The Virtual Language Resource project VWBPE This is a brilliant informal learning area packed with resources for French language students. This is an area for students to interact and find tools that will be meaningful for them. Magazines that are kept up to date, links to in-world and 2D sites. Student says it would be great to get more French learners to talk with – other language learners don't have a resource like this. Visit EduNation (28, 129, 25)

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Experimenting with rich media options of new SL viewer This clever avvie is looking at broadcasting his web cam into SL from a prim on his head… Visit EduNation (16, 124, 24)

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Join me this weekend at the Virtual Worlds Best Practice in Education conference – where more than 5,000 avatars from around the world will be attending some 190 plus events over the 44 hours starting in just under 5 hours or so (1AM US PST )

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This came to mind because last weekend my sister in law was talking about her search for a primary school for my oldest nephew. She expressed frustration at the school web sites for supplying mostly high-level vision statements rather than sharing how they set out to achieve those visions.

In researching some schools for her, one promise they all made was to partner with parents so that the education of each child was a parternship between the school, parent and child.

I know this is pretty typical, so I asked my sister over in New Hampshire, USA, if she could scan and send a copy of my niece’s (a senior in highschool) report card. I went to school in the States and as I wanted to track the evolution of the report card along one system, thought that made the most sense. Sis’ did one better and gave me the log in for her daughter’s school’s web site area for parents and guardians.

I couldn’t wait to see what would be there. Insightful notes from teachers would surely have to be there – how could my sister be a partner in her child’s education without communication from/with teachers? Perhaps examples of work good or bad so that she could see what her daughter has turned in? Perhaps a graph showing her improvement over time (or lack thereof) in critical skills?

What I found was the same information that used to be on my white cardboard report card in the manilla envelope in the 70s and 80s: letters and numbers. True there was also data on her attendance (really handy for checking up on kids who fib like a friend of hers apparently), but nothing else. No comments at all. I at least would get some database-ready stuff like “Could work harder” or “Pleasure to have in class”

So, letters and numbers. Links to the teacher’s email accounts. A history of her past grades that didn’t seem to go back too far. Course names that didn’t link to descriptions or learning outcomes. One course was “Advanced Health”. I asked my sister what that entailed – home surgery? Resurrection perhaps? She told me to ask my niece – she had NO idea.

So, if parents/guardians/involved adults are going to be partners in a child’s education – shouldn’t they get more information than letters and numbers?

PHOTO CREDIT: “Mark’s First Report Card” by laszlodemo, published to Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/11618809@N03/ CC (by) http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

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As far as collaborative documents go, I was able to get to the menu of my Google Documents but wasn’t able to open a document. I could see the Loading message happen at the top of the page, but no dice. I had better luck with using Etherpad.  I mapped an Etherpad URL to a prim in Second Life and was able to chat to people using EtherPad from within Second Life and was able to co-author a document with them.  Those not using the new browser will only see a grey prim – and I noticed that prims with videos that work in the old browser didn’t work for me.

Posted via email from kerryj’s neotenous posterous