Making and Using Machinima in the Language Classroom
By Carol Rainbow & Christel Schneider
A round publication
www.the-round.com
© 2014 Carol Rainbow and Christel Schneider
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the authors. Please contact us at
www.the-round.com for more information.
Cover design by Mark Bain
Edited by Penny Hands
This book is devoted with huge thanks to all the people who have helped,
often without knowing, as they have made their lands available for
photographs and machinima, particularly Heike Philp, Randall Sadler, Chic
Aeon, The University of West of England and the wonderful people of the
Machinima Creative Club and MachinEVO who have offered support and
criticism, were enjoyable to work with, and gave us more than they can ever
know towards the journey of us all making machinima! Finally, a very special
thank you to HazelDazel – actor, adviser, mentor, designer,
machinimatographer and always a wonderful friend!
About the authors
Christel Schneider is founder and managing director of CSiTrain, a company founded in January
2013. (www.csitrain.net) From 2006 until 2012, she was project manager and director of the
international language association, ICC (www.icc-languages.eu). Prior to this, Christel worked as
head of the language department for the German adult education association in Schleswig-Holstein
(Landesverband der Volkshochschulen Schleswig-Holsteins e.V. (http://www.vhs-sh.de/) and as a
lecturer at the University of Hamburg (Dept. of Education), teaching didactics and methodology.
Presently, Christel is partaking in an MA in Virtual Education at the University of Western England.
Christel Schneider has been a partner in more than ten European-funded projects, some of which
had a specific focus on virtual learning; others were designed for people with specific needs or
intercultural encounters. She is a passionate machinimatographer.
Carol Rainbow has been a teacher and teacher trainer for many years. She worked in local
government as an ICT Consultant for over 15 years, helping teachers enhance teaching and learning
through the use of technology. She has spent the last six years teaching in Second Life®, alongside
her online tutoring work for The Consultants-E www.theconsultants-e.com. She has spent three
years working as a moderator on the MachinEVO project, supporting teachers who are learning how
to make machinima for their language learners. She has been a teacher on the Avalon course and
taught English at the Second Life® school Language Lab™. She has also taught e-safety for teachers
from all over the world in Second Life®.
Using and Creating Machinima in Language Learning
Table of Contents
About the authors
Introduction








A virtual world: a MUVE?
What is machinima?
Avatars
Why teach in a virtual world?
What this book is about
Who this is book for
What if I don’t have experience in a virtual world?
Pedagogical underpinnings
o
o
o
Experiential learning
Lim’s Six Learnings of Second Life®
Situated learning
Section 1
Chapter 1 Examples of Machinima in Different Genres















Documentaries
Poetry
Storytelling
Grammar
Idioms
Conversation practice
Heritage
Humour
Instructional machinima
Informative machinima
Project-based machinima
Roleplay
Sketches
Intercultural issues
Advertising
Chapter 2 A Case Study of Making and Using Machinima in the Language Classroom




Using machinima to give feedback
The teaching steps are as follows
Integrating quizzes
Further ideas for roleplay and filming locations
Section 2
Chapter 3 How to make a Machinima in a virtual world
Six stages
1. Finding the idea
2. The script
3. The machinima plan
4. Filming
5. Editing
6. Post production
Machinima group management
Case study: the making of the Two Travelers and the Bear
Stage 1 Getting an idea
Stage 2 The script
Stage 3 The machinima plan
Stage 4 The filming
Stage 5 The editing process
Stage 6 Post production
Chapter 4 Making your First Machinima in a Virtual World







The software needed
Deciding where to film
o Studios
o Holodecks
Getting ready for filming
o Set the window for HD video
o Check the lighting for your scene
o Prepare your shot
o Hide the buttons
o Use an invisible avatar
o Capture video
o Check continuity
Add interest to your machinima
o Use animations
o Using a pose ball
o Use gestures
o Use different clothes
o Obtain and use props
Editing your video
o Adding transitions
o Adding titles or call outs
o Adding audio files
 Making a vocal recording
 Music and sound effects
Publishing your machinima
Sharing your machinima
Chapter 5 Challenges




Virtual world video is not accessible
Dialogue and script writing
o Other ways of generating ideas for student-created machinima
Adding text to your machinima should you or shouldn’t you?
Dealing with copyright issues
o Copyright
o Creative Commons licensing
o Finding Pictures to use in Machinima
o Second Life® permissions


Things don’t always look right
Griefers or griefing
Chapter 6 More Advanced Machinima Techniques




Graphics card settings
o Draw distance
o Depth of field
Getting the light right
o How to make lights in a virtual world
o How to use the windlight™ settings
Green screen or chroma key
o Creating a photobox or photosphere
o A demonstration of using green screen
Using a 3D mouse
Chapter 7 Machinima in Other Contexts

Machinima in transmedia
o Inanimate Alice
o The Cavendish Chronicles
o Transmedia Storyteller
References
Appendix I

How to use pre-existing machinima in the classroom
o Before watching the machinima
o Whilst watching the machinima
o After watching the machinima
Appendix II
Second Life® and other virtual-world shortcuts and settings
Appendix III
A scheme of work – using machinima in a language class
Appendix IV
Lesson plans




Dog idioms
Simple past talk
Past Talk - Simple Past - Self Study or Revision
Talking about the weather
Appendix V
Machinima resources




Video hosting sites
Story starters
More machinima for use with students
Machinima web links
Appendix VI
Downloadable resources


Other video editing software
Free sound effects and music
Appendix VII
Areas of interest to machinimatographers



Machinima Festivals and competitions
Research into machinima
Projects Involving machinima
o Euroversity
o MachinEVO
o The CAMELOT Project
If you are reading a paper version of the book, or an e-reader that allows pictures
but not videos, and have a mobile phone or tablet, use the Augmented Reality
program ‘Aurasma’, to make each machinima image play the machinima as you
hover over the picture in the book. Subscribe to the Machinima Book
http://auras.ma/s/FkL0m or use the QR code to subscribe to the channel on your
mobile device.
Introduction
Many teachers are sceptical about using virtual worlds for teaching and learning. This book aims to
demonstrate to teachers and learners how they might become more confident using virtual worlds
by getting engaged in making machinima.
What is machinima?
Machinima is simply a word composed from ‘machine’ and ‘cinema’, and it has become the
collective name for films or videos made in virtual worlds and gaming environments. A machinima
can be very simple – just a recording of a scripted narration, a dialogue or a roleplay. Machinima can
also be very elaborate, with several film clips or images woven into the action. Call-outs, subtitles,
blocks of text, speech bubbles, music and special effects can also be added to produce a more
complex and satisfying machinima. Examples that the authors have created of the simplest to the
more complex will be used to demonstrate techniques through this book.
We produced a series of machinima which aimed to:





promote learning in virtual worlds
make access easy through simple and visual instructions
trigger interest in learning and teaching in virtual worlds
demonstrate what can be achieved by learning in virtual worlds
help teachers and learners understand the benefits and challenges of learning in 3D worlds.
One of the machinima that we made called ‘It is never too late to learn something new’ was
produced to encourage potential users to get involved in using a virtual world.
A virtual world
A virtual world is a 3D environment, where people from all around the world can come together in
space, regardless of their geographical location. Second Life® is one of numerous virtual worlds. At
the time of writing, Second Life® has the equivalent of about 24,000 square miles of developed
landscape in nearly as many privately-owned regions of every conceivable design, with thousands of
free artefacts. Virtual worlds can be rewarding places for language learning, where learners may mix
freely with native speakers of their target language. Virtual worlds are also known as MUVEs (Multi
User Virtual Environments). The experience which can be obtained from a MUVE is summed up in
the following quotation:
MUVEs like SL have unique affordances that can provide opportunities for a richer embodied
social presence, sensory immersive experiences, hands-on activities, and authentic contexts
for experiential learning. (2)
Table of Contents
Avatars
A person in a virtual world is presented as an avatar – a graphical model of him- or herself. People
can choose to look like a human, an animal or almost anything imaginable. The avatar can move
around the 3D world, flying, walking and talking to others. When people set up an account in any
virtual world, the first thing they do is to create or choose a starter avatar. The avatar is controlled
by the mouse, the trackpad, arrow or letter keys. What we see on screen is from just behind the
avatar looking forward.
Why teach in a virtual world?
The virtual world offers something quite different from conventional teaching and learning. It can
create an immersive environment which is not possible in the physical classroom. Below is a list of
‘affordances’ (opportunities that present themselves and are good for learning and teaching) of a
virtual world.



Teachers and learners can interact with people both within and outside the virtual world at
the same time.
People with different language and cultural backgrounds are able to meet, interact and learn
collaboratively, regardless of their geographical location.
People can take part in simulations of events which would be impossible for many in real life
– such as going into space in a rocket, sky-diving, flying aeroplanes or helicopters, working
on an oil rig, or mending a pipeline under the sea.





