MULTI-USER AND VIRTUAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS: CASE STUDIES FROM NUS - - PDF document

MULTI-USER AND VIRTUAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS: CASE STUDIES FROM NUS

• J. Yap

Computer Centre, National University of Singapore (SINGAPORE) johnyap@nus.edu.sg

Abstract

This presentation will showcase 3 different academic modules in NUS that has effectively leverage on the NUS presence in Second Life for e-learning. The modules are made for undergraduate levels: “Introduction to Computing” from School of Computing, “Cybercrime and Society” and “Governance and New Media” from the New Media and Communication Department of Faculty of Arts and Social

• Sciences. We will present how the academic modules involved, have successfully engaged the

students in their learning, delivering unique experiential learning experiences and how assessment of their learning progress and performance was applied within the virtual environment. Keywords: second life, virtual learning environment, experiential learning, higher education, virtual world affordances, simulations for learning, game-based learning

1 INTRODUCTION

Teaching students using novel ways and keeping them engaged in theoretical topics has been the most daunting task for educators in Higher Education. In recent years, educators have begun to venture into the forefront of using Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) leveraging on sophisticated teaching platforms like 3-dimensional (3D) multi-user virtual environments (MUVEs) which resonates with well-established virtual learning environments(VLEs) like Second Life. Educators are challenged to improve or enhance the understanding by way of experiencing the context in the study using a virtual world simulation, in the hope of leading students into developing more independent thinking and critical analysis of the intended topics. Staying relevant to the current cultures and lifestyles of learners, that has leaned towards the influx of digital games in virtual platforms, they realised learning in our era takes on a different paradigm of engagement of students for improving learning experiences (Payne, 2009). What could be more innovative and forward- thinking than making use of the affordances and efficacies of students in a 3D MUVE?

2 BACKGROUND

With ever improving ICT infrastructures and prevalent new media cultures, there was an obvious need for a change in paradigm of learning. Brown. J(2002) has advocated that “learning comes as a result

• f a framework or environment that fosters learning rather than as a result of teaching.”(Pivec, 2006,
• p. 39). Educators need a shift in focus on result-oriented methods in teaching to the purposeful design

and implementation of actual learning environment that will be best for such delivery of information or knowledge transfer. The National University of Singapore first started their presence in Second Life in early 2008 and has been experimenting and testing this state-of-the-art learning technology for its education of Higher Learning in a MUVE. Lending our studies from the experiential theory, 4 dimensional framework in serious games, engagement and flow theories, Bloom’s taxonomies of learning, motivation theories, we shall summarise the learning experiences of the university in its 3 significant and impactful case studies.

3 CASE STUDY 1: FUN AND CHALLENGE IN A CYBERCRIME QUEST 3.1 Background: E-Learning Week in NUS

The e-Learning week in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) of NUS was planned with the intention to simulate preparation for an outbreak of any pandemic disease that would require all

students to be self-quarantined in their own homes. The e-Learning exercise mandated that all students of the faculty would continue their week’s learning off the campus while attending their lectures and tutorials in various electronic modes of delivery. These modes of e-Learning included webcasts of over 400 lectures, various discussions boards in asynchronous or synchronous modes for

• ver 1,400 tutorials and seminars throughout the entire faculty. “NM3210: Cybercrime and Society”, a

communications module attended by 108 undergraduate students from the Communications and New Media Department in the faculty, became an ideal and relevant choice for the implementation of this unique mode of e-Learning for the week.

3.2 The Challenge

The challenge for FASS in the e-Learning week was to find a virtual learning solution, formulate an e- Learning design that will prepare the students for a smooth learning experience, to effectively achieve better learning outcomes and to conduct assessments consistently without the existence of a typical face-to-face learning environment. At the end of the module, students from the different tutorial groups will also attempt to share their module research findings in the shared space of a virtual gallery that hosts all the final conclusions of their module research assignment.

