Global Kids' Digital Media Initiative

Hey everyone, it's me again, Nicholas Kit in-world.

Just last week I ran my Second Global Kids Interns event, entitled, Violence in Video Games, and I am glad to say, it went off without a hitch! This event was intended to teach residents of Teen Second Life about how violence in video games really affects you, but it ended up being much more than that, and it was a learning experience to everyone.

The main goal of this event was to teach people about the true affects of violence in video games. With today's media's video game pounding attitude, some people think that if you play a violent video game, you, yourself will be very aggressive, which is not true, and this event taught the true effects of it.

When the event started, many people showed up, which is always a good thing! An overview of the event was given, and then we moved on to human barometer. I tried something new with it, because frankly, I never played Human Barometer before and wasn't too sure how to do it! I asked factual questions (not opinion questions, which is the norm) and we discussed why people chose the answer that they did, to try to sway the people who were not sure. The statements included were things like "Violent video games make everyone aggressive", and "Violent video games are the root of teen violence". (Both having the answer of false).

Then, we moved on to discussion and discussed people's different views of violence in video games and I passed out a fact sheet. The fact sheet included things like "For video games to create a killer, you need a bad home environment, a mental problem, and stimulation like video games or music." We discussed all the new information that I passed out, and then the event was wrapped up.

This was a good learning experience for everyone, including me. We all got to see everybody else's views, and learned about different way video games affect people. Overall, I think this was another success. I can not wait until my next event!

-Nick

-Nicholas Kit :) :) :)

Posted by Nick - TSL Intern at 3:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

;-( I miss GK, it was a lot of fun and now I’m missing out. I can’t wait until we start again. I miss u guys especially, because I can’t do second life on my computer. I also miss having fun on second life.

Posted by VVP Tarana at 12:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ayiti: the Cost of Life was spotlighted on Slate.com in an article written by Justin Peters focusing on his top choices of free games to play online. Not only did we make his list, but he had some great things to say.

Best game with a social conscience: No matter how bad things are going, you could always be a subsistence farmer in Haiti. (To our Haitian subsistence-farming readers: God bless.) Ayiti: The Cost Of Life makes the Oregon Trail look like Candy Land. The game puts you in control of the lives of a Haitian family of five. You have four years to guide the family through a catalog of privations and calamities: hurricanes, robbers, depression, illiteracy, and on-the-job injuries. Ideally, you'll find education, prosperity, and health, but you'll probably just come down with malaria and die.

The article was also picked up by Slashdot on their site! They even made special note of Ayiti.

And when Salon says "Ayiti: The Cost Of Life makes the Oregon Trail look like Candy Land," they mean it -- most games don't need to caution you that "if the whole family is dead, you lose."

Great to see continued recognition of Ayiti. Thanks Slate and Slashdot.

Posted by joyce at 8:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We had a lot of fun today. We were able to work on different computers instead of having to share. We even got more snacks today. We spent a long time on second life which was really fun. I enjoyed the last day at Global Kids for the year. We even went to the back and made some new year’s resolution. But before that we all got paired up with someone and we had to describe a picture for them, that was really fun also. WE HAD A LOT OF FUN FOR THE LAST DAY AT GLOBAL KIDS! T WAS WORTH TO REMEMBER FOR THE NEW YEAR.

Posted by VVP Tarana at 12:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just want to wish everyone here at Global Kids a happy holiday and enjoy your blessings by being with the ones you love.

Posted by VVP Tarana at 12:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Philip Rosedale was asked in an interview last week: What are you most proud of this year?

He responded:

I am most proud of the uses of Second Life in education that have started to happen, because personally I am just really into that. I have a bunch of teachers in my family (and my background is in physics), and I am just really interested in how you can use Second Life to teach science. The things that have started to happen in the latter half of this year around education is just really, really amazing. For me that emerging use is the thing that I am most proud of.

And this is presumably BEFORE Philip learned of our Science Through Second Life High School class. I can't wait to learn what he thinks of that.

Posted by Barry at 5:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

All positions posted on October 20th have now been filled.

As you might recall, we decided to take a rather unusual approach. We were not sure how many people we needed to hire, nor the right combination of skills. So rather than take a guess and issue a few tightly-constructed job descriptions, we approached the hiring process as one of those old Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books which allowed applicants to tell us what their strengths were and how they could best meet our diverse needs.

Some applicants left their interviews interested in a different position, or a different combination of half-time positions, than when they had first applied. GK's understanding of each position and how they could be combined into one set of hires changed for us as well throughout the process.

It was certainly resource intensive to interview for what turned out to be more than a dozen unique job descriptions, but in the end we arrived at a strong combination of new staff and consultants arranged in a combination we could never have predicted in advance.

The two new full-time staff positions at the GK office are:

Just dropping in to say Merry Christmas to everyone and best wishes to all.

Posted by VVP Thein at 9:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last week while I was in the global kids program we went on second life again and we were making our very own movie. I haven't really gotten the chance to blog because I had no access to the internet on my home computer. Making our own movie was fun and interesting because I have never made a movie with second life. Now I know how. Merry Christmas and a happy new year!!!

Posted by VVP Justin at 4:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In our last week before the new year, Playing 4 Keeps had three major milestones: we chose our issue for the game, the students wrote their first blog entries, and we began experimenting with digital media creation. First, on Monday Barry came out to help resolve a schism in the group: the students were evenly divided between two issues for our game. Half the group wanted to do Hurricane Katrina, and half wanted to focus on the various issues of war and the military that President Eisenhower termed “the military-industrial complex.” While no one knew that term, many students could described its features: excessive spending on increasingly destructive weapons, underfunding social services to fund the military, and starting expensive, devastating, unnecessary wars.

Both issues are important and current and the students had strong, passionate arguments. Barry was able to stress that P4K is a team, however, and the point of our decision making process is to create consensus, not have one side beat the other. As a compromise, we have decided to make a game about “The effect of the military-industrial complex on the Hurricane Katrina Disaster.” Yes, it sounds like a masters thesis, and no, that doesn’t scare us. By focusing on one aspect of Hurricane Katrina, we’ll be able to drill down and make a very specific game, but also one that connects a local (and national) issue to global issues. I think the topic will work very well for our game, and from the preliminary research I’ve done, there’s so much information on this topic we’ll have to be judicious about what we include.

After choosing the topic, our kids went to the computers and started blogging for their first time. While some of the students took a little time to warm up to the technical details of blogging, and not everyone was ecstatic about an activity that seemed suspiciously like school work, others dove into the task. Some of the entries are rich with character and detail, and do a better job of describing the workshop than I’ve done in this entry. We’re definitely going to make blogging a regular part of P4K so the students have a chance to express themselves online and polish their writing skills.

On Thursday we discussed the different roles within a game design team and role-played the workflow of a game company. It was the students’ first chance to think about all the different jobs within a game lab, and what roles they might want to play in our project. The highlight of the day, however, was introducing Scratch. Scratch is a program designed by MIT that allows users to create digital media projects without writing any code. Instead, instructions such as turn left, stop, and loop are embedded in virtual puzzle pieces that can be snapped together. The blocks of instructions then control images users place on a stage allowing the creation of games, movies, and art.

The class loved the software and I was amazed at how quickly they picked it up. Within a few minutes they were making all different types of projects. Some were animating, others made music, and other students used the program like Adobe Illustrator to create elaborate scenes. I had planned to only work with the program for a half hour, but seeing how much fun everyone was having, it just seemed criminal to pull them off. For forty-five minutes we had art class, pure and relaxing. It was a good way to finish the year: our issue decided, our writing muscles exercised, and our creative juices flowing. Now the real fun begins.

Posted by Jay at 5:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday was so fun! We are becoming Second Life directors. Little Stephen Spielberg in our own way. My avatar was doing a music video though, lol. I caught her on Snapz Pro dancing. She looked so cute, lol. I sense a little star becoming! One of my fellow Global kids wanted her for their video so they filmed her too. It was cute. We also learned how to change camera angles and how to focus on other things rather then ourselves. Over all Global kids went well with a bang, leaving us wanting more. Happy Holidays guys, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and whatever you celebrate I hope it’s a good one. Oh Oh Oh before I forget, Tarana and I talked to Barry, we had a very interesting conversation about holidays around Christmas time that are not Christmas. Happy holidays, Write to ya in 08!

