[Opensim-users] Hoping for a fearless comparison of opensim vs unity 3D

Sun Jul 20 18:54:13 UTC 2014

Hi Kay,
'Even the online courses that utilize extensive instructor- or
institution-created materials always simultaneously utilize a textbook (to
insure the transmission of the relevant portion of the course-specific
common body of knowledge).  In turn, the textbooks I utilize in all of my
courses change each year.  Sometimes the textbook changes simply involve a
[maddening] re-sort of the chapters (to enable the publisher to change the
edition and sell more new copies of the text).  Still (and more
importantly), it is often the case that the material in the textbook
changes (and these changes need to be reflected in the course materials and
activities).'

This observation is spot ON. Actually we have to face exactly the same
issues for hazmat emergency response courses and I suspect this is true for
most fields.

R

On Sun, Jul 20, 2014 at 2:37 PM, Dr Ramesh Ramloll <r.ramloll at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Hi Doug,
> 'Collaboratively manipulating things that already exist is much easier,
> and the basis of almost every multiplayer Unity game. You work with or
> against your collaborator to whack the head off of some villain or uncover
> the secrets of the story.'
>
> Just a note here, the system RezMela has already allowed instructors to
> create a wide diverse range of stories, so there is not one story. The
> malleable linkset does not contain a fixed number of parts, in fact, it
> grows and shrinks, so it is not just direct manipulation. The 3D molecule
> model kit I mentioned earlier for e.g. is in fact like a 3D editor, where
> atoms can be created, duplicated, connected joined ... in another example,
> you could use the same principle to teach garden design for e.g. where the
> task would be to great various plants instances and rearrange to create new
> garden experiences and so forth...
> So again, when I talk about malleability, it is really well defined and
> specific. I see it is being stretched too far so that it became
> meaningless.... and I probably should coin another term.
> Glad Unity is working great for you. Point to us some clips, your success
> is worth sharing absolutely, and will be very useful to me as I continue to
> explore.
>  Ramesh
>
>
> On Sun, Jul 20, 2014 at 10:24 AM, Kay McLennan <mclennan.kay at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, Jul 19, 2014 at 11:45 AM, Tom <tom.willans at bessacarr.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> ...For many educational uses adapting and changing objects is not
>>> needed...
>>>
>>
>> While it is true that some types of educational simulations are well
>> suited for static simulations (like a virtual tour of the inner workings of
>> a human body part or a historic recreation of a city), static (Unity
>> platform-like) builds are completely ill-suited for the types of online
>> economics and business studies college courses I teach.
>>
>> Even the online courses that utilize extensive instructor- or
>> institution-created materials always simultaneously utilize a textbook (to
>> insure the transmission of the relevant portion of the course-specific
>> common body of knowledge).  In turn, the textbooks I utilize in all of my
>> courses change each year.  Sometimes the textbook changes simply involve a
>> [maddening] re-sort of the chapters (to enable the publisher to change the
>> edition and sell more new copies of the text).  Still (and more
>> importantly), it is often the case that the material in the textbook
>> changes (and these changes need to be reflected in the course materials and
>> activities).  For example, social media marketing is now one of the most
>> important components in the field of marketing but was barely mentioned in
>> textbooks even as recently as a few years ago.  Similarly, the cases in
>> business ethics textbooks continue to change at an almost exponential rate
>> owing to the abundance of new real work examples of unethical behavior
>> (think GMC, BP, the financial meltdown, GMOs, fracking, and more!).
>>
>> Further, college students (including traditional and non traditional aged
>> students) are pressed for time and require course-specific learning
>> simulations only.  That is, students do not have the time to explore
>> virtual world simulations that are only tangentially related to the course
>> learning objectives.  Rather, the virtual world learning simulations have
>> to be graded activities that are worth their time (in the sense of being
>> detailed and expansive enough to contribute specifically to their
