Ohio State University discusses using virtual worlds like Second Life for real-life education by creating immersive virtual classrooms and learning environments that allow for collaborative and creative learning. While Second Life offers advantages like being immersive, collaborative, and allowing for social networking and creative expression, it also has disadvantages like being difficult to learn, instable, emergent, and having some uncomfortable aspects since it is a proprietary platform. The document recommends resources like mailing lists and wikis for those interested in educational uses of Second Life.

1. Real Life Education in Second Life Ohio State University May 29, 2008

2. Metaverse Roadmap

3. Virtual Worlds A virtual world is a computer-based simulated environment intended for its users to inhabit and interact via avatars.

4. Mirror Worlds Mirror worlds are informationally enhanced virtual models or “reflections” of the physical world.

5. Coming Thing In five years, business versions of online virtual worlds like Second Life will be just as important to commerce as the Web is today. -- Forrester

6. Coming Thing By the end of 2011, 80 percent of active Internet users (and Fortune 500 enterprises) will have a “second life” -- Gartner Group

13. Who’s Doing What?

15. Cooperative Extension SL

16. Discussion