Posted by VVP Vanessa at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well Tuesday in VVP we did a Scavenger Hunt in Teen Second Life! I remember doing the hunt last year in the beginning as well, it was fun doing it. It was also great to see everyone this year, trying it. I think many people this year found the hunt fairly easy to do, and so many of them easily figured out how to do little things in Second Life. It's amazing to see how quickly some people are learning. I think we were all had fun making friends with new Teen Second Life residents, and finding cool places to go to. The only problem I had in my group was that, Second Life was running a little slow and I crashed at a point. But besides that, the scavenger hunt was really fun to do and working with the other VVP teens is always great. It's great seeing how much progress they have made, and I can't wait until we start filming...which we will hopefully start soon for the sake of time.

Posted by Nafiza - TSL Intern/VVP at 1:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Global Kids has taught me new things, especially in Second Life. Every Tuesdays and Thursdays I always look forward to going to GK. I am always excited as to what we will do today. GK is a good place to build on not only your life skills but your Virtual life as well. GK is my verb. It’s what I do.

Posted by VVP Tarana at 9:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today on second life we took turn on the computer because we were doing a scavenger hunt. It was a lot of fun finding things and making a lot of new friends outside of Global Kids.

Posted by VVP Tarana at 9:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On Thursday we used the computers in groups. We were having a really fun time in second life.

Posted by VVP Tarana at 9:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We went over some of the basic skills. These skills involved flying, walking, adding friends, etc. Afterwards, we put these skills to work by doing a hunt. There were a few tasks involved in this hunt that we had to perform. It was pretty cool because it involved a lot of teleporting, (which I managed to do for the first time) adding new friends throughout the island and visiting new places that were amazing. I also learned that lived a lot of bats live inside the volcano. Overall, it was a great experience and I cannot wait until next time.

Posted by VVP Jonathan at 9:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today we used second life again. This time we had to participate in a scavenger hunt. Let me tell you it was not easy. I probably completed only 2 of the 9 tasks. I didn't realize we could leave the island. Anyway when I did go off the island I went to Eden. It was full of different characters with different outfits. By going to the island I learned about linden and learning how to decorate the island. You can also participate in giveaways where you get money. You put on this code they give you and wait. Anyway the two tasks I completed was finding the animal that was at the bottom of the volcano and writing a notecard in time.

Posted by VVP Natalie at 4:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 18th marked the beginning of our virtual selection panels for social entrepreneurial teams on the Dream It. Do It. Island in TSL.

The first team to present, "Beat Bullying", comprised of three exceptionally talented young people committed to benefiting their local and virtual communities on issues related to cyber bullying.

The young presenters were well prepared for the panel using slides to present their main ideas and answered the panel's many questions with great candor and humor.

Global Kids would like to extend a warm thank you to our panelists for volunteering their time and a congratulations to "Beat Bullying" on meeting this great milestone.

View the machinima from this Selection Panel!

Posted by Amira at 12:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For our first Fireside Workshop of December, we focused in on the issue of nuclear proliferation and what it means vis-a-vis international politics and multilateral treaties like the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

We started off first by playing a game that illustrated the flaws in an international system that is not transparent in regards to nuclear weapons, and then went on to break into teams, each of which received a different real life nuclear scenario which laid out the time lines and issues related to situations actually occurring right now in the world. Each team was then given time to come up with policy recommendations about how they believed their nuclear scenario should be dealt with.

I have to say, I'm regularly impressed by TSL residents, and this particular case was no exception. The teams came up with some really impressive proposals for approaches to challenging situations involving nuclear weapons programs in Iran, India and Israel. Check them out below. While obviously these situations are all enormously complex, I felt that the overall thread of transparency and compromise that went through a number of the recommendations are solid values to have underpinning ones outlook on international affairs. Awesome work!

Israel:
As representatives for the panel of presidential policy advisers, we believe it is ethically important to continue to support Israel and keep them as an ally to our government. While continuing to support Israel, we also recognize the importance of having Israel sign the NPT agreement so other governments will have a better understanding of Israel's nuclear program rather than being in the dark about their plans. It is important to support Israel in a comprehensive peace plan to attempt to create peace between Israel and some of this neighbors, including: Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia.

Iran:
Push For economical sanctions against Iran.

