CMU professor uses sabbatical for virtual reality teaching
Lesley Withers is working on her sabbatical to show how teaching in Second Life benefits students and teachers.
Second Life is a three-dimensional online virtual environment, in which users create avatars to explore, interact with other residents, learn, recreate and shop with local currency, according to information in Withers’ sabbatical research.
The associate professor of communications and dramatic arts said the sabbatical gives her “opportunities to take this project to the next level.”
She has been working with colleagues — John Sherblom from the University of Maine and Lynnette Leonard from Nebraska University-Omaha — for more than a year with her actual sabbatical being this semester.
“Its cutting-edge with a lot of distractions,” said Dan Bracken, associate director of the Faculty Center for Innovative Teaching.
The sabbatical
Withers said a sabbatical — a semester off to conduct research — begins by writing a proposal, which has to be accepted by faculty and the dean.
Once it is accepted, she said the next step is applying for a grant.
The point of her sabbatical, Withers said, is to show how a virtual environment, such as Second Life, can be used in the classroom in certain situations,
“For what Lesley is using it for is a good idea because of her field of study,” Bracken said.
CNN did a segment on Second Life and now has its own avatars and station, which CNN does segments from, Withers said. This is where she initially got interested in Second Life.
Technology allows people to do many things by using it, but it also has drawbacks, she said.
“Second life is great for role playing, reenacting and group work,” Withers said. “It’s not something to teach a lecture hall through.”
She described her teaching methods through Second Life as a Hybrid of lecture and group work, but focuses more on the group work.
“It is not a replacement for face-to-face,” Bracken said of the teaching method.
Effective tech
Withers interviewed students Thursday about the Second Life project to add to her sabbatical and said she its interesting to see what students think.
Over Withers’ sabbatical, she traveled to Maine, Wisconsin and Illinois to present her research and to show how to teach using Second Life.
Since Withers has started her sabbatical, with the research she has found, she is able to have book chapters in the final process at the press.
“I have been writing up results. We have written up three different chapters,” Withers said.
A second book chapter was published in High Education in Virtual Worlds on Tuesday and two manuscripts have been submitted to various journals, Withers said.
“Lesley uses (Second Life) really effectively and is a model of effective use of technology,” Bracken said.
