Students were given Chapter 3 of "Second Life for Dummies" to review.
Students were asked to watch a video, "How to get started" at: http://adminstaff.vassar.edu/sttaylor/SL-Tutorials/.
Then, students completed an orientation activity described below.
ORIENTATION ACTIVITY
By November 16th:
Task 1: Review the Getting Started in Second Life documents in D2L and watch at least 2 You Tube videos on Second Life.
Task 2: Create a blog for your *group* at Blogger.com. E-mail to me the name of your blogspot once created. Make sure that your group members have access or that one member is in charge for updating the blog.
You will be posting your work product on Blogger for me and your classmates to view. Here is an example of a student project about Second Life on Blogger:
http://wwwolivesthesecondlife.blogspot.com/
There should be 1 blog per team.
http://help.blogger.com/bin/answer.py?answer=41440&topic=12498
Task 3:
Complete the Second Life Scavenger Hunt
Scavenger Hunt Instructions (you may want to complete this as a group or with a teammate):
1.) Create an Avatar (http://www.secondlife.com)
2.) While on orientation island, change your appearance (or clothes).
3.) Updated your profile by adding your 2nd Life and 1st Life information (Edit, Profile)
4.) Send to me (Juice Gyoza) a friendship offer (Edit, Friends or Ctrl Shift F)
5.) Visit the UWM island, Communication Building at:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Arts%20and%20Letters/80/220/22
Turn around 180 degrees to see the building
6.) Review the Rules.
Post the following information on your Blog.
1.) The name of your avatar(s)
2.) A screen shot of your avatar(s) in Second Life on UWM's sim
3) Challenges in getting oriented to Second Life
4.) Your first impression of being "IN" Second Life and how it could impact organizational communication
HELP SHEET
Getting Started in Second Life
Creating an Avatar
Go to http://www.secondlife.com. Click on the large button that says “Free Membership, Join Now.” You will be directed to a screen where you create an “avatar,” which will be your persona in Second Life. On this screen, you should choose your avatar’s name (you will have to select from a list of pre-selected names). Follow the steps to create your account and password. After you have created your account, you will be prompted to download the program.
Getting the Software
If you are on your personal PC or Mac, please note the following minimum basic requirements for running Second Life. After loading Second Life on your personal PC, click on "Start" and “Programs” or click on the Second Life shortcut on your desktop. If you are on your personal Mac, you can go directly to the “Second Life” icon in the “Applications” menu on a Mac. You must have a cable or D2L internet connect to use Second Life from your personal PC or Mac.
PC Minimum System Requirements:
Internet Connection*: Cable or DSL (no dial-up)
Operating System: Windows XP
Computer Processor: 800MHz Pentium Ill or Athlon, or
better
Computer Memory: 512 MB or better
Video/Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce 2, GeForce 4 MX or better, or ATI Radeon 8500, 9250 or better, Intel 945 chipset
Mac Minimum System Requirements:
Internet Connection*: Cable or DSL (no dial-up)
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.3.9 or better
Computer Processor: 1 GHz G4 or better
Computer Memory: 512MB or better
Video/Graphics Card: nVidia GeForce 2, GeForce 4mx, or better or ATI Radeon 8500, 9250, or better
More information on system requirements and recommended computer graphics cards can be located at: http://secondlife.com/corporate/sysreqs.php.
If you are downloading Second Life to your home computer or laptop, please be aware that Second Life must run on certain video/graphics cards and that many video/graphics cards will not support running the program. If you do not have a personal computer with the capacity needed to load Second Life, you can access Second Life in one of the CCLs on campus. Second Life is available in the CCLs in the Union, Bolton, and Library on the Macs. If you are a PC user, but going to use a Mac on campus to access Second Life, look for a Mac with a Mighty Mouse (right and left click) for easy and familiar use. If you are working in a campus computer lab, then you will not need to download the program; you can go directly to the “Second Life” icon in the “Applications” menu on a Mac after creating your avatar at secondlife.com.
Orientation to Second Life
First Entry into Second Life
When you first run the program, you will be prompted to enter your avatar name and your password. As this will be the first time that you will enter Second Life, you will be taken to “Orientaton Island.” In general, it is a really good idea to go all the way through the Orientation Island guide. The guide is simple and appears automatically on the left hand side of your screen.
