in-world meeting and a wiki

Several items to report today! First up, it was great to meet Lynn Yoder in-world. Lynn is our BOCES leader on this project. She and I have been emailing frequently, but this was our first Teen Grid hook-up. We had a great conversation and I taught her how to add texture to an object.

Second, I signed up for a free PBWiki online course this summer. Six weeks of work and conversation and if I do all the homework, I get a free, platinum-level wiki for an entire year. Not a bad payoff at all. Over 1000 people have taken advantage of this offer (educators only) and the place is rocking!

Why do I report that here? Because I'm wedding web 2.0 and web 3.0 (the wiki and SLTG, respectively) with this course. Not only am I using a blog for accounting purposes (and my own need to think things through), but I'm using the wiki for students to do the same. They'll record their thoughts in a journal page they keep, but they also will create content for the wiki as they go along (I'm planning to have them prepare "how-to" guides of some of the basic skills people need in SL). It's also a great place for me to put their assignments...so the kids can progress through at their own pace. I'll be in RL (real life) with my whip in the classroom to spur them on, but those that want to outpace me, will easily be able to.

So, I met Lynn and then added a few more texture boxes to the texture "store" and also added the journal page to the wiki today. A good day's work of about an hour and a half spent (would've been longer in SL, but the region was undergoing a restart, so I needed to log anyway. Took the time to write this post instead of making more texture boxes).

Take care,
Thespis