We chose this because an attack could have dire consequences, and diplomatic negotiation could scare Iran. If we chose to attack, and they had a secret nuke facility somewhere, they could choose to attack us back, and we do not want to start a nuclear war because.... uh... that would be bad....... If we chose the diplomatic route, Iran could get scared thinking that it could possible be a diversion, or that we had a back-up attack plan, so they attack us.

India:
We need to push the country of India to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) because they need to be held to the rule set by the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency. They will have to submit to inspections by the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency so that their weapons status will be available to the world and stop Pakistan from thinking that they have to develop more nuclear weapons and finally firing them at India. Having India sign the NPT will also keep them from helping non-nuclear states attain nuclear status. The only con that I can think of would be that the Indian people may resent having to submit to the inspections and having their weapons status open to the world.

Posted by Rafi at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As usual it was fun at Global Kids. Everytime I attend a workshop, I learn something exciting. It feels really good learning something new. I also tried to log on from my home but my PC wasn't working properly.

Posted by VVP Sabina at 10:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was on second life trying to customize my avatar. I learned a few things about my avatar that I learn to wear items i built. I was amazed on the possibilities you could do.

Posted by VVP Juan at 8:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today everyone was in second life doing a little hunt. So we had to do to finish the list now who ever is finished with it wins a... (are you ready..) Christmas HAT !!! lol
I actually like the hat, I think it will look nice me lol

Posted by VVP Juan at 8:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well last Thursday everyone learned how to make a billboard in Second Life! It was great seeing everyone gather the picture that they found last time and then upload it into Second Life and then use it on a prim to make a poster/billboard! I think this is the first experience many of them had building in SL, so it was interesting. I think they enjoyed it too!

After making the billboard, we went into Second Life and took a picture of our avatars next to the billboard. Overall, we did not face that many technical difficulties, we had some...but it was not horrible. We also a guest, Erin, who was sitting in to observe our work. It was great to see her take notes. She also asked me an interesting question about whether or not I considered the copyright on the images before uploading it into TSL.

I hadn't, and even Barry admitted that he hadn't either; it was interesting because that's the first thing I take into consideration when I am putting something up on my website, but I didn't even think of it when it came to TSL. I can't really figure out why, but when I upload something into TSL sometimes I feel like it's as simple as saving it onto my desktop. Maybe that's why? I'm not sure, but I am curious to learn what others think about this! But overall, it was great having her there and it was also great that everyone got a chance to learn how to make billboards!

Posted by Nafiza - TSL Intern/VVP at 1:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

P4K is not what I expected it to be. At 1st i didn't know that it had to deal with global issues but now i understand. For example when we did all the games that we did it was not just fun but also educational as well, and although i didn't know what some issues were I learned eventually. Today was one of the most important days. We had to pick the subject that the game is going to be about which by the way was Hurricane Katrina and the war in Iraq. Many kids had ideas and me also and I also cant wait till we finish and hope that our game that we will work hard on will be played on X-box live which is all i have to say. Well I really hope that it's a game that people will play very often and also educates people and learned about the problems and try to make our world a safe environment to live in. THE END.

Posted by p4kJose at 4:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Basically what I was thinking was that since we were doing a topic of Hurricane Katrina and the War, I thought of a little scenario like this: Hurricane Katrina has hit New Orleans in Louisiana, and there is a big war in Israel because of the bombing in Lebanon (which the Americans got themselves involved in giving weapons to them and bombs to Israel). Little did America know that there were hidden files in Louisiana that got washed up along with the Hurricane. That's all I wrote for now but there will be optional info on my idea if people and my group decide to go along with it.

Posted by p4kCourtney at 4:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I know we're going to be doing a long term project so one thing I just want to get across to my fellow teammates as well as Global Kids as to what program we are going to be using to create the game, whether it is: Flash, C++, or C#?

