Awhile back I talked about how a MySpace-style platform might be a great way to integrate students into an online learning experience. Well, it looks like the virtual world of Second Life may be starting to fill a similar role, although not in as expansive a way as I had discussed.

I recently read blogs by Joe Sanchez, a doctoral student at the University of Texas, Austin. He’s using Second Life to teach students how to create and interact with virtual reality in a course aptly called “Working in Virtual Worlds.” Sanchez intends to show how Second Life can be an effective teaching tool and that it’s not beyond students’ technical capabilities.

This last part has been a key critique of Second Life; essentially, Second Life has been considered to be too technical to be mainstream. I wonder if Sanchez’s investigations may reveal that the mainstream may be moving towards a higher level of technical ability.

Sanchez set up a virtual space on Second Life for students to claim condos and then use that space to tell their life’s story. It’s kinda like the English 101 essays that many of us have done. Only it allows for a huge scope of visual opportunities to express one’s self. He pretty much lets the students run with the ball from there, keeping direction to a minimum. So far, his posts suggest that this philosophy has worked out well, and students have found a number of innovative ways to personalize their virtual condos.

This class and investigation are following up on his paper “Second Life: An Interactive Qualitative Analysis.” In that paper, he analyzed the experiences of English students from 2006 and their many frustrations with the Second Life platform for learning. Sanchez’s class at the time of this post is in progress, but if you’re interested in seeing how things evolve, you can catch up with some of the updates at Educator’s Coop.