SIG-VE Playground Events

Day 2 of the ISTE 2010 Virtual Environments Playground included a great presentation by Alice Krueger (SL: Gentle Heron) on accessibility in virtual worlds. She presented different models of accessibility and made some very interesting points. One point was that many see virtual worlds as leveling the playing field for people with disabilities, when in fact this often is not true (e.g., use of voice for those in the deaf community). Alice then introduced Eme Capalini as the presentation moved into the Virtual Ability sim in Second Life. Eme discussed universal design in SL, using the example of the Sojourner Auditorium. BTW, this is a “must see” in SL if you have not already visited (or if you want to revisit with new [univeral design] eyes).

Eme Capalini discusses universal design at the Sojourner Auditorium

Yesterday, graduate assistant Bodi MacIntyre and I presented on Project Based Learning in Second Life. The expanded powerpoint (with notes and landmarks) is here:
ISTE2010 Presentation on Project Based Learning in Second Life