Virtual_Worlds

Carrie Bresnehen [|YouTube Video about using Second LIfe in the classroom] This video describes many examples of how to use Second Life in the education. The ideas that I thought would be most useful in the library were vocabulary scavenger hunts, exploring different time periods, and exploring different countries famous landmarks. The idea of Second Life is intriguing to me and is something I want to explore further. I think students would find if very engaging as so much of their lives are game centered.

Karen Cool [|Overdrive Example] Stevens High School is the trial school for our District to use Overdrive. I think this is a beautiful example of how it is used. Our local libraries also use it and with the advent of e-readers taking such a prominent role today, it is one of the best and easy to use resources we have especially in a school setting as shown here. Overdrive Media Console is the source of the APP or format that is to be accessed to whatever devise available wherher it be Android, Apple or many things in between.

For an easy to understand Youtube lesson on downloading Overdrive, please see the following link: []

The actual link for overdrive access and download is below along with all the information needed to get started in your location. [|Overdrive Link]

KATE COLVIN - __Literary Virtual Worlds__ http://brn227.brown.wmich.edu/literaryworlds/index.html Created by professors at Western Michigan University, this is a website that brings together a number of literature-based virtual worlds for teachers to use with their students in an English classroom. I have personally used the one for the novel //Things Fall Apart// (Chinua Achebe), in which my students were assigned a character from the village the novel is set in (either a main book character or other generic village character) and they had to travel around the "world" and interact with one another as that character. It was a lot of fun for the students, and forced them to really research who their particular character was, as well as what would go on if it were really taking place in the "world" they are in.

In addition to worlds for //Things Fall Apart//, there are also worlds for:

//1984//, George Orwell //Of Mice and Men//, Steinbeck //Lord of the Flies//, William Golding //Native Son//, Richard Wright //Mrs. Dalloway//, Virginia Woolf "Dicken's" London to accompany books like //Oliver Twist// and //Bleak House// various different worlds for many of Shakespeare's plays

This resource is probably best used with high school students, as the books that accompany the "worlds" are typically read by older students.