1) The document describes a project fostering collaboration between first-year writing students and senior English majors through the virtual world Second Life. 2) The project involved multiple layers of collaboration between faculty, instructional designers, and students. Students provided feedback on each other's work and built virtual exhibits related to Edgar Allan Poe. 3) Evaluations found that the collaborative Second Life project enhanced learning and provided positive educational experiences for both students and faculty. It engaged students with the texts and allowed experiential understanding.

1. Fostering Virtual Collaboration Between First-Year Students and Seniors in English Courses2011 Mid-Atlantic Regional ConferenceJanuary 13, 2011 Dr. Mary Balkun Mary Zedeck Seton Hall University

2. Project Overview History Where we were Goal – Spring 2010 Foster collaboration between first-year writing classes and senior seminar students (English majors) Continue to explore potential of Second Life for teaching and learning Result Unanticipated multiple layers of collaboration Interactive virtual learning space: The Poe Crawl

4. The Layers

5. Layers 1 and 2 - Planning Layer 1 - Faculty to ID Dr. Mary Balkun – Senior Seminar Mary Zedeck – Instructional Designer Layer 2 - Faculty to Faculty + ID Dr. Mary Balkun – Senior Seminar (SS) Melinda Papaccio – College English II (CEII) Mary Zedeck – Instructional Designer

6. Layer 3 – Faculty to Students Layer 3a – Faculty to Senior Seminar Students Introduction to and training in SL Organized course to course partnerships Layer 3b – Faculty to College English II Students Overview and demonstration of SL Students write about SL experience and suggestions for SL project build as part of research paper proposal Papers sent to Senior Seminar students for feedback

7. Layer 4 – Students to Students CEII send paper proposals to SS Students SS students peer review of CEII student paper proposals Suggest idea for their research on Poe Comment on student ideas for Poe SL build Send papers back to College EnglishII students

8. Layer 5 – Senior Seminar Senior Seminar SL Project Development Group share of CEII ideas Develop project ideas based on CEII suggestions Students organized into teams based on project interest

9. Layer 6 - Evaluation Layer 6a – Closing the Loop CEII faculty demonstration ofSS class final Poe Crawl build in SL Layer 6b – Assessment Senior Seminar student in-class presentations of SL projects Review CEII evaluation

10. The Poe Crawl SL Poe Projects – Spring 2010 The Black Cat Usher in the Madness Premature Burial Mirroring Alcoholism There Are No Accidents

11. Results All layers of collaboration had positive results Faculty-Instructional Designer Faculty-Faculty Faculty-Students Course-Course (SS and CEII) Student-Student (SS) Real-world audience Enhanced team skills Project-based teaching and learning Broader exposure to SL

12. College English II Evaluation “Regarding the add-ons to the Seven Gableshouse, I like all of the stories and podcasts pertaining to Poe. It makes learning about what would usually be a monotonous subject more of a fun experience.”

13. CEII Evaluation “I think that the Second Life build is great… With your avatar you can tour the Seton Hall Island and learn a lot of things about most early gothic writings. I think that the build helps the reader understand and grasp a clearer idea of the stories they may read. I like the gothic setting as well as the sound effects. The graphics were pretty cool. Overall, I think the students did a great job with this Second Life build. “ “I think that the Second Life build is great… With your avatar you can tour the Seton Hall Island and learn a lot of things about most early gothic writings. I think that the build helps the reader understand and grasp a clearer idea of the stories they may read. I like the gothic setting as well as the sound effects. The graphics were pretty cool. Overall, I think the students did a great job with this Second Life build. “

14. CEII Evaluation “We liked the interactiveness of the graveyard. The atmosphere of the graveyard was put together very well especially with the addition of the changing colors of the fog. We thought that the podcasts were pretty cool but having to click on different links seemed to be a hassle. It takes too much time to go to outside links so we believe they should all be within Second Life. Also, we thought that there was too much reading in the notecards.”

15. Senior Seminar Evaluation Do you believe doing textual analysis through the Second Life project was useful for learning about the text(s)/your topic? Please explain your response. “Yes, Second Life provided a new environment for exposure to the primary text as well as the ability to experience the text in an environment that contributes to the overall effect.”

16. SS Evaluation What preconceived notions about doing a class project did you have prior to class? Have they changed at all and if so, how? “Class projects are generally boring, have an unevenly distributed workload, and generally have no impact after they are handed in. This was a dynamic project that was completed quite fairly, and will be around long after the close of class.”

17. SS Evaluation Other comments: “I believe working within Second Life as we did in Women and Lit in the Spring 2009 helped to learn the way in with SL is meant to be used better than the way in which we used this semester. However, I do understand time constraints. I believe that the 1202 class could have betterplanned their part of Second Life so we could have done the work in a timely manner and could all have been involved in every aspect of the project.”

18. Future Plans – Spring 2011 Repeat SL collaboration between CEII and English majors Different author or theme? Early American Grotesque and CEII To achieve deeper collaboration between students and courses One CEII class instead of three Commence project earlier in the semester CEII students to be actively involved in SL In addition to prior collaboration, SS to peer review CEII research papers and provide feedback in SL

19. Q&A Dr. Mary Balkun mary.balkun@shu.edu Mary Zedeck mary.zedeck@shu.edu Seton Hall Pirate Island – House of 7 SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Seton%20Hall/163/186/30/