I am Librarian, I am Avatar
Well, wow! I don’t remember librarians at school looking like these who inhabit Second Life (SL)!
Seriously, even though this is not a video but a Slideshare.com presentation, I was very impressed by it.
Bernadette Daly Swanson, a Librarian at the University of California at Davis, has published an engaging and informative presentation on how academic and public libraries effectively use SL. (Her faculty page.)
Take a look at her presentation….
Confession & Who’s Having Fun Now
When I was in high school, and even through my undergraduate college years, I wanted to be a university librarian. I was young and single, then. People discouraged me from that career choice. They told me the job didn’t pay well, and that librarians didn’t have much fun.
“Who wants to check out an encyclopedia?” they’d say, hinting that I wouldn’t get asked out on dates if I was a Librarian. I didn’t want to be perceived as a walking encyclopedia back then.
Well, from my current vantage point of a non-Web 2.0 and non-elearning 2.0, traditional corporate training department sitting behind a firewall fortress, with regulatory and network security folks constantly on watch….Bernadette and her fellow librarian avatars are having a ton more e-learning 2.0 fun than I am!
Hmmm…but, according to her presentation, the research indicates that all learning professionals will be involved in SL in the near future. I look forward to that day, as long as the learners actually learn. But, I’m not going to wait until I get the official mandate.
It’s Time for SL
It’s time I visit SL despite my full schedule. Why? Bernadette’s presentation has kicked me over the edge out of complacency because, as a Librarian, she’s having way more educational fun than I am in my somewhat traditional, corporate world. (I coulda been a Librarian; look at what I’m missing out on!)
And, like Bernadette, because I believe that SL will be a part of the general training world sooner than the regulators and network security folks might want. The needs of the business and of the learners will require it. As blended learning begins to replace first-generation e-learning, I believe SL will replace Webinars. So, good-bye WebEx, Citrix, Adobe Connect…hello Second Life (or a behind-the-firewall, purchased version)!
That means I need to prepare myself to gain the skills and tools I’ll need to be a virtual-world facilitator.
Besides, we’ll all have nice physiques like the Librarians’ avatars without going to the gym!
Note: I haven’t researched the Librarian career field lately. Just for fun, I went to Flickr.com to try and find a photo of a fuddy-duddy librarian. Ohmygosh how things have changed!
21st Century Librarians on Flickr.com
Sigh. They are having way too much fun. At least I’m “Always Learning”!
Update! Alternatives to Second Life
Look what Karl Kapp has posted on his blog…a list of “behind-the-firewall” virtual world companies! Woo-hoo!
http://karlkapp.blogspot.com/2008/06/alternatives-to-second-life.html
Thanks, Karl! I am also adding you to my Blogroll.
Wow, Another Update!
And, I just found Dr. Tony Karrer’s post on SL videos that show you how others use SL for their learning activities. I can’t wait for the weekend!
http://elearningtech.blogspot.com/2008/06/second-life-learning-videos.html
Tags: academia, e-Learning, learning_tools, second_life, virtual_training