EPSY590 VE

Course Description

This course will engage students in the examination of the history, theory, and practice of pedagogy in virtual environments such as:

• Second Life
• Open Simulator
• Project Wonderland
• Croquet
• Alice
• Scratch
• Daz Studio
• Blender
• Historical text-based virtual worlds (such as MUDs/MOOs)
• Other commercial and open source gaming/simulation packages.

Students will read research literature, participate in online discussions through the Moodle course management system, and participate in real-time activities in several types of virtual worlds. The project component of the course requires students to develop educational artifacts in the virtual world and perform peer review of artifacts developed by other students . Projects will support some aspect of learning or teaching in the students’ own workplace, and will incorporate multimedia, web, and other networked resources. Students are expected to have access to computers that meet the hardware and networking requirements to utilize the applications covered in the course.

Expected student background
Students should be interested in using virtual worlds for educational or training purposes, whether in K-12, university, or corporate/government settings.
No programming experience is required. Prior experience in EPSY 590 NET will be helpful, but is not required.
Hardware and software requirements:

• Windows XP/Vista, Mac OS X, or Linux machine which is capable of running the course software. This will require a reasonably powerful and up-to-date system, as these packages are rather demanding when it comes to processor speed and graphics capability.
• High-speed Internet connection required (1.5Mbps+)

Possible Readings
Please click on the following link for a list of possible readings.
http://wik.ed.uiuc.edu/index.php/EPSY_590_VE_Bibliography

Instructors

	Tony Hursh Email: hursh@illinois.edu			Hee Young Choi (Teaching Assistant) Email: hchoi28@illinois.edu