3.3 An Engaging “Cybercrime Quest”

All students will begin their virtual learning experience called “Cybercrime Quest”, at the landing area

• f NUS in Second Life, where there will be explicit signboards(Figure 3a) and instruction guides to

help them through the exercise in a scaffold distribution (Silberman, 2007, p. 140) of instructional notecards or visuals along the way. For most of the students, this was a first experience in a MUVE like Second Life and it was important that explicit instructions are provided at the start (Judith Molka- Danielsen, 2009). At the first landing area, the students will all receive a start-up kit (which is a folder

• ffered to their inventory) that will serve to steer the quest in a roleplay mode of a training criminologist

with the challenge of identifying a cyber-hacker on the loose. All critical evidences need to be collected to warrant the arrest of the allegedly dangerous cybercriminal. The notecard will also briefly summarise the quest’s milestones so that students can have a glimpse of what is ahead for them in the VLE. Figure 3a: Start of Cybercrime Quest

3.4 Problem 1: Locating the Cipher Device

From the landmark provided in the start-up kit, the students will be teleported to a simulated crime scene in the ghetto slum apartment(Figure 4) where the criminal was last found at his cyber-hacking

• location. Students will arrive at the scene with instructions to search through the ghetto apartment to

locate the hidden cipher device in the midst of several decoys(Figure 3b) laid out in the same

• apartment. This was probably the most challenging but fun introduction of the quest because only by

locating the correct cipher device will the students be provided with further instructions and landmark to teleport to the next location last visited by the criminal. By clearing the first level of the quest, the students will naturally be more immersed in the VLE and also more proficient in using Second Life. This will also ensure that through such challenges (Malone, 1981), the students will be able to gain substantial confidence through the avatar’s interactivity, engaging them to take on the next challenge to decrypt the located cipher device. Figure 3b: Locating the Cipher Device

3.5 Problem 2: Decrypt Cipher Device

Students will arrive at the second simulation, the NUS Cybercrime Laboratory, using the landmark given together with the cipher device. They are required to watch a video that illustrates how a typical ROT13 decryption technique works for decryption of data. In order to decrypt the cipher reader found earlier, they will need to hold the cipher device while touching the cipher reader (Figure 3c) to retrieve the codes. With the generated codes appearing only on their individual screen, they must now use the decryption codebook (Figure 3d) found on one of the walls to derive/substitute these codes which will reveal the next challenge location: “Ridgecat Cafe”. Unlike the previous stage where direct teleportation landmarks were provided in notecards, the students will now need to locate the signboard(found near the landing point) independently within the compound that will teleport them to the Ridgecat Cafe to proceed. Figure 3c: Retrieving Decryption Codes Figure 3d: Decryption Codebook Wall

3.6 Problem 3: Locate a Surveillance Camera

Upon teleportation to the third simulation, the Ridgecat Cafe, the students will enter an internet cafe that is filled with excessive surveillance cameras (Figure 3e). By clicking on the correct camera, they will finally receive the visual of the criminal as taken by the one and only surveillance camera (Figure 3f). They will need to use this visual to match with a mugshot lineup back at the laboratory later. Before teleporting back to the laboratory, the students will also be required to watch a video on the excessive surveillance cameras in London, England, on the video wall. With this immersion experience in the virtual environment simulated to mimic our modern society of such surveillances, they will be also required to submit their own constructive reflections of the social impact of using surveillance cameras in the form of a short essay with reference to the exposure they have just experienced. Figure 3e: Excessive Surveillance Cameras Figure 3f: The Correct Surveillance Camera

3.7 Problem 4: Submission for Assessment

This is the second teleportation to the Cybercrime Laboratory and the final teleportation trip, where the students would be very close to completing their e-Learning exercise in the VLE at this juncture. They would need to match their retrieved visual from the previous location with the mugshot lineup on the wall and submit their selected identity of the criminal via a dedicated chat channel scripted to store the individual submissions used for grading for their participation (Figure 3g). Figure 3g: Virtual submission of identity of criminal

As part of the proof of participation in the exercise, the students would also be required to take a snapshot of their avatars in the VLE to be submitted into the IVLE workbin(image repository) for the lecturer’s assessment of their participation. This snapshot, together with the submission of their final reflection essay on the social impact of surveillance cameras experienced in their virtual learning experience in Second Life, marks the fulfilment of their learning requirements needed for the week.

