ISTE Playgrounds

I loved being active in the playgrounds at ISTE because if you really want to see what others are doing in schools you can see it here. If cloning myself were an option, I would spend some time in each of the playgrounds just to catch a glimpse of amazing ideas and projects in action. For those interested, each of the playgrounds are sponsored by one of ISTE's special interest groups or SIGs. The wikis associated for each of the SIGs hold resources from several past ISTE conferences and are definitely worth a visit. Take a look at the Media Specialist SIG wiki and check out the 2012 ISTE resources.

At the Media Center Playground I spent some time with Linda Doughtery talking about Infographics and then connecting with Jennifer Garcia whom I met several years ago and have since worked with on a few collaborative projects. Jennifer's school wiki is full of terrific resources and ideas for the classroom.

The following day I spent some time in the Virtual Environment Playground. The idea of using virtual environments to teach has always been an interest of mine ever since I dabbled in Second Life for a research project a few years ago. I like the thought of students coming to class, signing on and participating in live discussions taking place in another world because it brings a sort of annonymity to the classroom where preconceived notions and ideas about students and their abilities fade away. I went to learn more and the session I attended was a great way for a begiiner like me to be introduced to the vocabulary and possibilities about using virtual environments in the classroom. My notes are below:

• Virtual Reality 
• Prezi on mixed realities
• Prezi.com/is0vrxmzbhhc/mixed-realities/
• Augmented Reality - Think of the first down lines superimposed on the television screen when watching football.
• Alternate Reality Game - give them a role andd a challenge and have them play the situation out -give them the rabbit hole leave breadcrumbs along the way and then teachers get to be the puppetmasters, leave them challenges
• TINAG this is not a game
• Games often don't allow kids to build, only play
• Machinima - blend of cinema and machine
• Go into a virtual world and have them so screencaptures for tutoials
• MOOC massive inline open course - connectivism, social network knowledge construction
• Mixed realities matter because they are persistant, social based, sense of shared space, rea-time, copressence, interaction, embodiment, immersion
• transmedia is the ability to follow the flow of stories and information across multiple modalities
• The ability to adopt alternative identities for purposes of improvisation and discovery
• Play the capacity to use your surroundings as problem solving, hard- fun( horrible until you get it right)
• Collective intelligence the ability to pool knowledge and compare noted with others toward a common goal
• You can augment what students are doing

Virtual Worlds

1. Second Life
2. Minecraft
3. World of Warcraft
4. Club Penguin
5. Warhammer online - students made characters and had to defend
6. Joycadia grid - open sim
7. Eveonline ( is checking this out)

• PD - p2pu.com peer tp peer university
• P2p university is free online university
• Virtual worlds tour class
• Machinima online open course
• ARG academy course
• Big G games Jim G games for change conference, arizona state university good research on games in education
• Affinity groups - groups outside the game that do research on a topic
• Communities of practice - learn how your communitieds talks and behaves
• ARG prime - july 9 - july 23. Choose edison or tesla, who would you save
• Games based learning MOOC july 9 five week
• Tuesday 5:30. - 7:30, machinima fest here at iste in room 5 and in second life
• Play as professional development