A brief overview of Virtual Worlds as a pedagogical tool for the education of health care education. By: Margaret Hansen, Associate Professor, School of Nursing, at NI09 Congress, June 29, 2009, Helsinki, Finland
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Potential of Virtual Worlds in Nursing Education
1. NI09 Helsinki, Finland The Potential of 3-D Virtual Worlds in Nursing Education Margaret M. Hansen Peter J. Murray Scott W. Erdley NI09 Helsinki, Finland: June 29, 2009
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6. Virtual Worlds teamwork e-empowerment communication skills interactive no borders critical thinking unique educational research health care accessible a place to meet community colorful creative andragogy motivation experience e-rehab self-efficacy collaboration search support
Good afternoon. Today I would like to give you a brief overview of virtual worlds and some examples of how they are being used in professional nursing education…. Maggie Waechter (an avatar) in SL visiting the Ann Myers Medical Center. Avatar = an old Sanskrit word portraying a deity… Avatars may fly, swim, move, walk through doors, speak, eat, gesture, etc. Voice enabled so avatars may hear each other speak and create dialogue via text
The use of virtual 3-D worlds in education is expanding at a rapid pace. And, some empirical research is beginning to be conducted regarding students’ satisfaction and experience using SL . For example, Boulous & Toth-Cohen have recently published an article about students’ evaluation and reflections of the University of Plymouth’s Sexual Health Sim experience after its one year anniversary. Nonetheless, there are many challenges related to delivering and evaluating the educational impact of 3-D virtual worlds. As an educator I’m interested in learning about the actual student learning outcomes.
A third form of the web’s architecture and applications that enable social publishing. Blogs, wikis, twitter, Facebook, Tee Bee Dee, MMVWs or Massively Multiplayer Virtual World is one example of a dynamic web 2.0/3.0 computer based application. The most popular VW right now for educators is SL. You may create objects, have streaming video, audio, TV, YouTube. Lectures, conferences such as NIH and the CDC in the United States are held in SL. Second to the general concept of web 2.0, “virtual worlds are the source of more articles in PubMed than any other emerging socialtechnology. Of the many virtual worlds, Second Life (a free, open source 3d virtual world platform) is the one with the strongest presence in health care communities, from patient groups and medical education to research and professional meetings. Second Life can enable health systems to create either public or secure private spaces for functions from patient education, outreach, staff training, remote meetings, or more. As with any social technology, understanding the context and norms of the online space are essential to making institutional engagement a success.” Patricia Anderson, U of Mich
Here is Maggie Waechter visiting Evergreen Island and looking at ECG strips and trying to decide how to treat these rhythms.
Here is another example of a group of educators applied for a HRSA Grant and received funds to develop a virtual community for nursing students. The grant funding is helping nursing faculty infuse technology into a collaborative online Bachelor of Science in Nursing Degree Completion Program. There is also an online community, Second Life Educators : SLED boasts over 4,000 users. And, there is CC International: a community of over 4,000 and offers training sessions on how to create objects, etc. as well as offer college-level courses for credit
Here I am standing at the bedside of the medical education in world Imperial College London. One has to wash their hands, get permission to see a patient and then buy (yes, buy in Linden dollars) the right to care for this patient.
I believe there is a steep learning curve for academics to produce SL areas and participate in SL. According to Linden Lab, CEO, Philip Rosedale it takes 4 hrs to learn how to use SL. In 2008 Linden Lab reported a retention rate of those using SL was about 10%. And a study conducted in 2007 revealed 56% of regular users thought it was easy to use SL.
One needs to take into consideration tenets of theorectical frameworks when trying to make sense of their adoption in educational circles.
Knowledge is distributed across networks of connections…learning consists of the ability to construct and move across networks. Of course other theoretical tenets may include constructivism, experiential learning, self regulated learning