Benefits of Second Life in education
Our Second Life for education article talks about the role of this virtual world in a learning environment. It looks at how and why it is used in this type of setting.
This article discusses the benefits of doing so.
The benefits of Second Life in education are:
- Visit other countries without leaving the classroom
- Learn about other cultures and acquire new skills doing so
- Engage in new forms of communication with others
- Further develop your ‘people skills’
- New ways of solving problems – which you are unable to do so in the ‘real world’.
- Connect with other online communities, forging new links and friendships.
- New opportunities for collaboration/social interaction
- Self-paced learning to suit all learning styles
- Opportunities to create, comment and share content with other users.
- Integrate within a blended learning system
These all form part of the student experience and aid with understanding, and, most importantly, retention.
Plus this type of system can be connected to a Moodle – an open source learning management system which is available to educators and is focused upon interaction and collaboration.
Second Life provides a range of opportunities for research groups due to its emphasis on collaboration and connection between users. It opens up a whole range of possibilities which may have not been previously considered that can lead to some very interesting outcomes.