3.8 Finale: Cybercrime Gallery

Although the e-Learning week was eventually over, the team saw the immense learning potential of how a shared space in the VLE in Second Life can be used as a common virtual space for the students to share their final term research findings which would usually be limited to face-to-face presentations in their tutorial groups. The summary of the findings in each group’s research were all collated and exhibited on poster boards in a “Cybercrime Gallery” (Figure 3h) in the university’s virtual campus, where all the students’ final term presentation summaries can now be accessed and shared visually by the entire student cohort. Figure 3h: Students at Cybercrime Gallery

4 CASE STUDY 2: A SIMULATION NOT POSSIBLE IN REAL LIFE 4.1 Background: Limitation of Case Studies

The focus of the teaching and learning experience in this paper is on, “NM3202: Governance and New Media”, a communications module offered in early 2011, for 100 undergraduate students majoring in the Communication and New Media Department from the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences in the National University of Singapore. This module focuses on the approaches and policy options adopted by governments and international organisations around the world to address governance issues and challenges related to the mass adoption, usage, and even abuse of ICTs that has permeated almost every facet of our daily lives. Students will learn that such governance issues are invariably multi- dimensional, with considerations of social, cultural, political and even economic impacts and that there is a need to work with multiple stakeholders and interest groups to effect appropriate governance

• policies. The case study of the Bhopal toxic gas leakage of India in 1984, was used as an industrial

case study for the module depicting how the country is still languishing in its aftermath even today due to the negligent and irresponsible policies and governance of industrial accidents. The case was selected as a key reading to illustrate a highly controversial and debatable real life circumstance of governance inadequacy in policy making. Students will usually need to be actively involved in the typical research of any related issues in the context of this incident, perform the necessary analysis and eventually discuss their findings in their tutorial classes.

4.2 The Challenge

The objective of this enhanced activity in addition to usual case studies learning methods, was largely to yield a better understanding of how the effects of such rippling governance can affect the lives of people in the country. Students can try to further understand the case study based on related research

• f governance resources or additional media reports in the internet which often only focused on

controversies surrounding the event. Such resources are sometimes not pertinent to the actual social impact, cause and effects of the doctrines of governance for industrial accidents. It might appear to be highly engaging to partake in such a real life case study, but it does not necessarily translate into knowledge transfer that students can associate with in their cognitive or affective domains of learning (Anderson, Krathwohl, & Bloom, 2001), since it really is just written texts to be analyzed and discussed as a class, with little engagement emotionally in reality. From previous experiences, students usually keep their indifferent distance from the situations they read from the case studies since they do not see the impact it has personally, especially in the local context. It was also obviously not possible or feasible for the students to revisit the actual site due to the hazardous threat or to make a physical trip to India to understand the real social impact it has on the people. MUVEs like Second Life, are fast becoming one of the popular virtual 3D environments that academic institutes have been leveraging on for their new technologies in education recently. Using avatars, which are essentially 3D digital representations of its users, there was an obvious justification that educators can associate with when simulating environments for education. The reason that education in a VLE itself, being “conceptually” built up mirroring what the real physical world looks like, would serve to provide an “enhanced feeling of presence” of themselves in an environment(Park, Hwang, & Choi, 2009). Such a natural advantage of the platform makes a VLE, conducive vehicles to expose students to in their learning process. With affordances of zero life-threatening consequence in simulating our physical world in a highly immersive environment, the deployments of these academic activities become a niche that most learning environments and platforms cannot achieve.