>> understanding of the course material).  Again, in the same way high quality
>> college textbooks and online course sites require continual updates and
>> upgrades, high quality virtual world simulations need to be updated and
>> upgraded -- to contribute specifically to students' understanding of the
>> course material.
>>
>> Also (and this is a BIG item), I am constantly thinking up (and testing)
>> new types of virtual world learning simulations.  In other words, my view
>> is that it would be too limiting to be only be able to create a simulation
>> once.  In contrast, right now, I currently have about 40 or more different
>> types of virtual world learning simulations "in play" [read:  that I
>> collect student feedback data on (based on student -- Likert scale-based --
>> views on the interactivity, engagement, and contribution to learning
>> outcomes for each simulation -- see some of the early data collected at:
>> https://sites.google.com/site/fvwc12mclennan/student-survey-data-2)].
>>  Note:  Over the years, students have provided excellent and surprising
>> feedback.  For example, in the basic economics course I teach, I thought
>> students would be keenly interested in the Free Trade Game I built (with
>> each student the president/king/queen/dictator of their own island nation).
>>  However, the in-world PP slides (from my lecture notes that are also
>> uploaded into my course site) and the in-world vocabulary flash cards were
>> rated markedly higher than the Free Trade Game in every category.
>>
>> Note:  My college-level students almost universally [first] say they need
>> asynchronous virtual world learning activities ONLY (in keeping with how
>> all of my online courses are asynchronous).  However, after the students
>> get some experience with the virtual world learning activities, they almost
>> universally request real time meet-ups in-world!  That is, one of the main
>> attractions of virtual worlds continues to be the ability to interact with
>> others in-world.
>>
>> Finally, while I keep trying all of the different available virtual
>> platforms, to date (and for the reasons detailed above), I believe the
>> OpenSim platform is the best fit for my online college-level virtual world
>> learning simulations.  [Still, I will confess to being particularly taken
>> with the genius and intuitive "ease of use" of the smartphone control panel
>> or interface feature in the Cloud Party virtual world viewer.  That is,
>> while the Firestorm or Singularity or other OpenSim viewers work perfectly
>> for me (and I do NOT think a virtual world viewer has to be
>> browser-based!), I wonder if a second type of OpenSim viewer (that is
>> geared for a beginning user only) might be needed (?)...]
>>
>> Best,
>> Kay
>>
>> *Kay L. McLennan, Ph.D.*
>> *Professor of Practice*
>> *School of Continuing Studies*
>> *Tulane University*
>> *kmclenna at tulane.edu <kmclenna at tulane.edu>*
>> *e-Teaching in Virtual Worlds @
>> https://sites.google.com/site/fvc13mclennan/
>> <https://sites.google.com/site/fvc13mclennan/> and
>> https://sites.google.com/site/fvwc12mclennan/
>> <https://sites.google.com/site/fvwc12mclennan/>*
>> *e-Course Teaching Schedule & Syllabi @ http://www.tulane.edu/~kmclenna/
>> <http://www.tulane.edu/~kmclenna/>*
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Opensim-users mailing list
>> Opensim-users at opensimulator.org
>> http://opensimulator.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/opensim-users
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> 'Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labor or spin.'
> *Rameshsharma Ramloll* PhD, CEO CTO DeepSemaphore LLC, Affiliate *Research
> Associate Professor*, Idaho State University, Pocatello, ID 83209 Tel:
> 208-240-0040
> LinkedIn <http://www.linkedin.com/in/rameshramloll>, DeepSemaphore LLC
> <http://www.deepsemaphore.com>, RezMela <http://www.rezmela.com>, Google+
> profile <https://plus.google.com/103652369558830540272/about>
>

-- 
'Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labor or spin.'
*Rameshsharma Ramloll* PhD, CEO CTO DeepSemaphore LLC, Affiliate *Research
Associate Professor*, Idaho State University, Pocatello, ID 83209 Tel:
208-240-0040
LinkedIn <http://www.linkedin.com/in/rameshramloll>, DeepSemaphore LLC
<http://www.deepsemaphore.com>, RezMela <http://www.rezmela.com>, Google+
profile <https://plus.google.com/103652369558830540272/about>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://opensimulator.org/pipermail/opensim-users/attachments/20140720/5a4ac546/attachment-0001.html>