People can do things which are physically impossible in their physical life such as flying or
walking under water, and, in fact, anything imaginable.
People can visit places such as virtual Morocco, take part in the virtual Hajj, fly to the top of
the Eiffel Tower, visit Berlin in the ’20s or climb Big Ben, either alone or in groups.
People can completely change their identity, personality, gender, size or shape, and become
non-human. They might become a robot, a vehicle or an animal.
There are no physical disabilities in a virtual world unless someone wants one.
It is possible to record oneself and one’s peers in a wide range of places as an infinite
number of characters and in many different situations (and then edit these recordings
together to create machinima).
Table of Contents
From the point of view of a teacher, the advantages of virtual-world teaching are many.
Teachers can:



offer learners a place to meet and engage in social, cultural and entertainment activities
prepare field trips to extraordinary places to engage and inspire learners
prepare simulations of life-changing events such as a sinking ship, a plane crash or maybe a
massive industrial fire, which their learners can learn from without being in any danger
Tornado simulation: http://youtu.be/WrIFDl9Gaus

simulate everyday situations which may occur when visiting places such as a bank, a
hospital, a supermarket or a hotel, thus enhancing the immersive environment and
experiential learning aspect.
The freedom offered by interacting in virtual worlds gives people the scope for creating motivating
videos. Avatars can adopt a shape, age, gender or costume. They can allow the learner to become
anyone from Mary Queen of Scots to President Obama, from a cat to a dinosaur.
Table of Contents
There are some very good reasons to make machinima:



They are fun.
They are cheap.
Students can produce them by themselves.


Avatars can do the impossible.
Creators have ownership.
The educational potential of machinima in virtual worlds for language learners is vast. So long as
they have access to a digital device, learners can:


listen to a machinima created by a teacher
practise the language whilst trying it out in the 3D reality of a virtual-world simulation.
For higher-level learners, planning, preparing, filming and editing their own machinima is an
interesting way to enhance the learning experience.
In the wider sphere, instructional machinima are becoming widely available. They demonstrate, for
example, how to use various pieces of equipment for nursing or farming. These can be made and
shared very cheaply. With regard to language learning, we have seen machinima made to teach
students what to expect when they go to a new city or country to study. Finally, there is marketing
potential in machinima, both in producing them for companies and developing one’s own to sell.
What this book is about
This book is a guide to making machinima using Second Life® – a program offering a free machinimamaking facility called ‘Your World – Your Imagination’. We have used examples from Second Life®
www.secondlife.com since this is the most sophisticated virtual world for the creation of machinima.
However, everything written in this book about making machinima could also be applied to other
virtual worlds.
The first section of the book deals with ideas for ways in which teachers and learners can use
machinima either in the classroom, the virtual world, or individually. A scheme of work (Appendix III)
and several lesson plans ( Appendix IV ) are provided for further reference when planning classes. All
of these can be adapted to different groups and levels of learners.
The second section of the book deals with making machinima in Second Life®.
Table of Contents
Who this book is for
This book is written for teachers, teacher trainers and learners of all subjects, with a special focus on
language learning. You do not have to have experience of Second Life® to make machinima though it
would help. Learners however may have experience in other games such as Minecraft™ and
perfectly good machinima can be made in those too.
What if I don’t have experience in a virtual world?
If you are new to virtual worlds, you will need to follow some initial basic instructions before getting
started with making machinima. These instructions will enable you to log into the virtual world and
create your avatar.
See Getting Started with Second Life® – a video guide http://youtu.be/TPHTknDn9Fo
and http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Second_Life_Education/Get_Started a written guide and indepth help wiki.
Table of Contents
Pedagogical underpinnings
1. Experiential learning
According to Kolb, American educational theorist (see below), experiential learning is a way of
learning through taking part in an activity, and then reflecting on that activity afterwards. Learners
can take part in roleplays, for example, making a pitch to some prospective customers, or visiting a
restaurant and ordering food and drinks. The action can be filmed, and the result is a simple
machinima. Learners can watch their work and reflect on their performance and language. A teacher
and other learners present may question the performer at length. Thus, the learner is reflecting on
the experience and revising or updating his or her thoughts.
Whilst developing the machinima itself, it is necessary to reflect quite deeply on what has been done
in the lesson to ensure the machinima is true to the learning intentions. Sharing the machinima
helps the learner to analyse the outcome and further practise the language.
Simply practising booking into a hotel, making complaints, ordering food and similar scenarios in a
virtual world make the language learning experiential. Interviews for business language learners,
people looking for jobs, or learners hoping to get into university are powerful, realistic and easy to
manage rehearsal opportunities. A machinima of the applicant’s mock interview can be studied and
discussed, and verbal techniques can be improved, all simply as a result of having conducted the
interview in a virtual world and having recorded the action.
Table of Contents
Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle: (4)
1. Learners have a concrete experience.
2. This is followed by a period of ‘Reflective observation’ where they step back and review
what has been experienced, ask questions and discuss it with others.
3. The third stage is ‘Abstract conceptualisation’, a process of making sense of what happened.
This may call on knowledge of others or textbooks.
4. The final stage is ‘Active experimentation’ where one tried out the new learning to see how
it works and if it is useful.
Table of Contents
2. Lim’s Six Learnings of Second Life®
When teachers move into a virtual world, the temptation is to replicate their physical classroom.
Teachers and trainee teachers need to be encouraged to be adventurous and try out new styles of
teaching. This can be difficult, especially in the first instance, when it is hard to see how they might
do anything differently, and they do not have well developed virtual-world skills. New methods and
learning perspectives offer approaches which will help teachers think differently when they come to
teach in Second Life® or any other virtual world. A prime example is the ‘Six Learnings Framework’(5)
created by Kenneth Lim, educator at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological
University. It is easy to see, when reading down the list, that machinima could give notable language
learning potential within this framework.
Lim’s six learning perspectives are:
 Learning by exploring: for example, visiting a museum or art gallery in the virtual world
and exploring the artefacts found there.
http://youtu.be/qSq8Dx4OJSU A virtual tour to Renaissance island
http://youtu.be/jbaOtyoaIYw A virtual tour to a museum

Learning by collaborating: for example, working as part of a team to plan, design and film a
tour guide for one of the ‘sims’ (= areas of land in a virtual world, so called as they are
hosted on simulators), or solving a puzzle such as reconstructing a rocket, where one partner
gives the other instructions in the target language.
http://youtu.be/CAo-fC3O-eo Building a rocket

Learning by being: there are many roleplay sims in virtual worlds where learners may be
encouraged to explore and take part with native speakers. Also, there are any number of
holodecks (storage containers for holding many different scenes, which individually can be
opened on the same plot of land when they are needed). These can be used for small
dialogue scenarios such as booking into a hotel, visiting a doctor, ordering food in a
restaurant and more. Making machinima of these activities gives learners opportunities to
revise and correct any language issues.
Table of Contents
The following image shows a simulation of an Earthquake, where the avatar is experiencing the
house falling down around him as the Earthquake takes place.

Learning by building: working in a group to build a simple poster display based on a theme
would ensure new vocabulary is learned, used and hopefully committed to the long-term
memory.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajc-BfrRhv8 How to build a window in a wall

Learning by championing: for example, language learners, teachers or trainee teachers could
make a machinima to teach everyone how to use a new teaching tool such as the
Opinionator or share information about a charity event which they support. Lim, in his paper
titled ‘Pedagogy, Education and Innovation in 3_D Virtual Worlds’(5) suggests championing a
real-life cause. There are many of these in Second Life® such as Cancer Research or Aid for
Africa.
The following machinima was taken in Fantasy Faire, a Relay for Life™ cancer awareness and
fundraising activity which takes place yearly in Second Life®.
http://youtu.be/hz10N2G0MwQ Fantasy Faire
Table of Contents

Learning by expressing: learners focus on expressing and articulating their learning by
sharing it with others outside the virtual world. In this instance, machinima could act as a
huge enabling resource; the potential is vast. Visiting art galleries, museums, virtual
representations of other countries inside the virtual world, when often not possible in the
real world, gives learners for more scope for a broader experience to talk about and share
ideas.
http://youtu.be/km_afd0_dEI Why Second Life® (or any virtual world)
3. Situated learning
Lave and Wenger’s theory of ‘Situated Learning’ sees adult learning as taking place within
communities of practice through socialisation, visualisation and imitation.
Lave and Wenger (3) argue that ‘learning should not be viewed as simply the transmission of
abstract and decontextualized knowledge from one individual to another, but a social process
whereby knowledge is co-constructed.’ If we consider how their theory could apply to learning in a
virtual world, we find that opportunities for all three are present.
Socialisation: a virtual world gives access to situated learning as it is a place for anyone from
anywhere to meet socially, chat, dance, make music as in the following machinima, and more.
http://youtu.be/TZP54zcZQfc The Drumming Circle
Table of Contents
Visualisation: this is a major factor in learning in a virtual world. It is possible to walk through
molecular cell structures or be in the middle of a tornado without danger.
http://youtu.be/WrIFDl9Gaus Tornado Simulation
Imitation: this refers to doing the thing that you are learning about. For example, in a virtual-world
language learning context, learners may go shopping with the group and rehearse buying clothes.
This will enable them to familiarise themselves with the experience before needing to go into a real
shop in a foreign country.
http://youtu.be/invu_jwfql8 Einkaufsbummel
Table of Contents