4.3 A Hazardous Environment in a Virtual Learning Envrionment

Students were given 1 week’s time to complete this simulated learning experience and any relevant assessments at their own free time. They were allowed to complete this exercise with another companion in class or anyone they could have encountered anonymously from the module during their access of the simulation site in the university campus. Students will access the start of the simulation exercise from the landing point of the university campus where there will be explicit signboards that will provide instructions to the start of the simulation(Figure 4a). Figure 4a: Starting point of Simulation Exercise

Students will be provided a ‘startup kit’ which is a folder given to them upon clicking on the sighboard for instructions. Within this folder, they will receive a notecard and a toxic gas mask which they are recommended to put on before they start the exercise. In an effort to engage the students in the immersive roleplay, the notecard will provide a very important context of a background of the exercise where the students will assume the character of an environment government officer in pursuit of a case of alleged toxic leakage sighted in an industrial plant. It now requires their coordination with another predecessor undercover colleague who is already at the site. The notecard will also include a brief summary of the virtual tasks to let students have an idea of what to expect ahead in the exercise. As part of the immersive roleplay, their first task was to locate the whereabouts of the undercover colleague and to uncover the hidden evidence that was found recently before losing contact with them. Students will then put on their toxic gas masks (Figure 4b) provided earlier since the plant is supposedly hazardous to their health and begin by teleporting into the simulation of the industrial plant using the landmark provided at the startup. Their first task was fairly easy to accomplish: to comb the restricted areas of the plant in search of the site that contains the evidence (Figure 4c). Figure 4b: Students in toxic gas masks Figure 4c: Location of Toxic evidence Upon locating the evidence, the students will need to take a snapshot of themselves together with the evidence to be submitted to the lecturer as the proof of their participation in this part of the simulation exercise (Figure 4d). They will also discover here that the undercover colleague’s identity has been compromised and he was found dead mysteriously at the site of the evidence. As part of the continuation of the roleplay, it is the student’s task now to locate a payphone where they can submit the name of the deceased colleague to a dedicated chat channel, scripted to collate their answers for the grading for their virtual participation (Figure 4e). Figure 4d Snapshots submitted by students Figure 4e: Students submitting answers After the submission is done, the students will now enter the final and most crucial learning point in the simulated exercise. At this final juncture, the students are given the heavy responsibility of the whole experience in this simulated environment: making a critical decision of the discovery. In the event that they have evidences that could bring about a change in how such life threatening hazards in industrial

practices can be prevented, through better governance and their policies, how would they take this situation to task? There will be 3 options for them to choose from: The Vigilante, The Confused and The Faithful Agent (Figure 4f). Figure 4f: Choose any options (L-R): “The Vigilante”, “The Confused”, “The Faithful Agent” The students will now need to consider the 3 options presented to them in the simulation of the VLE, with a closer and affective sense of the responsibility of their choices, and to weigh each consequence in a personal perspective based on what they have learnt and read. By interactively clicking on their choices, it will bring about an immediate reciprocated response in the simulation. Choice of “The Vigilante” will ignite an immediate explosion to simulate the decision for complete annihilation in its lack of faith in any form of governance (Figure 4g), while choice of passive options like “The Confused” will yield a simple sound effect with an explanatory notecard and choosing “The Faithful Agent” will require the effort to power down the plant(Figure 4h) and trusting the reigning government to take actions to eradicate such malpractices.

Figure 4g: Explosive Consequences of “The Vigilante” Option Figure 4h: Shutting Down of Plant in “The Faithful Agent” Option

4.4 Debrief and Reflection

In the following week after the virtual exercise, a debrief was held in the lecture to reveal to the students, the location of the toxic evidence and also explain the rationale of this immersive experience for a better understanding and feel of the consequences of governance. This will ensure that any doubts the students had about the circumstances encountered during the exercise would be clarified. The three options presented to them at the end of the simulation would be further addressed and explored in the next discussion tutorial as a class, after the week’s assignment in the VLE. Last but not least, they will be required to complete a full reaction paper after this discussion in class where they will hear their other classmates’ experiences in the VLE and their choices with all possible rationales, in a debate. The reaction paper will be produced by all the students individually after this discussion and the reflection process here becomes the most critical assessment of the learning outcomes in the simulated learning experience of the plant that is not possible in real life.

5 CASET STUDY 3: A LABYRINTH THAT TEACHES COMPUTING 5.1 Background: Game-based Learning Environment Needed

The School of Computing offers an academic module, “IT1001: Introduction to Computing” to all non- computing undergraduate students, seeking to impart fundamental levels of computing knowledge, used as a non-major academic elective used for fulfilment of the undergraduate graduation

• requirements. As the module of 180 undergraduates is made up of a mixture of students from all non-

computing faculties with no mandatory pre-requisites in computing experience, The coverage of the subjects in the module is widespread in coverage of fundamentals but none too focused on mastering particular areas of computing, making it a suitable module with less demands for complex learning

• utcomes, to conduct part of their learning in a virtual learning environment (VLE). The curriculum of

this module has traditionally revolved around the typical lectures, small group discussion tutorials and assignment-based assessments with little multimedia components used as asynchronous modes of learning.

5.2 The Challenge

Past VLE experiences in Second Life in previous modules have included mostly synchronous tutorial chatrooms, which predictably like most early adopters, removed all barriers of shyness and yielded a substantial increase in participation in the class, but also caused a lot of disorientation and loss of focus in the subjects discussed in a typical synchronous chatroom. What appears to be needed for this module was similar to what Bignell et al (Bignell, 2010) has investigated: a conducive environment that allowed a higher level of control and interactivity by users in its immersive experience, asynchronous in its mode of learning, and sufficiently rich in its environment for an unique experience that would be as good or even better than a face-to-face class. 3D MUVEs like Second Life has emerged in recent years as the apparent answer to deliver a more enriching and technology-enhanced learning in education that traditional VLEs cannot accomplish. Traditional VLEs might appear to be more extensively explicit with their functions but is often less affective or immersive and therefore less engaging in its mode of learning (Bignell, 2010, p. 17). Unlike most games we are familiar with, Second Life is a virtual world that is not bounded by any game mechanics or objectives that has an end in itself. It is also a highly customisable learning space that allows designers, developers and educators to collaboratively craft out a more creative curriculum with boundless flexibility and possibilities that typical face-to-face learning cannot achieve. With the vast possibilities of how the contents can now be creatively weaved into the media rich VLE, it was also a challenge to ensure that the enhanced learning experience would be fun, interactive and yet challenging enough to become an important pedagogical enhancement to the learning process(Wankel & Kingsley, 2009).

5.3 Task Type

Students will need to first perform the task of exploration and undergo experiential learning (Judith Molka-Danielsen, 2009, p. 38; Kolb, 1984; Silberman, 2007) in the Dell island with the specific

• bjective to explore the giant computer simulation(Figure 5a) to gain the necessary knowledge needed

for the hardware coverage of the learning outcome. They would then need to take a simple snapshot at a designated spot (example: memory slot on the motherboard) of the site before teleporting back to the next simulation in the virtual campus. Upon returning to the virtual campus, the students will start their walk through an interactive maze that resembles a labyrinth, with some guiding instructions at the entrance(Figure 5b). The students will enter this maze, encountering each questions which will each be displayed on the wall where they tread upon(Figure 5c), of which they will need to choose their answers at the spot and proceed in the guided direction to pick up the assigned alphabet on the wall. There will be a total of 8 questions(Figure 5d) that contains a mix of questions pertinent to their earlier exploration in the Dell simulated computer and the lecture contents over the past weeks. Each question will correspond to the choice of 2 answers, which will yield them an alphabet each(be it right or wrong) when

• encountered. Students will be required to note down the alphabets they encountered based on their

choice of answers so that they can submit the answers for assessment later. The maze is designed to be forgiving at the early part where there are some dead ends strategically placed in the maze in which the students can track back to choose the correct answer so that they would gain confidence needed in the beginning. The labyrinth will proceed further with its questions increasing in difficulty,

becoming more challenging in its attempt to engage the students in their pursuit of an ultimate exit out

• f the labyrinth.

Figure 5a: Simulation of gigantic computer in Dell island Figure 5b: Instructions at entrance of the Maze

Figure 5c: Student’s avatar in the labyrinth Figure 5d: Typical question and alphabet picked up in the maze

5.4 Media-Richness

The principles behind the media richness theory(Daft & Lengel, 1984) applies in a variety of communication possibilities that are supported by Second Life. With abilities to enable feedback with high levels of immediacy and speed, it also allows recording, storing and playback(Judith Molka- Danielsen, 2009, pp. 117-118) which can be also be used during debriefing. Communications in avatar forms can also be personalised in both textual messages and voice chats in a variety of

language choices as well. In the context of this VLE, the students can use a simple mode of communication to communicate with any avatars they encounter in the campus or at the Dell exploration visit. They will also submit their final answers of the collected alphabets from the maze for assessment via typing into a scripted chat channel at the end of the labyrinth. Collated answers from each avatar will be graded together for participation (snapshots of their avatar) and the correct order of their alphabet answers.

5.5 Assessment

The traditional assessment that the module has been implementing is a class quiz pertaining to the content from lectures and reading resources. Students will need to be assessed of their learning

• utcomes for the particular period in the VLE during the semester. This assessment during the period

will be replaced by the virtual assessment via the avatars submission of their answers in a dedicated script channel(Figure 5e) scripted in Second Life to collate all the students’ inworld virtual

• submissions. The final graded segment of the assessment is the submitted snapshot where students

will need to take a snapshot of their avatars with the background image(Figure 5f) found at the end of the labyrinth(Figure 5g). This submission which will be used as one of two snapshots used to grade for participation and completion of this game-based exercise. Figure 5e: Simulation of gigantic computer in Dell island

Figure 5f: Background for avatar’s snapshot submission Figure 5g: Students at the end of the labyrinth completing the final assessment

6 CONCLUSION

MUVEs like Second Life are not without its pitfalls and limitations during implementation of academic activities, especially due to the requirement of large volumes of bandwidth to support a lag-free

• experience. This would also mean common wireless technology which is prevalent in most places will

not be adequate to sustain optimum performances. Communication and detailing of instructions for learning within the environment is another major influence when students are being exposed to the environment for the first time. Scalability of concurrent users is also an issue with the maximum number of avatars existing at a common location, the simulation will therefore always be preferably in asynchronous mode so that it can be hosted and utilised during student’s personal time of access which will be more convenient to them too. As educators who are evaluating and experiencing such technologies in the forefront, it will be sensible and rational that the platform is evaluated for a longer period to test it for what it is best for and to develop ideas from such unique affordances that only a MUVE like Second Life can achieve, instead of being quick to judge its effectiveness by the early entry level of experience. Many times when such a new technology is being introduced, it also tends to get confused with other prevailing social media influences and would end up getting measured using the same yardstick for the current and popular social media in its delivery of knowledge transfer. It is important that we need to know the difference and their suitability in the platform’s mode of delivery so that we can ride on its niche in the delivery of such information. The design of a game-based learning from the case studies have exemplified the possible methods for learning to transform its delivery towards a more integral part of the culture(of gaming) and technology(3D MUVEs) that we are living in. With effective management and strategic planning, we can now leverage on this advantage in technology to drive a better understanding of the learning that traditional practice often found to be limited with.

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