Posted by p4kCourtney at 4:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I must admit that i wasn't paying attention to most of the discussions and peace talks that took place due to my unfortunate and constant lack of sleep, as well as the thought of $10 disappearing from my wallet as of 5th period this afternoon... (sometimes, it sucks to be me). Moving forward, we did an original activity planned by Global Kids in which the participants were asked/instructed to grab the hands of the person that was two people away...or somewhat. After the enjoyment and delight of being tangled up within human arms and human sweat, we were then instructed to figure out ways in which we must "untangle" ourselves to form a perfect or "disconfigured" circle. Sounds fun, doesn't it? (Laughing sarcastically).
Next, we journeyed over to the digital point of view where the P4K gang and mediators participated in a viewing of a music video entitled "The Saints are Coming" with appearances by a personal frat party and performances by Green Day with vocal assistance from U2. (Nothing like a music Video to scare you to death or worse :)). Included in the viewing was a question sheet that was based on the events, (and lyrics), in the video. Afterwards, we once again discussed or voted on what we wanted our game to be based on, (WAR or Hurricane Katrina.....which is where my uncanny drowsiness got the best of me, so i lost track on what was voted on, [dear god, i hope it's war]). Anywho, here we are at the computers making a brand new post for our personal accounts and all that good stuff.

Did you learn anything, yet?
Hope so!
-Otis-

Posted by p4kOtis at 4:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Playing 4 keeps teaches us about all the things we forget in the world. This shows us how lucky we are to be living in New York. This is a club for the people who desire to shout their feelings out to the world. Today in the Club we spoke about war and hurricane Katrina. We spoke about how they both affect each other. We watched a video name ''The Saints Are Coming'' and this tells us about what could have happened if the war wasn't going on right now. They could save the people from the damage of hurricane Katrina. There could be helicopters delivering food for people and trying to seal up the dam. Money matters at this point because of the disasters that happen now.

Posted by p4kMoniqueF at 4:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For 17 sessions now Global Kids has been working on a new game that we going to create. Today, we finally found a topic to create the game about. Everybody was happy that we came up with a great topic. Now, we just have to do some reseach on the topic. The topic is about war and katrina.

So, the question is: what is the american decision....should we fight in iraq or save the nation from flooding.

Posted by p4kReginald at 4:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'm thinking about a game where each level has two missions, one were U.S. troops are helping you, then a harder one where you are alone ( in both missions you must do the same thing). The mission where troops help represents what could have happened if the war would have been over, and the harder one were you're alone will represent what really happened.

Posted by p4kDanielP at 4:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hurricane Katrina was one of the strongest storms to impact the coast of the United States during the last 100 years. With sustained winds during landfall of 125 mph (a strong category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale) and minimum central pressure the third lowest on record at landfall (920 mb), Katrina caused widespread devastation along the central Gulf Coast states of the US. Cities such as New Orleans, LA, Mobile, AL, and Gulfport, MS bore the brunt of Katrina's force and will need weeks and months of recovery efforts to restore normality. I found this information on the website of the NOAA Satellite and Information Service.

Posted by p4kJean at 4:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today we ''supposedly'' decided on a topic in which we decided on to merge the two topics our game was going to be about out topics were War and hurricane Katrina.It took two days(and alot of fustration and debate ) but we came to a compromise. I wanted to do a game on the counter intillegence program but from my blog we know how that went well hopefully this won't be total drag but on the other hand with a group I have to work with it would seem that way.

Posted by P4KDevante at 4:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In p4k we design video games and use them to help us to see problems that are happening in the world today. The game that we have decide on making is a mixture of two world issues. These games will be on the war in Iraq and about the Hurricane Katrina. We are not sure yet on how we are going to do it but we will find out how to make a good game.

Posted by p4kAndrew at 4:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last week was a challenging and exciting one for Playing 4 Keeps. On Tuesday, we came to Canarsie ready to start researching possible topics for our game. Instead, we were told the school was having a “rapid dismissal” and all after school programs were cancelled. There was a meeting after school where teachers were to be told the bad news before the Board of Ed went public: Canarsie is being phased out. Next fall, Canarsie will stop accepting freshmen and it will graduate its last class in 2011. Over then next few years, vacancies will be filled by three of even four new, smaller charter schools.

Some of the staff was outraged, and as I sat with my fellow GK trainers, we braced for the coming battle to keep up student morale. I’ve never been through this process before, but from what I’ve been told, it’s a struggle to keep students excited about education and stop them from feeling like the school system is casting them aside. We have a strong group at P4K, but we’re going to have to work extra hard to help everyone stay focused on the road ahead. The DoE’s decision has nothing to do with the quality of Canarsie’s faculty or students, and it’s our job to make sure the students realize this. Changes our hard, but learning to adapt to them is a vital part of growing up. I’m sure our students have the maturity to handle this transition.

