Jun 29 2008
Video: Kidz Connect Saturday performance
This is a live mix recording of our show yesterday in Tampa, Amsterdam and Teen Second Life. We haven’t fixed the audio levels yet — and we will — but in the meantime, enjoy the show.
Archive for the 'Second Life' Category
Jun 27 2008
Talking back
We’re adding a Q&A “talk back” for after the show, allowing audience members to ask questions and try out Second Life by exploring with an avatar. If you watch the live online broadcast or come to the live show in the Patel Conservatory’s TECO Theater at the TBPAC, you’ll get to meet all the creators of the show, including director, choreographers, musicians and performers. Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 if you procrastinate until tomorrow. Or, you can watch online for free at www.kidzconnect.org/shows.
I’ll be sad to see this all end. It’s been a blast getting to watch this whole amazing process develop into an actual show, involving technology and traditional theater. Until next year when hopefully, we’ll meet again. And in Second Life, we can meet anywhere, anytime!
Jun 05 2008
One Week to Go
I have to admit that I’m new to social media. Six months ago, I’d never heard of Second Life, let alone Teen Second Life (TSL). I had no Facebook or MySpace account, would have thought “Twitter” was a type of bird and had never written a blog entry.
So it’s with much delight that I find myself now involved in the fascinating Kidz Connect project, about to embark on a three-week educational frenzy, with an avatar of my own and more accounts and pages than I can reasonably keep track of. Some of the students that the teachers and I will work with will probably already have their own avatars in TSL and be experienced in online communications than I am. I look forward to learning from them. Other teens, we’ll have the joy of introducing to the amazing virtual world of TSL and watching them blossom along with the creation of their avatars.
Personally, I’m most excited about watching the students learn about their counterparts. Since I’m geographically located in Tampa, I’ll see the Floridian teens discover life, culture and youth in Holland and am sure to learn right along with them. Although I did get to travel to Amsterdam, it was before our students were even born! It will also be interesting to see the students here explain about themselves, their community and their country to those abroad.
We have one week to go before classes start and everyone involved with the project is busy finalizing and perfecting lessons plans. But the truth is, I think we all know that planning will only go so far and we’re setting off on an adventure with a group of young people we’ve never met - some of whom we never will meet in person - who will influence us as much as we’ll influence them.
May 27 2008
Questions for Teens
The Kidz Connect teachers are coming up with intriguing ways for the Tampa and Amsterdam teens to intermingle. They’ll be asking and answering questions like, in your community,
*how do people greet each other?
*how do people get from place to place?
*what do you eat/what is your favorite meal?
*what do you wear to school?
*what does your neighborhood look like?
*what does your neighborhood sound like?
Students will answer these questions in writing and also via videography, photography, creating in Teen Second Life, and will incorporate into theater, music and movement. Teens will have time at the end of class to write in their journals about their thoughts and experiences in this cultural exchange.
May 22 2008
Teen Summer Jobs Down
Teen summer employment is the lowest it’s been in 60 years. Many jobs that used to be there for teens simply don’t exist anymore. Participating in Kidz Connect could be a great way for teens to spend some time in June and gain valuable experience in developing in virtual worlds. An interesting article in the Wall Street Journal recently discussed this problem of fewer teen jobs and talked about some teenagers who are earning real money by working in virtual worlds. Read it here: http://tinyurl.com/4wdtdd
May 04 2008
Last class: Shopping, pianos and animations
Today was our last class (awwww!). We have really enjoyed teaching the classes, and it’s looked like everyone has enjoyed them. As well as the four people we were teaching, I think another half dozen people dropped in to see what was happening and now have avatars!
We started today with a bit of retail therapy and a trip to GuRLywood - the biggest and best hair shop in Second Life! 
Unfortunately the grid started to get a bit iffy so we went to Torley Linden’s youtube site and all watched the video on creating your own SL animations. We then attempted to make our own animation, but the version of Qavimator for the Mac is buggy.
We switched to the FreeSound site instead and showed how to download short sound clips and import them into SL. We then made a giant piano with five keys each which all made strange noises. Mine had a trumpet fanfare, a meow, a laugh, a comedy toot toot horn, and an old-fashioned ringing phone.
We had a quick look at editing the land terrain, then Dan and Josephine arrived and we turned to testing streaming and setting up blogging.
[Ed.: Kate's adorable baby Louis dons his kilt for lunch with us]
We were joined by others at lunchtime, Sheri, Ranney (songwriter and comedien), DJ (the hiphop teacher), as well as a vast quantity of food. We then spent the rest of the afternoon discussing the summer program.
Afterwards we helped tidy up, including opening up all the sealed packaging on the headsets, mice and mousemats for the program. We then headed to the Jerk Hut for some jamaican food with Dan and Josephine before they headed off to the airport.
We’ve had a fantastic time teaching this class. I’m really going to miss everyone we’ve been working with, although I’m sure we’ll still meet them online in SL! I’m looking forward to keeping an eye on the Kidz Connect island and seeing what they get up to with the kids there this summer.
May 03 2008
Last day of training
Today is the teachers’ last day of training with our fabulous Second Life experts Katie and Sean Farrell who have come from Scotland to train us. It has been an amazing experience to delve into Second Life and create and experience this new world. Kidz Connect creators Josephine Dorado and Dan Winckler are here from NYC and it’s been inspiring to hear in person how the whole project began and where we are all going with the project!
May 03 2008
7th class: Everyone doing different things!
Dan and Josephine were along this evening, but they’d had a long couple of days of meetings. Rachel wasn’t along as she was graduating, and Sheri was back having been off since the start of last week. We also had a couple of staff along who would be helping with the program. They worked through induction island.
Crystal and Leslie played with making sculpted prims using Plopp SL. Crystal then did some shopping and Leslie worked on setting up the Kidz Connect blog. Sheri tried doing some building and textures.
May 02 2008
Teachers preparing
May 02 2008
6th class: Hide and Seek and Sculptees
On Tuesday we had asked everyone to come to class on Wednesday with a question or something they weren’t sure about and want to cover more.
After writing a list we played a warmup game to practise camera controls, finding a hidden prim then IMing me after seeing the colour on the opposite side of the prim.
We looked at putting photos and links into notecards. We talked about ways to promote events in the teen grid and giving gifts and prizes to other avatars.
During the class Wendy dropped in to say Hi. She brought us a cassette tape of white noise that she made and used to sell to parents of babies with colic. We tried it out as Louis was lying about playing on the floor. It was kinda surreal teaching while there was the sound of a tumble dryer in the background!
For the last section of the class we looked at sculpted prims (or sculptees) using the fruit textures provided free in SL. Leslie made a very funky spinning apple with a picture of her avatar on it.