If people are interested in finding out more about the AVALON project, then you can come to one of the events listed below. I’ve also included a quotation from our project proposal to tell you more about the project.
The first event will be held in 2nd Life and will start on Kamimo Island where we will give a short presentation describing what our project is about and what we hope to achieve. Members of the project team will then offer short tours of various places that will have some connection to the project. This meeting will start at 4.30pm CET on Friday 27th Feb. My avatar in 2nd Life is called Gwared Morgwain and I will be online at this time. The SLURL for the event is: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Kamimo%20Island/127/148/25
The 2nd event will be held in Adobe Connect Professional and you will need to go to this url: http://breeze1.manchester.ac.uk/r24988587/. Simply sign in as a guest. We are offering a session in Adobe Connect for those who have yet to get into 2nd Life. This meeting will be on 28th Feb at 3pm (CET) and will be a short briefing on the project.
If you are not able to attend yourselves, you may want to advertise the events to others.
As regards the project itself, this is what was said in the original project proposal:
“It is still very difficult to provide learners with language practice in real environments, it is often too costly and people need to feel confident enough even if they are able to travel. Tandem schemes have proved fruitful, but rely on access to speakers of target languages. The maintenance of motivation is always a problem. Access to digital technologies has become a reality for many more people in recent years and the roll out of broadband has made it possible for many more people to benefit from the high end services that are now online. This project facilitates language learning in virtual 3D worlds offering spaces where genuine communicative acts can take place at a distance. These acts offer an affective experience beyond the classroom, simulating real world activity. They require communication and provide a social network where learners do not necessarily need to be themselves and which is engaging enough to encourage them to return.
Currently, however, immersive environments have some limitations and the following issues are addressed in this project. We will:
• create case studies which will include field-tested communicative scenarios and the guidance on how utilise them;
• provide the necessary skills for language teaching professionals to work in these new online environments through a targeted training course;
• facilitate easier access in cases where there are limited computer resources;
• promote general awareness in mainstream educational contexts of the potential of these environments.
All of the products of the project will be made available in a repository under a Creative Commons Licence and through our dissemination we will build awareness of them amongst a broad community. We will be reaching learners from three different constituencies: community based adult learners; business learners and university students. We will also build the community of teachers who are able to use these tools in a variety of contexts and provide a market place for continued activity through a certificated course.”
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