Thursday, after some discussion of Monday’s announcement, we got down to business. We’re looking to have our game’s issue established before winter break, and that’s fast approaching. We started the workshop by watching some short videos on topics the class had shown interest in. First, we saw an excerpt of a documentary on the Black Panther Party that focused on the pivotal role of women, the BPP’s school breakfast and health clinics, and the FBI’s COINTELPRO program which was designed to infiltrate and destroy the party. Next, the students learned about Abu Ghraib and the use of torture in the War on Terror. Finally, we watched part of Spike Lee’s documentary “When the Levee’s Broke.” We had the students break up into small groups and use the information from the videos as well as other topics we’d discussed over the year as a starting point to think about what issue our game should be about. They were encouraged to pick one of the issues from a list, or decide on their own issue and develop persuasive arguments for why their issue should be picked.

When we came back together as a group to pick our topic, I was amazed by how passionately our students argued for their causes. They really cared about the issues they’d chosen and they were determined to make their fellow students understand why the issue was worth caring about. Two students felt COINTELPRO was most important. One argued that there can be no justice in a society where the people enforcing the laws cannot be trusted. I saw a flash of young Huey Newton and my face hurt from smiling so hard. Gay rights and the death penalty were two other topics proposed, but after the first round of voting, Hurricane Katrina and War were the two issues on top.

War is, obviously, an enormous topic, but the specific facets described were massive military spending, increasingly destructive weaponry, and privatization. I told them those issues are collectively known as “the military-industrial complex.“ When we voted on these issues, however, with precious few minutes left in the afternoon, the vote tied 7-7. The debate raged even more passionately after the vote, and the decision couldn’t be made in the time left. Monday afternoon, however, we’ll have this done and be ready to start planning the game.

Posted by Jay at 9:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Totally Wired: How Technology is Changing Kids and Learning public forum, featured panelists Henry Jenkins, Katie Salen & Howard Gardner, was held Wednesday, December 12, 2007, 5:30-7:00 pm EST, at the Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle Street, Cambridge, MA 02138.

Hosted by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to celebrate the publication of the MacArthur Series on Digital Media and Learning. The panel was introduced by Jonathan Fanton, MacArthur President, and moderated by Connie Yowell, MacArthur's Director of Education.

This event was streamed live into the virtual world of Second Life on the main grid at the University of Southern California's Annenberg sim and within the teen grid on the Global Kids island. Below you can watch the video from the live event (we apologize in advance for a few microphone glitches):

Click To Play

Listen to the podcast

In addition, we compiled a half-hour collection of videos made of the presentations as viewed in both the teen and adult grids of Second Life:

Click To Play

To download the original video files, to mash-up with appropriate credit of course, go to our blip.tv collection.

View all photos posted with the mac121207 tag.

Read the abridged transcript from the teens who were watching on the Global Kids Estate. While watching the stream they discussed the topics as they were raised, such as:
- Web sites blocked at schools
- The concept of being a digital native
- The relevance of testing

"Experts Praise Classroom Media," Harvard Crimson, MA
"How they'll learn," Boston Globe
Coverage of the event on a German education blog

Posted by joyce at 6:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yesterday in our workshop there was a guest doing research, she seemed excited to join us and learn about Second Life. I got to work with Nafiza, a vet of the whole GK thing. I think Nafiza is the official Global Kids Celebrity. If you look at the website there are picture of her everywhere, lol. Plus she is like a Second Life pro. She taught me about groups and how there are Second Life designers who make clothes, and you can buy them or join and a group and get great clothes for free. There were other islands and great graphic art all round. So yeah Nafiza is the Official Global Kid Celebrity of the Virtual Video Project. Hope she doesn’t mind me shouting her out! lol

Posted by VVP Vanessa at 12:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This part of the year is always so exciting, when a new group of students first come in to Second Life.

This week the Virtual Video Project's youth leaders came into Second Life for their third time, learning how to import images from the web to make billboards about peace and justice.

Here they are hard at work:

Posted by Barry at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just got back from the Totally Wired conference in Boston and I was amazed to see so many people were interested on how digital media is providing new learning venues for youth. The theater, where the conference was held, was packed and the public was very much interested in knowing the link to our live video stream so that others could also enjoy the conference. The whole experience really made me realize how important the OLP department is to Global Kids and our youth. I really think we are doing some groundbreaking digital media work and we are ahead of many organizations that are simply providing classroom learning environment for students. Attending this conference reminded me how important it is for OLP to continue to use digital media as a learning tool for our youth.

Posted by Kathy at 10:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A recent nationally circulated Associated Press article online, written by AP writer Colleen Long, announces the new research lab at the Parsons design school which will be focusing on developing and studying serious games and their scope for social good.

PETLab, the first such lab in the country, will work on creating models of new types of games or interactive designs that address social issues and will do interactive research on whether playing the games helps effect positive social change.

Global Kids hopes to partner with PETLab on some of our projects this upcoming year (stay tuned for more on that). We also were overjoyed to be cited as a good example of what is possible in the field of serious games.

Lab researchers hope to create more games like the popular "Ayiti: The Cost of Life," developed by the nonprofit Global Kids and tech company GameLab, in which players manage a rural family of five in Haiti. The aim of the game is to keep the family healthy, and players make decisions on whether to save money or spend it on a party or at the store, and the family benefits or suffers based on the decisions.

You can read the full article here.

Posted by joyce at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today as always we learned something new. We learned how to make a billboard in SL. To make one you have to first of all have a saved picture. Go to upload image, which will cost you 10 lindens in SL. Once you have your picture, click on build and from there you edit. Apart from the billboard we also made a ball. We took snapshots of ourselves sitting on our billboard. Today was a fun day mostly because it went smooth.

Posted by VVP Natalie at 7:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Totally Wired: How Technology is Changing Kids and Learning public forum featured panelists Henry Jenkins, Katie Salen & Howard Gardner, was held Wednesday, December 12, 2007, 5:30-7:00 pm EST, at the Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle Street, Cambridge, MA 02138.

Below is the abridged transcript from the teens who were watching on the Global Kids Estate. While watching the stream they discussed the topics as they were raised, such as:
- Web sites blocked at schools
- The concept of being a digital native
- The relevance of testing

Rafi Gkid: Have a seat guys, it's about to start!
Mk5793 Zeluco: lol....the seats still aren't scripted...
kevin Oto: they wont work
Rafi Gkid: Just need to click it from the right angle. : )
Cage Babii: what we doing
Rafi Gkid: Just hit play on your movie tab and you should be abl e t o see the st ream.
Mk5793 Zeluco: rafi...what's up with the pics to the right of the scre en? XD
Rafi Gkid: Those are the presenters tonight.
Rafi Gkid: Just hit your video tab to get the stream going.
kevin Oto: will be on youtube 2
Meghan GKid: Read the Green sign, also, for more info :)
Rafi Gkid: Welcome Mike, Kronos.
Rafi Gkid: We're watching a live panel from MIT with Henry Jenki ns, amon g ot her people.
Mk5793 Zeluco wants to see leroy jenkins XD
Mk5793 Zeluco: lol they're 2 mins late so far >.>
Rafi Gkid: It should start in just a couple of minutes.
Mike Denneny: Where is this taking place
Rafi Gkid: At MIT, which is in Cambridge Mass.
Mk5793 Zeluco: lol, noones waved at the camera so far >.>
Mk5793 Zeluco: *jeopardy song plays*
Mike Denneny: I could state several things that secondlife ha s cha nged ab out my life.
Mk5793 Zeluco: yay vidz!
Mk5793 Zeluco: omg thats SL!
Rafi Gkid: lol, yup, that was GK island
Rafi Gkid: Are you guys doing ok with loading? Can you hear it a lri ght?
Mk5793 Zeluco: I see it
kevin Oto: it see it
kevin Oto: and i hear it
Rafi Gkid: w00t sl!
Mk5793 Zeluco: w00t! SL 4 life!
Rafi Gkid: yay shout out.
kevin Oto: but not loud
Second Life: Your region will restart in 5 minutes and 0 s eco nds f or m ain tenance.
kevin Oto: omg
Mk5793 Zeluco: oh fun -_-

Second Life: Your region will restart in 1 minutes and 0 s eco nds f or m ain tenance.
kevin Oto: 1min
Mk5793 Zeluco: going down with the ship rafi?
Second Life: Your region will restart in 0 minutes and 30 sec onds for mai ntenance.
Rafi Gkid: i guess so... i tried, we'll be back up in a couple
Rafi Gkid: yup, you can watch on the web.

Rafi Gkid: do you guys have the video working?
kevin Oto: yap and yap and yap
kevin Oto: is he going to show any thijng
kevin Oto: he keeps talking
kevin Oto: why did i just foze
Rafi Gkid: well the panelists are going to get up there soon
kevin Oto: will they show second life on this
kevin Oto: or online sites
kevin Oto: or just talk
Rafi Gkid: not sure
Mk5793 Zeluco: lol they already have >.>
Rafi Gkid: you might try listening to what he's saying though. : )
Rafi Gkid: Katie wrote one of the best books on game design, if tha t's s omet hin g ya'll are interested in.
Echolon Syaka: so what they talking about
Echolon Syaka: like doing
Rafi Gkid: The book is called "Rules of Play"
Rafi Gkid: it's amazing
kevin Oto: were is it at
Navaro Bao looks it up
Mk5793 Zeluco: lol....book.... that word is almost archaic
Navaro Bao: Heh.
Rafi Gkid: Still important folks
Rafi Gkid: Howard Gardner is a HUGE guy in the field of psycholo gy
Navaro Bao: http://books.google.com/books?id=UM-xyczrZuQC& dq= rules +of+ pla y&pg=PP1&ots=2xLJxR5DZo&sig=H5V7y5mQhrlxsUjWBr1abCNhFPM&prev=http://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=s&hl=en&q=rules+of+play&btnG=Google+Search&sa=X&oi=print&ct=title&cad=one-book-with-thumbnail
Rafi Gkid: he originated the idea of multiple intelligences
Navaro Bao: Thats the book link I think, heh.
Navaro Bao: Hooray for Feedback!
Echolon Syaka: embarising
Mk5793 Zeluco: gor that right XD
Mk5793 Zeluco: yes...static the evilness up XD
Navaro Bao: And then it started to Rain
Rafi Gkid: eep!
Mk5793 Zeluco: no one shall hear >:)
Echolon Syaka: what was that
Navaro Bao: She turned off her static machine.
Echolon Syaka: oh my gosh
Echolon Syaka: get better sound systems
Echolon Syaka: xD
Navaro Bao: "Allright, who's playing with Tinfoil?"
Mk5793 Zeluco: XD
Navaro Bao: It's good enough, we're used to things not wor kin g per fect all y. We do play secondlife afterall :P
Rafi Gkid: I'm being told that this is a really old theater with an old soun d s ystem,
Rafi Gkid: Do you guys feel empowered?
Mk5793 Zeluco: not atm
Mk5793 Zeluco: unless feeling empowered is what I think is fe eling bor ed. ..in which case, I must be really empowered >.>
Navaro Bao: Lol
Echolon Syaka: this is teh worst feedback ive ever heard i n m y wjo le l ife
Echolon Syaka: xD
Echolon Syaka: and he thinks talking louder is gunna make it so u can he ar him better
Echolon Syaka: but it just increases the feedback

Rafi Gkid: Welcome Ryan!
Ryan Dayton: thank you
Mk5793 Zeluco: lol...maybe we can have chewbacca translate fo r him ...
Rafi Gkid: How many of you have filters on computers at your sch ool s?
kevin Oto: we do
Ryan Dayton: I do
Echolon Syaka: me
kevin Oto: but we got to prozy sites
Ryan Dayton: sidewalksoup.com
Ryan Dayton: :D
kevin Oto: what that sidewalk site
Rafi Gkid: do all of you know how to use proxies to get around t he filte rs?
kevin Oto: yea
kevin Oto: i do
Ryan Dayton: Yep
Navaro Bao: I've got filters and use proxies :P
kevin Oto: second life was on the block
Mk5793 Zeluco: <3 proxy servers :D
kevin Oto: at school
Rafi Gkid: yay sl!
Navaro Bao: I use SL at school :P
Ryan Dayton: My school blocked my website for some reason
kevin Oto: WHy
Rafi Gkid: well duh, what with your anarchistc view and all.
Rafi Gkid: : D
kevin Oto: a techer said he was going to block my site
kevin Oto: becuse i was just on it all the time
Rafi Gkid: I love the way Henry talks about Harry Potter as a te en that cha