There are four areas on the island to visit and develop the skills needed in Second Life:
Move – Help you learn basic movement and motor skills. It allows you to practice moving fluidly through Second Life and avoiding bumping into objects. You will also learn how to drive a
vehicle and to fly.
Appearance – How to change your appearance and buy clothes.
Search - Gives you practice using the Search function in Second Life. Learning about this aspect of moving throughout Second Life will be very important if you want to find out about people,
places and events at other campuses and regions.
Communicate – Provides you with practice in chatting and communicating with other avatars.
While it may be tempting to skip this step, going through Orientation Island will greatly accelerate your participation on the main land. Make sure to complete the tasks on orientation island to develop the needed skills to complete your course activities.
If you simply must get onto the main land immediately then there is a sign on Orientation Island right where you first came on. If you click on this sign it will let you go to the main land to an area called “Help Island.” Here you can pick up all sorts of free items. However, it is *strongly* recommended that you complete Orientation Island skills. Getting to the UWM Sim
Once you have gone through Orientation Island, go to the UWM sim. To do this, you can click on your Map and type “Arts and Letters” into the search box. Choose the sim called “Arts and Letters Region.” Click on Teleport. Otherwise, you can follow this link once you have created an avatar and downloaded the Second Life software to your computer:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Arts%20and%20Letters/80/220/22
Basics of Second Life
Getting Help
The Second Life Help menu at the top gives you pull down menus with instructions for various concepts and Second Life needs.
Navigating
There are several options available for controlling your avatar's movement.
Using the Mouse: To walk or fly, right- (or apple-) click on your avatar, select go, and click on the directional arrows with your mouse.
Using the Keyboard: Use the arrow keys on your keyboard to move forward (up arrow), back (down arrow), or right and left (right and left arrows, respectively).
To fly, push the flu button OR press and hold Page Up (or press the "f" key). To hover, let go of Page Up; you can now use your arrow keys to fly around. To land, press and hold Page Down (or press "c").
There are spaces around the campus where you can "park" your avatar while you chat or look around. You can sit on almost anything in Second Life, including the ground, the edges of steps and walls, and most objects. To sit down, right- (or apple-) click on the desired spot and select "Sit Here."
To view an object, use the alt key and click on it. To zoom in and out, use the mouse. Adding the control keys allows you to orbit around your avatar, and adding control and shift allows you to pan from side to side.
Note: Moving takes some getting used to. Play around. Remember that if you fall or find yourself in water, you will have to fly out instead of jumping.
Chatting
Make sure your toolbar is on view at the bottom of the screen. Click the button that says “Chat.”
A button saying “History” will appear, next to a bar with a space to type. When you type, your avatar will appear to be typing on an invisible keyboard. When you are done chatting, click escape.
Changing View Are you tired of looking at the back of your avatar? Want to see something from a different angle? Want to look at something without moving the avatar? Here are the basics.
The “View” button at the top allows you to select movement and camera controls to display on screen, and also gives tips and commands for some other actions. The Toolbar at the bottom of the screen can be taken on or off display from this menu. We suggest leaving the toolbar open, as you might need to use some of its features.
Inventory
Your avatar comes with a basic inventory, which includes clothing and body parts, objects you have acquired, gestures, note cards, and your library. Your library is where you can store things that you create and where items that are given to you will be located. You can access your Inventory by clicking the “Inventory” button on the bottom-right side of the toolbar, which then gives you a pop-up box with a basic directory and sub-directories for items.
If you’ve clicked on an object which can be added to your Inventory, there will also be a “Take” command.
Appearance
Right click or Alt+click on your avatar, and select the “Appearance” piece of the command pie. You get a box with a list of body parts (shape, skin, hair, and eyes) and a list of clothing items. When you click one of these buttons, you get another list to the right with boxes that show how you can modify all the components of that feature. For example, when you click eyes, you then get a sub menu that allows you to change the color and the lightness of your iris. You can change the shape of your eyes, the position on the face, and so on by clicking the “eyes” sub menu which appears after you’ve clicked “Shape.”
Finding things in Second Life
Click Edit on the menu, and select “Find” from the pull-down menu. You can look for a number of things, including places (including shops to buy new clothes, hair, skins, and so on), events, people, and classified ads. There are also numerous blogs, wikis and websites devoted to helping you discover new dimensions of this fascinating, ever evolving world.
UWM's Repository of Student Orientation materials on SL can be found at:
https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/groups/sa/ltc/SecondLife/Student%20Orientation%20Activities/
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment