Dealing with interruptions in text-based chat sessions

Running a teaching session that achieves its aims and objectives requires organised and structured dialogue between teacher and students that leaves room for a clear line of instructions. However, participants can disrupt the flow and prevent the achievement of these objectives through constant interruption (via questions or comments). The interruptions mentioned here include any discursive interaction that halts the flow of the argument and causes distraction for teacher and students

Pedagogical Practices for Virtual Worlds

As a result from activities carried out within Module 2 of the MUVEnation programme about exploring active learning approaches, we have created a collection of practices for teaching and learning in Virtual Worlds, organised in 21 chapters, classified in the following categories of instructional methods: Presentation, Demonstration, Discussion, Drill-and-practice, Tutorial, Cooperative Learning, Gaming, Simulation and Discovery. The educational professionals who participated in the course worked in teams, but in some cases individually to map and describe the existing range of teaching practices in Second Life, and to draw a reflection about the elements for their success. Practices described include: lecture, multimedia presentation, demonstration, dialogic teaching and specifically debates and consensus building, but also other forms of discussion like seminars, symposia, syndicates, panel discussion, workshops and organized forums; brain storming, treasure hunts and virtual quests, learning by projects, self paced learning and self study, Labs (class/ fields), role play, virtual theatre and theatrical improvisation matches, peer tutoring and learning, Role playing, and simulation games

Educational Tools for Second Life: a handbook for educators in virtual worlds.

As a result of two collective activities organised during the MUVEnation programme, we have produced a collection of educational tools for Second Life. This collection has been produced in two stages. First, back in September 2008, 33 partcipants in the introductory module worked together in groups for the identification of more than 100 tools used for teaching and learning in Second Life. Later, in March 2009, 55 education professionals (lecturers, researchers, learning technologists and teachers) have collected, tested and fully described more than 150 tools. The result of this collective work has been transformed into a book, published as an Open Educational Resource under CC licence by attribution unported, so anyone is free to distribute without restrictions: adapt, translate, re-mix and improve it