Enhancing Research-Teaching Links in Higher Education

Internet and Web 2.0 technologies have contributed significantly to distance learning and completely changed how people interact online, and in turn, the role of the tutor as facilitator is given a new emphasis. According to the theory of Communities of Practice and the model of Situated Learning, learning is largely a social practice rather than something individuals do. With the increasing pressure to deliver learning at a distance, one particular technology, 3D Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs), is being investigated as a means to supplement campus-based learning because 3D VLEs enable a possibility for social engagement which other technologies do not. Research to date about student engagement and learning in 3D VLEs has tended to rely on anecdotal or epithetic evidence. There has been little measurement employed in the initial design of experiments and which have tended to be very technologically focused. Lots of assessments of learning were actually about assessment of technology. Even if there was initial measurement of educational outcomes and there was less technology-focus, experiments might not be scalable to other VLEs. In order to explore the opportunities for social engagement as well as technical engagement in 3D VLEs, this paper will investigate student engagement within virtual learning communities through the exploration of the proposed ideas about narrative and avatars, i.e. narrative creation is an imaginative and cognitive process and essential to student engagement; avatars are the animated agents that connect sociability and interactivity. In 3D VLEs, there is the possibility for community to be re-introduced that other technologies may have stripped out. In addition, the role of the tutor in virtual learning communities is further developed as a co-participant rather than simply a facilitator because in addition to the need for a tutor to provide scaffolding or even intervene in open-ended VLEs (e.g. Second Life) there is also peer negotiated and self-directed learning. A review of literature and directly observed case studies is performed. A model of learning that emphasizes an individual’s role within a socially regulated community will be used to analyse the existing use of virtual environments in order to measure different styles of engagement. As a result, this paper concludes that narrative is the mechanism that binds communities together and that avatars are the mechanism by which a personal narrative is implemented. Joe Wan, Mike Reddy and David Longman