Shiv on Learning

There are lots of advantages for students practising English in virtual worlds like English City.  From multi-modal communication to the liberating feeling of movement through your avatar.  This series of blog postings will talk about the key benefits to students.  I will start with multi-level communication and talk about how it is very useful to have different channels of communication in a language learning environment.

Multi-levels of communication.

In a classroom the teacher can talk directly to the whole class, with one student, with a group of students.  However, only one if these can happen at once.  In a virtual world there are multi-levels of communication which are happening simultaneously.

Ways to communicate in a virtual world:

1.    Speaking directly to everyone in the vicinity (local voice chat)
2.    Speaking one to one with a student (private voice chat)
3.    Typing to everyone in the vicinity (local text chat)
4.    One to one messages (Instant Message or IM)
5.    Talking to your group without the other group hearing (Conference call)
6.    Messaging others in your group (IM conference)

As you can see there are lots of ways to communicate and all of these can be happening at the same time.  This is great for group work, pair work, or if a shy student wants to ask the teacher something.  It encourages peer learning as at any one time there could be 10-15 conversations happening.

Types of interactions:

1.  A student could be asking the teacher in a private message to repeat the previous instruction.
2.  Group of  students could be discussing the topic in a private text message. 
3.  Teacher can address one student in a private voice call to correct them without disturbing the class or embarrassing the student.

An instant Message is a private message from student to teacher.

Local voice chat people talking openly in the virtual world to everyone else around them.

Local chat is a text message that everyone in the vicinity can see.

- Jessica Driscoll