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Contact Lindi Forbes
Director Public Relations
Labette Community College
620-820-1212

Walker Uses Virtual Teaching as Classroom Tool

For the past year Robert Walker, Associate Professor, at Labette Community College has been using Second Life virtual world software to enhance his teaching of music appreciation to students in online and on-ground classes. Second Life has received attention lately from the television media to the congress. Recent TV shows like CSI, NY have featured it and the Congress held hearings both in real life and in Second Life about the future of virtual worlds for business and education. A thriving community of educators exists in Second Life. They often work together to assist new teachers at all levels of education. More than 500 colleges and universities around the world have presences in Second Life.

Virtual worlds started out as massively multi-player games such as Worlds of Warcraft and others. They have grown not only into bigger games, but into opportunities for business and industry. Real people are earning real money doing business in them. Many real world businesses have presences in Second Life. IBM does a great deal of their corporate training there. Reuters News has a bureau office in Second Life. There is also a long list of clothing and pop culture businesses in Second Life.

With the successes of the virtual worlds, there has also been controversy. Gambling was one such controversial issue. In the last year, Linden Labs, the owners of Second Life, have banned all forms of gambling.

Walker’s project started out as a pilot study in spring of 2007. His pilot study results were published in the League for Innovation Learning Abstracts in November of 2007. He has presented at several state and national conferences about his methods and research. In March of this year, he presented to the Virtual Worlds, Librarian, Educator, and Museum Conference, held completely in Second Life. He also presented from LCC at the Massively Multi-Learner Conference, held at the University of Paisley, in Scotland.

The project consists of students listening to classical period music in “virtual spaces” that resemble the time period. So when they listen to music of the medieval period, they do it in a dark gothic chapel. In addition to the music the students listen to, they are exposed to the art, architecture, history and literature of the period. The idea has been to create a humanities oasis. Places were not only music students, but students from any area of the arts can come and experience period art in its context.