Virtual Worlds in Government
Virtual Worlds in Languages
Paulette Robinson, PhD
National Defense University
“A global learning community for government’s most promising information leaders.”
Federal Consortium for Virtual Worlds
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History
Purpose
Working groups
Communication channels
Federal Virtual Worlds Events
http://www.ndu.edu/irmc/fedconsortium.html
IRM College Second Life Government Center
Meeting Rooms
25
Welcome Center
Conference Center - 60
Crisis Center
Auditorium for 220 (in June 08)
Benefits of Virtual Worlds
 Collaboration from anywhere
 Teleworking
 Collaborative work projects
 Education and Training
 Synchronous Communication
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Text chat
Voice
Body Movements
Bloghub.com
3-D representation of objects
Avatar personalization
Presence and Transference
Can be fun
Challenges of Virtual Worlds
 Emerging Technology
 Learning Curve: Movement and actions are not intuitive
 Security
 Avatar level
 Network level
 Content
 Cost of development
 Ability to share content
 Worlds are not interoperable
 Identity
 Privacy
Areas of Virtual World Use
1. Information Delivery (e.g., NOAA, NASA, CDC)
2. Meetings (IRM College Government Center)
3. Education and Training
4. Prototyping (facilities)
5. Analytical spaces (individual and group)
Types of Virtual Worlds
 Over 100 virtual worlds in existence
 Most common in the government
 Second Life
 Forterra (built on Olive platform)
 Active Worlds
 Qwak (build on Open Source Croquet platform)
 Nexus (National Guard)
 RFI—NASA (new world on the horizon)
 RFP—Air Force MyBase
Forterra Worlds
Active Worlds
Places to Learn Languages in SL
http://languagelab.com/en/
Place to Learn English Language
 http://www.avatarlanguages.com
 http://slenglish.com (free)
SL English
Avatar Languages
Resources for Teaching Languages in SL
 SL Languages Conference
(http://www.slanguages.net/home.php)
 http://SLEnglish.com
 http://www.Bloghub.com
Questions????
Paulette Robinson
Asst Dean for Teaching, Learning & Technology
Information Resources Management College
National Defense University
Washington DC
[email protected]
202-685-3891