Pedagogical immigration to 3D virtual worlds: a critical review of underlying themes and their concepts

A contentious issue has been in debate for the past decade, over the extent of dependency of current generations of students on information and communication technology (ICT) for education. Despite this controversy, there is a generalisation amongst researchers that fundamental shifting of educational methods towards e-learning is deemed inevitable and beneficial to cater for emerging students’ skills and preferences. One of these newly emergent e-learning platforms is 3D Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) like Second Life. To the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first to derive and critically analyse, using grounded theory, advantageous and disadvantageous themes and their sub concepts of providing e-learning through 3DVLEs

Affordances and constraints to e-learning: role of architecture in 3D learning space digital design

While abundant research has been devoted to investigate successful learning prospects of 3D Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs), sparse research explores users’ satisfaction from buildings used within these 3DVLEs. No research depicts users’ contentment levels, preferences or requirements from 3D educational buildings’ different constructional and architectural design elements. This paper is part of an ongoing research investigating the presence of such impact of architectural features of 3D virtual educational classrooms on users’ comfort within them, by recording and categorizing higher education students’ space design propositions to enhance virtual campuses, internally and externally. This has potential to boost e-learning experiences within 3DVLEs analogous to the positive effect of physical real-life architecture on students’ learning within their respective classrooms. The second part of this paper offers an example. For, while former research also reveals that architectural colour-design of physical learning spaces directly affects students’ learning, there is no equivalent study supporting similar impact of 3D virtual learning spaces’ colour design on students in 3D VLEs, whether as affordances or constraints to the e-learning process. To fill this gap, this paper examines the various positive and negative emotions expressed by students during exposure to different colours inside 3D virtual educational buildings; in an attempt to determine best practices in digital colour-design of learning spaces inside 3D virtual worlds to enhance students’ overall e-learning experiences and satisfaction within them