VWER Meeting Transcripts by Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at www.vwer.org.
Transcript of the Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable July12, 2012
Topic: Special Meeting Interview with Amy Cheney
Photos, by Iggy. Please help us by joining our VWER groups at Flickr and Koinup to add your own pictures!
AJ Brooks: Hi everyone, and welcome to a special meeting of the Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable. Today’s Special Guest is Amy Cheney
AJ Brooks: The VWER meets each Thursday at 11:30am SLT for an hour and is a forum to educate and inform the community about issues that are important and relevant to education.
AJ Brooks: Our group has met every week for over four years and we get a wide variety of educators, from seasoned veterans to the newly rezzed.
AJ Brooks: This is a public meeting, so we will be keeping and publishing a transcript of what is said in local chat. If you’ve not seen our transcripts, you should check them out – they are an excellent information asset
AJ Brooks: and a great historical reference. Via our web site, they are also searchable. The transcripts can be found at http://www.vwer.org – select the LIBRARY tab at the top.
AJ Brooks: The Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable continues to develop a community of educators from around the world with a variety of thoughts, needs, and ideas.
AJ Brooks: Please join the Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable group here in SL. If you are on Facebook, please join our group there – Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable.
AJ Brooks: The URL is https://www.facebook.com/groups/159154226946/
AJ Brooks: You can also find and post pictures to our Flickr group and follow us on Twitter @VWER. When you blog or tweet, please remember to include the tag #vwer
Iggy (ignatius.onomatopoeia): and Koinup 
AJ Brooks: (its important not to forget to include the #)
AJ Brooks: One thing you will notice today is that we have transcribers who will capture the essence of what our guest and I are saying and post it into the public chat.
AJ Brooks: This is for those who are not using voice chat as well as for our transcripts.
Iggy (ignatius.onomatopoeia): cracks his knuckles
AJ Brooks: Occasionally we have a special meeting like this one, in voice chat. Normally, though, we all sit around a big round table and everyone can participate in the conversation.
AJ Brooks: Although you are welcome to use the local chat as a back channel, know that the guests and I will not necessarily be monitoring it.
AJ Brooks: If you’d like to make sure your questions gets considered, please use Google Moderator.
AJ Brooks: Google Moderator is a online forum where you can post questions, or VOTE on questions that are already posted. Our URL for that is http://bit.ly/vwermod
AJ Brooks: If you forget the URL, you can find it by clicking on the sign behind me to the left and right.
AJ Brooks: A programming note – our meeting next week will be a regular roundtable meeting and our topic will be “Future VWER Meeting Topics”
AJ Brooks: Anyway, enough of all that, let go ahead and get started. As many of all know, my name is AJ Kelton, AJ Brooks here in sL.
AJ Brooks: I’m the Director of Emerging & Instructional Technology for the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Montclair State University in NJ.
Iggy (ignatius.onomatopoeia): Hippies!
Lillie Islander: All the cool kids are doing it! 
Bill Friis: AJ passes the skill test.
AJ: Now I will sit on the floor. Amy thank you for joining us
Amy: I’m Amy Cheney and happy to be here. I’m an Associate Professor of Information Technology at Appalachian State in Boone NC
AJ: What types of courses do you teach?
Amy: All our courses are aimed to teach students to use tech well in the classroom. we discuss tech & law, leadership, and planning
AJ: How have you used SL to teach some of that?
Amy; We don’t use SL. We did use Activeworlds.
AJ: We used the be the SL ed Roundtable, but then we branched out to other VWs
So how do you use virtual worlds?
Amy: We currently use Teleplace (name to change soon) and we reach out to a population across NC. Our contructivist philosophy works really well in virtual worlds
AJ: Any work with persona? I had a PhD student write to me about faculty persona in VWs
Amy: Paul Wallace, on our faculty does research in that area. She may want to talk to him.
AJ: Tell us what AERA is
AJ Brooks: post questions, or VOTE on questions that are already posted. Our URL for that is http://bit.ly/vwermod
Amy: AERA is a large group, with a diverse set of interests about research in education. The conference will be in San Francisco in early May or late April
July 23 is the deadline for the call for papers
AJ: let’s talk a bit about ARVEL too
Amy: ARVEL is a group that considers issues of teaching in immersive environments both games and VWs and mixed environments
AJ: What is a “strand:” in this group?
Amy: In the big conference, we have a series of roundtables and symposia about our topics concerning immersive learning. We have a business meeting, and Constance Steinkuehler will be our speaker
AJ: What is a SIG?
Amy: A special interest group. Our group has about 125 members.
D’lightful (delightful.doowangle): Constance Steinkuehler http://website.education.wisc.edu/steinkuehler/blog/
Amy: the strand is part of the larger conference and participants can attend any meetings (over 10,000 people at the conference)
AJ: fees are reasonable to join a SIG if you are in education
Amy: a few dollars for a student, more for faculty
AJ Brooks: post questions, or VOTE on questions that are already posted. Our URL for that is http://bit.ly/vwermod
Amy: the research focus this year is on poverty. We look for immersive projects to help students with issues of social justice and poverty
AJ: So as you get ready for this, what are your expectations?
Amy: We have looked at Games for Change, others who might use these tools with those who otherwise lack access. AERA chose the theme, but we have also interpreted that as equity.
AJ: Does someone *have* to present on that theme?
Amy: We’d consider other worthy topics
AJ: having organized conferences, I know it’s a lot of work. Let’s talk a bit about your duties and role
Amy: As chair elect, I’ll be in that role the following year. We have a thorough vetting process, with a panel of reviewers and a triple review process. Overall, it’s a low acceptance rate for the conference. There’s a higher rate of acceptance for the SIG. Triple review means blind review of the proposal by three readers
(Amy, correct that if I’m wrong!)
AJ: What advice for a person proposing a topic?
Amy: We focus narrowly, so you’d want to focus on the focus of our Sig
It’s good to let the reviewers know that participants will have some fun as well as learning something
AJ: Can you compare the experience of AERA to the SIG, in terms of # accepted
Amy: overall for AERA, acceptance is in the teens. It’s twice that for AERA
*for the SIG at AERA
Bill Friis: AECT is real. I have seen it.
Lillie Islander: http://www.aect.org/newsite/
AJ Brooks: post questions, or VOTE on questions that are already posted. Our URL for that is http://bit.ly/vwermod
AJ: If you have a question for Amy, post it to moderator. Must the talks be about completed research?
Amy: no necessarily . We have papers about theory, pilot projects, and ongoing research. The Sig at AERA is a good place to present and test one’s ideas
Amy: It’s a fun group in our Sig. We do not just present papers. Last year we had an augmented reality murder mystery game in Vancouver
Claudia13 Rossini: (heyyyyyyyyy)
Bill Friis: What? Nerd?
Lillie Islander: Geek?
AJ: Everyone here has some nerd in them
D’lightful (delightful.doowangle): Neeeerrrrrrdddd
Claudia13 Rossini: lol
Iggy (ignatius.onomatopoeia):weekly RPG ÒNerd NightÓ for Iggy
Claudia13 Rossini: (oh great…’old’)
AJ: We have an image of “The Researcher” that may not be accurate. I would love to go this year. Several friends and colleagues present on fascinating topics
Lillie Islander: And I’m glad of it! People cringe at the word “research” but we have a decent turnout today for summer…15 on the sim now.
AJ: Tell us about some of last year’s sessions
AJ Brooks: post questions, or VOTE on questions that are already posted. Our URL for that is http://bit.ly/vwermod
Amy: We had presentation on Indian culture in SL (nation of India), Those with an interest in a topic should contact me. We had a lot of STEM oriented topics as well. We are not seeing as many proposals this year. We are very collegial and have fun. We met in New Orleans and are not stodgy
Lillie Islander: http://www.aera.net
AJ: So if someone here wanted to go, you would need to belong to AERA to go. As a student member, my cost is under $70 and that includes memberships to several Sigs
Lillie Islander: http://www.arvelsig.com
AJ: Registration is about $400, but that is much less than EDUCAUSE
Amy: this is a URL to our Ning. We have Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin presence. You can find the call for papers at the Ning
AJ: if someone goes, how can they find a roommate? the listserv?
Amy: Yes, this is an option
AJ: Tell us what you mean by presence and community
AJ Brooks: post questions, or VOTE on questions that are already posted. Our URL for that is http://bit.ly/vwermod
Amy: presence in a space is essential, and you do not get that in an LMS people come together for a common purpose and a common goal we found that students who had only an in-world experience had a better outcome than those who met face to face. We are trying to come up with why this is so.
AJ: Two Questions from D’Lightful
D’lightful (delightful.doowangle): Thanks AJ 
What are the prospects for conducting research in immersive 3d environments?
Amy: Good prospects. We ant to begin using machinima to show what is going on. A group among us is developing methods for demonstrating what is happening in this new field of research.
Chimera Cosmos: Konstructivism
AJ: You mentioned “Constructivist” twice. Define that
Amy: Lev Vygotsky is not light summer reading, but it’s our basis. Students learning and developing knowledge in partnership with teachers
Chimera Cosmos: They are kind of the antithesis AJ.
Amy: the antithesis is the grade-driven accountability
Chimera Cosmos: grades are highly behaviorist
Lillie Islander: definitely they are
AJ: I hope that what is going on today is less about accountability and more about assessment. Assessment can be used in either Objectivist or Constructivist settings
Chimera Cosmos: Speaker agreed with me. LOL
Lillie Islander:
Chimera Cosmos: carrot and stick
AJ: The method of assigning grades is behaviorist, not necessarily the act of grading
Amy: Some K-12 teachers get very frustrated with us because the philosophy is alien
Lillie Islander: The k-16 system, I’d argue
Claudia13 Rossini: (using what you’ve memorised in new ways vs just memorising) vs
AJ: At Montclair, we work with many K-12 teachers, but the system they come from focuses on standardized learning. In my writing classes taught a few years again, I felt sorry for my first-years, who had just come out of a system that was all about the teacher making sure the student learned. The basis for this is standardized tests, then in college they are dropped into a place where the system is switched. The student must do the work and the teacher can give Fs
Amy: I’d argue that even at college we have similar problems, with an industrial model of edu with some education faculty
AJ: Other question, “What desired improvements are sought to be able to conduct research within these environments?”
Chimera Cosmos: Or 45 days!!
Both speakers: this is the sort of Q that Jon Richter loves
Amy: there are things in these environments that cannot happen elsewhere
Chimera Cosmos: Betting JR is a Constructivist….heheh
AJ Brooks: hell yeah, with a lower c though I think. From a research perspective, some new thinking needed. New methodology needed to know how to conduct research. Counting keystrokes, for instance, is an old methodologyl
Chimera Cosmos: hmmm…I’m betting on BIG C
AJ: machinima might be a way to gather data. You give interesting and concise answers! Thank you for joining us today!
Claudia13 Rossini: (page 45 on his list)
I hope to be at AERA this year
Bill Friis: clap clap clap
Chimera Cosmos: I wish. AERA rocks. So many diverse viewpoints.
Lillie Islander: cheneyal@appstate.edu or awcheney@gmail.com
D’lightful (delightful.doowangle): Thanks so much Amy/Lillie
Zotarah Shepherd: Thank you Amy
Ridvan-Researcher (ridvan.atolia): thank you Amy
Zotarah Shepherd: Thank you AJ
Frankie Antonelli: Thanks Amy and AJ
Chimera Cosmos: thanks!
Lillie Islander: Thanks so much for having me!
Camie Rembrandt: thank you! it was great
Iggy (ignatius.onomatopoeia): See you all next week!!
