Blending on-campus and online experiences through the use of virtually immersive technologies

Recently, there has been a great deal of attention put toward efforts to integrate teaching methodologies and strategies between face to face and online classrooms looking to maximize learning by combining delivery modalities. Studies point to students not only learning more when online capabilities were added to traditional courses, but also increasing their level of interaction thereby improving the students’ sense of satisfaction with the courses taken. However, these studies tend to isolate deliveries to either all online deliveries or to all on-campus classes and students, without taking into account the more recent movement of blending teaching methods that look to cross over the barriers between online and face to face students. To meet some of the collaborative requirements for blending instruction, virtually immersive environments are beginning to show promise as an interactive communication media that can facilitate the needs of several communities including e-learning, distance education and corporate training. So the question was posed - what happens when online students are given the opportunity, through the use of virtually immersive technologies, to engage with students attending traditional on-campus sessions? Thus, the purpose of this case study is to evaluate the use of virtually immersive technologies as a platform for the conduct of synchronous and asynchronous classroom activities. This article also presents the framework for conducting an undergraduate level ‘Technology Project Management’ course that includes delivery approaches to students from both online (Distance Education) class offerings and on-campus (Face-to-face) class offerings

Data in Depth: Web 3-D Technologies Provide New Approaches to the Presentation of Course Content

For nearly two decades, the Web has provided the classroom with vast, ever-expanding volumes of browser-accessible information. As the web has evolved so too has our desire to become more involved with the process of content-creation and content-sharing. Now new web-based technologies look to provide smarter, more meaningful content and present that content with a new level of depth and interactivity. No longer are faculty and students browsing for information that is largely static; instead, these users are interacting through their three-dimensional (3-D) proxies (their avatars) and are querying applications (semantic web agents) soliciting them to collect, filter, verify, correlate, and present answers to their queries. Yet, all of this capability is not without potential challenges. There is an evolving need for faculty and students to find and build out new structure in their 3-D virtual surroundings that visually enables their content, making it more palatable to the user while presenting it in a 3-D format verses the typical 2-D format that has been the mainstay for the past two decades. With the maturation of virtual world (3-D Web) and semantic web technologies, the web-based content available in the classroom increases exponentially and takes on a new look. Following a brief overview of these two technologies and their overall impact in the classroom, this article presents several practical approaches for presenting course content in 3-D Web environments based on recent implementation efforts. In-World lectures and lab assignments, project team briefing sessions, student mentoring activities, and open conference forums are just a few of the areas discussed. Further discussions also focus on setup and future evaluation studies planned in the near-term to further evaluate course content presentation techniques

Virtual world technologies provide platform for interaction between on-campus and online students: A case study

There has been a great deal of attention paid to efforts by educators to integrate teaching methodologies and strategies between face to face and online classrooms in an effort to maximize learning by combining delivery modalities. Recent studies point to students not only learning more when online capabilities were added to traditional courses, but also increasing their level of interaction thereby improving the students‟ sense of satisfaction with the courses taken. These studies tend to isolate deliveries to either all online classes and students or to all on-campus classes and students, without taking into account the more recent movement of blending teaching methods and crossing over the barriers between online and face to face students. So, what happens when online students are given the opportunity, through the use of virtual world technologies, to engage with students attending traditional on-campus sessions? The purpose of this case study is to evaluate the use of virtual world technologies as a platform for the conduct of synchronous and asynchronous classroom activities. A framework for conducting an undergraduate „Technology Project Management‟ course is presented that includes delivery approaches to students from both online (Distance Education) class offerings and on-campus (Face-to-face) class offerings. Stand-alone, asynchronous, or synchronous learning modalities are incorporated into the framework. To evaluate the framework, a composite evaluation of survey, responses, and assessments analysis are examined. Discussion includes the challenges of developing and presenting this framework as well as managing the instructional complexities involved in the planning and execution of virtual world interactions in the classroom setting. Further discussion includes use of virtual teaming sessions and self-paced online case studies; incorporation of in-world interactive learning modules; assessment of impromptu, in-world, e-learning sessions in the form of informal student interactions; and use of online text and voice chat capabilities. The data indicates, surprisingly, that the learning curve for students was not as steep as expected and that overall the students felt reasonably comfortable with the introduction of this technology into their learning environments. Finally, there is little evidence, beyond pedagogical preference, of adverse effects in using this framework while there were some initially positive small gains in the online students‟ performance related to learning objectives using the virtual world technologies

