment check out these amazing online projects. The first is the Ghosts of A Chance alternative reality game which was held last year. The project was set up as a way for visitors to interact with the collection at the Luce Foundation Centre for American Art. The project ran for three months and attracted 6,000 online visitors as well as over 200 on-site visitors. It was a pretty crazy combination of creating, gaming, online communication and detective work and it takes some time to get your head around (reading about it after the fact), but what a concept!

The other project takes virtual reality even further. This is the Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum hosted on Second Life. This really is out there! Basically you set up an avatar for yourself in Second Life and he/she walks through the Museum and visits the exhibitions.
Have fun!
Caz

The Networked Student

Uploaded on August 31, 2005by Robin Hutton

Here's a little light reading from the Australasian Journal of Educational Technology. In her article, 'The networked student model for construction of personal learning environments: Balancing teacher control and student autonomy', Wendy Drexler provides an interesting insight into the networked teacher/ student relationship using a test case undertaken with a group of 15 k-12 students in south-eastern USA. It's a bit long but if you are interested in this area it might be worth printing off to read on a 'rainy day'!