A New Approach to Communications Management Planning Through 3D Web and Semantic Web Technologies

Communication management plans are used to determine not only who needs what information but also how that information will be collected and transmitted. Now two evolving technologies are looking to drive project planners to develop new approaches and methods for planning communications in the coming years. The first of these technologies, the Semantic Web, is becoming a driving force in how computers are making web content available to its users. The second technology, Web three-dimensional (3D) focuses on web-based content presentation by providing a rich 3D Web-centric environment for users to access information and interact with other users. This effort discusses the advent of the Semantic Web and Web 3D technologies and identifies many of the new planning considerations driving project information collection and analysis. The planning considerations for these two technologies are also discussed to aid in the framing of a new approach to project communications planning

A Design Case: Assessing the Functional Needs for a Multi-faceted Cybersecurity Learning Space

Following a multi-year effort that developed not only a detailed list of functional requirements but also the preliminary physical and logical design layouts, the concept for a multi-faceted cybersecurity center was approved and the physical, as well as, additional infrastructure space was subsequently allocated. This effort briefly describes the structure and scope of the current cybersecurity program being supported and then draws out the functional requirements that were identified for the center based on the needs of the institution’s cybersecurity program. It also highlights the physical and logical design specifications of the center, as well as, the many external program delivery requirements that were identified as essential to not only the current cybersecurity program but also the projected future needs of the program and its supporting activities

Data in Depth: Web 3-D Technologies Provide New Approaches to the Presentation of Course Content

For nearly two decades, the Web has provided the classroom with vast, ever-expanding volumes of browseraccessible information. As the web has evolved so too has our desire to become more involved with the process of content-creation and content-sharing. Now new web-based technologies look to provide smarter, more meaningful content and present that content with a new level of depth and interactivity. No longer are faculty and students browsing for information that is largely static; instead, these users are interacting through their three-dimensional (3-D) proxies (their avatars) and are querying applications (semantic web agents) soliciting them to collect, filter, verify, correlate, and present answers to their queries. Yet, all of this capability is not without potential challenges. There is an evolving need for faculty and students to find and build out new structure in their 3-D virtual surroundings that visually enables their content, making it more palatable to the user while presenting it in a 3-D format verses the typical 2-D format that has been the mainstay for the past two decades. With the maturation of virtual world (3-D Web) and semantic web technologies, the web-based content available in the classroom increases exponentially and takes on a new look. Following a brief overview of these two technologies and their overall impact in the classroom, this article presents several practical approaches for presenting course content in 3-D Web environments based on recent implementation efforts. In- World lectures and lab assignments, project team briefing sessions, student mentoring activities, and open conference forums are just a few of the areas discussed. Further discussions also focus on setup and future evaluation studies planned in the near-term to further evaluate course content presentation techniques

Design Considerations for Virtual Classroom and Laboratory Environments

With the ever-increasing demand for distance education one of the key challenges facing faculty is not only delivering effective instruction through both lecture-style and laboratory means, but also giving students an environment with a sense of presence. The key challenge here is to improve on the distance student‟s capabilities for interaction and collaboration thereby enhancing their ability to work in more group and team settings. In short, virtual environments present distance students with exciting new forums for meeting and sharing their thoughts and ideas in real-time. Today‟s virtual environments like Second Life (SL) provide students with open-ended opportunities for exploration and invention. This has broad reaching implications for faculty, and allows for the delivery of course content in stimulating and highly engaging manners. However, before these virtual environments can be implemented as academic tools, virtual spaces in the form of classrooms and laboratories need to be designed and developed to facilitate student and faculty interaction. This effort describes considerations made when designing some of the early virtual classroom and laboratory spaces developed within a newly established virtual campus. Once these spaces were built, class sessions were conducted and the students were surveyed in order to document their first impressions of the experience. Finally, the survey responses are analyzed and consideration is made for the establishment of design criteria for further virtual site development

Enhancing the Distance Learning Experience: Designing Virtual Classroom and Laboratory Environments

New virtual environments are evolving to a point where academics can visualize the benefits of these more socially interactive distance media. A first step in evaluating these virtual environments is to build virtual classrooms, meeting spaces, and laboratories that look to improve the distance student‟s ability to collaborate and interact. The next step is to identify new ways to interface with existing classroom and lab materials. The goal is to accelerate the process of building out new virtual course offerings and also provide distance-based class platforms for further study and analysis. Finally, evaluating the effectiveness of these newly built virtual classrooms and laboratories is critical to any proposed pedagogical presentation. Current efforts have focused on the building of several classroom and laboratory environments in the Second Life virtual space. Discussion includes efforts to identify, design and develop virtual environments that enhance the learning experience for distance students. Further observations describe the conduct of several other academic events conducted in these newly established virtual spaces including holding office hours, completing lab assignments, giving group presentations, working with student project teams, and conducting class lecture meetings virtually. This paper documents courses of action taken by the authors in the development of virtual classrooms, meeting spaces, and learning labs in the realm of Second Life where students and faculty can conduct effective and meaningful academic activities. Key discussion areas include choosing a virtual environment, virtual classroom and meeting room design considerations; virtual lab and workspace design considerations; preparations for successful initial virtual meetings; and a look toward future virtual design efforts

Compounding the Results: The Integration of Virtual Worlds With the Semantic Web

Over the past 20 years, governmental use of Web-base information and technologies has continually expanded taking advantage of the Web's vast, ever- expanding volumes of browser-accessible information. Now, it infuses two new technologies, the first one espousing a world where semantic-powered applications become knowledgeable assistants for Web users. The second new technology takes a perceivably flat two-dimensional approach to presenting current Web-content and adds a three-dimensional perspective to the presentation. Welcome to the Semantic Web as seen through the eyes of a Virtual World participant, an environment where Web users no longer are browsing for information that is largely static, where Web users interact through their proxies (avatars) query applications (Web agents) soliciting them to collect, filter, verify, correlate and present answers to their queries often in a more visually palatable three-dimensional format. Following a brief overview of these two technologies, this article presents several of the key force drivers behind their evolution and the benefits gleaned from their collective use. Further discussion identifies new methods for visualizing semantic content in virtual worlds. Finally, as with any technological evolution, the merge of these two technologies brings on a whole new set of challenges from a Web userÕs perspective as well as perspectives from technology developers both in academia and government

Incorporating Virtually Immersive Environments as a Collaborative Medium for Virtual Teaming

Virtually immersive environments incorporate the use of various computer modelling and simulation techniques enabling geographically dispersed virtual project teams to interact within an artificially projected three-dimensional space online. This study focused on adoption of virtually immersive technologies as a collaborative media to support virtual teaming of both graduate and undergraduate-level project management students. The data and information from this study has implications for educators using virtually immersive environments in the classroom. In this study, we specifically evaluated two key components in this paper: 1) students' level of trust and; 2) students' willingness to use the technology, along with their belief about the virtual environment's ability to extend and improve knowledge sharing in their team work environment. We learned that while students did find the environment a positive add on for working collaboratively, there were students who were neither more nor less likely to use the technology for future collaborative ventures. Most of the students who were not very positive about the environment were “fence sitters” likely indicating needs related to additional training to improve communication skills. Finally, based on the full study results we have provided basic recommendations designed to support team trust building in the system along with interpersonal trust building to facilitate knowledge transfer and better strategic us of the technology